2004 Fallujah ambush

The four armed contractors—Scott Helvenston, Jerry Zovko, Wesley Batalona and Mike Teague—were killed and dragged from their vehicles. Their bodies were beaten, burned, dragged through the city streets, and hung from a Euphrates River bridge.^[2]

Photos of the event, showing jubilant Iraqis posing with the charred corpses, were released to news agencies worldwide, which caused a great deal of indignation in the United States.

The ambush led to the First Battle of Fallujah, a U.S.-led operation to retake control of the city. The battle was halted mid-way for political reasons, an outcome that commentators have described as insurgent victory.^[3][4][5] Seven months later, in November 2004, a second attempt to capture the city, the Second Battle of Fallujah, proved successful.

Intelligence reports concluded that the attack was planned by Ahmad Hashim Abd al-Isawi. He was captured by Navy SEALs in 2009, five years later.^[6] al-Isawi was held for a time by the United States intelligence community, including at Camp Schwedler. In 2010, he testified at a court-martial of SEALs he accused of mistreating him.^[7] He was subsequently handed over to Iraqi authorities for trial and executed by hanging some time before November 2013.^[8]

The families of the victims filed suit (Helvenston et al. v. Blackwater Security) against Blackwater USA for wrongful death in January 2005.