Jezebel post on LaVena

Reprised from the LaVena site: An email from a reader at Jezebel alerted me to today’s post there on LaVena Johnson.

This is Private First Class LaVena Johnson of Missouri. An honors student who nonetheless didn’t quite know what she wanted to do with her life, she enlisted in the Army right out of high school in 2003 and was sent to Iraq, where she died. When the Army returned her mutilated body to her grieving parents as a suicide, her dad, Dr. John Johnson said to himself and the Army coroner, “Somebody murdered my daughter and you picked the wrong person to fuck with.” Fucking right.

Megan Carpentier draws on the recent Salon post by Kate Harding, Tracey Barnett’s article in the New Zealand Herald, and the June 3rd story at St. Louis-based KMOV-TV.

Not reprised from the LaVena site: Regular readers (I do have a few) will recall that I am very fond of Nick Denton’s fine Gawker Media products. That the LaVena story was spotlighted by Jezebel warms my heart of hearts. When I called LaVena’s father today to tell him about the post, I read him the excepted paragraph, right down to the “fucking right.” Wherever you are, Megan Carpentier, thank you.

Similar posts:
Salon Broadsheet post on LaVena
New Zealand Herald column on LaVena
Feministing, BuzzFlash on LaVena
LaVena’s parents on Democracy Now!
Tell Me More interviews LaVena’s father