JESSICA LYNCH RAPE CLAIM CHALLENGED BY DOCTORS WHO SAVED HER LIFE
Fri Nov 07 2003 14:14:43 ET
Iraqi doctors who treated Jessica Lynch dispute claims made in her biography, penned by former NEW YORK TIMES reporter Rick Bragg, that she was raped.
Dr. Mahdi Khafazji, who performed surgery on Lynch's fractured femur said he found no signs of sexual assalult.
Khafazji said he examined her extensively and would have noticed signs of rape, and said the examination turned up no semen.
"She was injured at about 7 in the morning," Khafazji said. "What kind of animal would do it to a a person suffering from multiple injuries?"
Dr. Jamal al-Saeidi, head of the orthopedic department at the now closed Military Hospital, recounts:
"When she was brought there she was fighting for her life. She was in shock because of the severity of her injury... Her clothes were not torn, buttons had not come off, her pants were zipped up."
Al-Saeidi also said he found no evidence of rape during an examination -- though he said he was not looking for evidence of a sexual assault.
"We had a few minutes, golden minutes to save her," he said.
"Why are they saying such things?" the hospital's deputy director Dr. Khodheir al-Hazbar said. "We were good to her."
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