| Paul Marshall Johnson | |
|---|---|
| Born | May 8, 1955 New Jersey |
| Died | June 18, 2004 (aged 49) |
| Occupation | engineer |
| Known for | beheaded by Al Qaeda in Saudi Arabia |
Paul Marshall Johnson, Jr. (May 8, 1955 – c. June 18, 2004) was an American helicopter engineer who lived in Saudi Arabia. He was a native of both Stafford and Eagleswood, New Jersey. In 2004, he was taken hostage by terrorists and his murder was recorded on video tape.
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Johnson, who worked for Lockheed Martin on upgrading Saudi AH-64A Apache attack helicopters,[1] was stopped at a fake police checkpoint near Riyadh June 12 and then abducted.[2] His kidnappers called themselves Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula.[3] The group, headed by Abdel Aziz al-Muqrin, posted a video of a blindfolded Johnson on an Islamist website on June 15, 2004 and threatened to kill him unless all al-Qaeda prisoners were released from Saudi jails within 72 hours.[4]
Immediately after the video was released, American and Saudi Arabian authorities began to deal with the hostage situation. Both the United States and Saudi Arabia asserted that they would not comply with the kidnappers' demands. Those demands included, but were not limited to, releasing all terrorists being held in Saudi custody. The video was released on the same day that Crown Prince Abdullah promised to step up security and investigations against militant Islamic groups in Saudi Arabia.
One of Johnson's Saudi colleagues, Abdullah Al-Momin, published a petition message to the kidnappers through Al-Arabia TV. He asked them in the name of Islam to free Johnson as he has nothing to do with the American military, "if they are really Muslims they should release him" Abdullah said.
Johnson's abduction came during increased violence against foreigners in Saudi Arabia. The previous week, BBC journalists Frank Gardner and Simon Cumbers had been shot, and two other Americans had also been shot in Riyadh.
Sultan Al Haseri, who was later to be listed on Saudi Arabia's list of most wanted terrorist suspects, who was killed in a shootout in July 2005, was later to be described as taking a role in Johnson's kidnapping and murder.[5]
At 17h30 UTC on June 18, Al-Arabiya and CNN reported that Johnson had been beheaded. This report is based on three photographs of the murder posted on the Internet. Saudi officials initially claimed to have discovered Johnson's body near Riyadh later that day, but on June 19 those claims were withdrawn. The Saudi government withheld official proclamation of Johnson's death until the body was found. In the murder video, after making the statements, the next shot is the beheading already in progress. He is lying on a bed with what appears to be three men holding him down as one militant severs his head. Unlike the Nick Berg and Eugene Armstrong videos, there is no screaming. The video was also similar to that of Daniel Pearl, who was killed in Pakistan in 2002, and Kim Sun-il, a South Korean who was killed in Iraq during the same month not long after Johnson was killed in Saudi Arabia.
HostingAnime, the company which hosts images and video of his murder, have defended showing his beheading.[6]
On July 21, 2004, Saudi security officials found Johnson's head in a refrigerator in a villa in Riyadh.[7]
Johnson was described by his son, Paul Johnson III, as a lover of Saudi Arabian culture who often sent verses of the Qur'an to his daughter.