I thought Iraqis would kill me, says freed POW

One of the seven US prisoners of war found safe and well said he was convinced his Iraqi captors were going to kill him.

“I thought they were going to kill me,” Pfc Patrick Miller, 23, of Park City, Kansas, told two reporters who interviewed the seven PoWs on a transport plane to Kuwait.

“That was the first thing I asked when they captured me: ‘Are you going to kill me?’ They said, ‘No’. ... I still didn’t believe them.”

The seven were released in relatively good condition south of Tikrit, after more than three weeks in captivity.

Freedom brought hugs, applause and slaps on the back from smiling Marines before the seven were flown to Kuwait for a medical check-up and debriefing. Back home, their families and friends burst out in jubilation.

Five of those returned yesterday were members of the 507th Ordnance Maintenance Company that made a wrong turn near the southern Iraqi city of Nasiriyah and was ambushed on March 23 – the same incident in which rescued PoW Pfc Jessica Lynch was captured.

The other released prisoners were crewmen of an Apache helicopter downed the next day.

“It’s just a good way to start off the morning, to have been notified that seven of our fellow Americans are going to be home here pretty soon in the arms of their loved ones,” US president George Bush said in Washington.

Among the former PoWs was Shoshana Johnson, 30, of Fort Bliss, Texas, a single mother of a two-year-old. Johnson, the only woman among them, had been shot in the ankle, and Spc Edgar Hernandez, 21, of Mission, Texas, had been shot in the elbow, according to Marines who flew them to safety.

The others appeared to be unharmed. They said they were treated roughly when captured, but given medical care.

Shortly after their capture, the seven had been shown on Iraq’s state-run television, giving a human face to the peril confronting American troops. Nine others of the 507th convoy were killed.

The Americans freed yesterday were picked up wearing bedraggled clothing - blue-and-white pyjamas, khakis or shorts.

All seven were released after a medical assessment in Kuwait, said Lt Col Ruth Lee, chief nurse at the facility where they were examined. “Their condition is good. I saw nothing that looked abnormal,” Lee said.

Lt Col Larry Cox, a military spokesman, said the seven would be debriefed in Kuwait, then decisions would be made on a “case-by-case basis” on sending them elsewhere.

Besides Johnson, Hernandez and Miller, the others from the 507th were Sgt James Riley, 31, Pennsauken, New Jersey and Army Spc Joseph Hudson, 23, Alamogordo, New Mexico.

The other PoWs were Chief Warrant Officer Ronald Young Jr, 26, and Chief Warrant Officer David Williams, 30, of Orlando, Florida.

Back home, in Lithia Springs, Georgia, Young’s father watched shaky video footage of the soldiers on CNN. “It’s him, and I’m just so happy that I could kiss the world!” said Ronald Young Sr. “It’s him! It’s definitely him.”

There were conflicting reports on how the Americans were recovered.

Capt David Romley said US Marines marching north towards Tikrit were met by Iraqi soldiers north of Samarra. He said the Iraqis approached the 3rd Light Armoured Reconnaissance Company and had the seven PoWs with them.

Another spokesman for the 1st Marine Expeditionary Force, Capt Neil Murphy, said the Iraqis who brought the Americans had been abandoned by their officers and, ”realising that it was the right thing to do, they brought these guys back”.

US Gen Tommy Franks, commander of US forces in Iraq, also said he believed “our guys picked them up on the road”.

But Maj Chris Charleville, who commanded the operation that transported the PoWs from outside Samarra to an airfield south of Baghdad, said he was told that Marines had been searching buildings in Samarra when they stormed a building and found the PoWs inside.

US Secretary of Defence Donald Rumsfeld said Iraqis told US troops they would find the seven missing soldiers at a location just south of Tikrit. “They said, ’You should go get them,’ and they did,” Rumsfeld said.