Silicio, Woman Who Took Iraq 'Coffins' Photo, Has No Regrets

By: (AP) Looking back on the job she lost and the media frenzy she endured, Tami Silicio has no regrets about taking a picture of flag-draped coffins of U.S. soldiers killed in Iraq and letting a newspaper publish it.

The former cargo worker shot the picture hoping to show the dignity and care given to U.S. war dead.

Instead, she and her husband got fired from their contract jobs, drawing international attention to a Pentagon policy that sought to bar media coverage of the transport of military coffins.

From her home in this city north of Seattle, Silicio spends many late nights chatting online with war veterans and support groups for people who have lost loved ones at war.

She says she's received many words of support. One message came from Bill Mitchell, who says his late son, Army Staff Sgt. Michael Mitchell, likely was in one of the coffins depicted in the photo.

"It depends on the day, but the bottom line is that it helped a lot of people, and I'm glad it was published," Silicio told The Seattle Times, which published the picture on its front page April 18.

"I have seen so many acts of right come out of it and have met so many great people. It's just an awesome gathering of friends that the picture has brought me. And for me, friends are forever, and money comes and goes."

Maytag Aircraft Corp. fired Silicio and her husband after Silicio e-mailed a friend a photo showing workers inside a cargo plane at Kuwait International Airport securing 20 flag-draped coffins for the trip to Dover Air Force Base in Delaware. The friend e-mailed picture to the Times, which got Silicio's permission to print it. After appearing in the Times, the photo ran in many other papers and Web sites around the world.

Silicio and her husband returned home to a frenetic round of media appearances. The spotlight has long since dimmed. They separated, and he found work outside the Puget Sound region. She's been looking here.

She says she'd like to work with an international aid agency but so far has had no success landing a position.

When Silicio returned to the United States, she said she was not trying to make a political statement by releasing the photos. Since then, she's become a sharp critic of the war.

Her photo is one in a series of powerful images that emerged last spring as the U.S. death toll rose sharply. There were pictures of the burned bodies of American contractors in Fallujah, and those of U.S. soldiers grinning beside naked Iraqi prisoners at Abu Ghraib.

"The photograph is a version of the truth you cannot deny," said Scott McKiernan, founder of Zuma Press, which marketed Silicio's image. McKiernan said that the photo was published in at least 30 U.S. newspapers.

The photo's publication would have been even more widespread were it not for the release that same week of other images of flag-draped coffins by the Defense Department, responding to a Freedom of Information request.