Kenneth Bigley

The bodies of some unnamed hostages, believed to be Iraqi, were allegedly found hanging from the walls. Two conditions will result to players being forfeited during a drag race—head-on collisions with a vehicle (traffic or opponent), barrier or divider, or blown engines as a result from prolonged redlining and the subsequent overheating of the engine. military stated that, in 20 houses, it found paraphernalia associated with hostage-holding and torture, including shackles, blood-stained walls, and a torture chamber. Steering in this mode is simplified to simply allow for lane changes, while the computer handles the steering along the lanes, and the player focuses more on maintaining an optimum speed for the car. The U.S. In order to master Drag mode, players must employ good timing and reflexes for gear shifting, redlining, overtaking, and the use of nitrous oxide boosts; the mode places particular emphasis in monitoring the tachometer during races, which is enlarged and situated on the leftmost portion of the screen. military invade the town in an effort to quell an insurgency, and it was during this operation that Bigley's cage was discovered. It involves racing against three cars on typically straight tracks, and attempting to obtain top positions to win.

[3] The November 2004 "Battle of Fallujah" [4] saw the U.S. Drag racing is the second most technical form of race in the game. military to be a Sunni Muslim stronghold. This may explain the absence of nitrous oxide in this mode, since it serves no suitable purpose in this situation. The chicken-wire cage Bigley was filmed in was later reported to have been found in a house in the Iraqi town of Fallujah, a town said by the U.S. Drift mode is the only type of racing where speed does not matter, since players are given the freedom to complete the allocated number laps at their own pace. The sometimes controversial columnist Mark Steyn had his column pulled from the British Daily Telegraph on October 11, 2004 when in it he stated that Bigley's last words "Tony Blair has not done enough for me" would not be high up on his list of final utterances. Bonuses are awarded for players who drift in the other borders of the track, drift vertically, or perform chained-drifting (continuous drifting by constantly steering the vehicle during drifts to maintain speed); if the player succeeds in ending a drift without collisions onto the sides of the track, the collected points are added into the score, otherwise, the collected points are cancelled.

The same high-coverage news strategy was notably absent in the case of Margaret Hassan, the Irish-born aid worker, who held Irish, British and Iraqi citizenship, who was kidnapped on October 19, 2004 and killed two weeks later. The player would be required to beat these scores in order to obtain top positions. After his death, the British media were criticized for the amount of news coverage his situation had been given. The player competes with three other contestants, who appear to accumulate scores along with the player during the drift session. The captors attempted to drive Bigley, who was carrying a gun and was disguised, out of town, the reports said, but he was spotted and recaptured at an insurgent checkpoint. Drift mode consists of one player in a short loop track, where the objective is to collect as much points as possible by drifting along the track. News reports [2] published after Bigley's death suggested he had briefly managed to escape from the kidnappers with the help of two MI6 agents of Syrian and Iraqi origin, who paid two of his captors to help him. Drifting is one of the most challenging and technical aspects of the game.

According to some of those who have watched it, there appear to be continuity gaps, and the final scene shows what some have interpreted as a bullet wound to Bigley's head. These races are typically shorter than "circuits" (with a maximum of 8 km in length), so players are required to be more cautious of any mistakes during racing. However, as with the Nick Berg video, the events may not be in real time. Sprint mode is a variation on the Circuit mode, where the contestants race in a point-to-point track instead of loop tracks. According to reporters who watched the film, Bigley was wearing an orange jumpsuit, and read out a statement, before one of the kidnappers stepped forward and cut off his head with a knife. In the case of Underground, Knockout sessions have a maximum of three laps for four racers. The kidnappers made a film apparently showing Bigley's killing, and the tape was subsequently posted on Islamist websites and on one "shock" site. A variant of Circuit is Knockout, which, similar to previous Need for Speed titles, involves "knocking out" the last racer who passes the starting line in each lap until the final leader of the race remains, and wins the race.

As of December 2005, his body has not been recovered. Circuit is a standard race that involves racing with up to four opponents cars around a loop track for two laps or more, and is the main mode of the game. A multi-faith memorial service, attended by Tony Blair and his wife Cherie, was held for him in Liverpool on November 13. . He was only weeks away from retirement and the birth of his first grandchild. In addition, vehicles do not have damage models. His death was first reported on Abu Dhabi television the following day. EA took some effort in making the races appear as sanctioned racing events, and included a public service announcement in the game's introduction.

Despite the efforts to save him, Bigley was beheaded on October 7, 2004. It is rumoured that the car manufacturers were very strict in how their vehicles were to be portrayed in this game, especially considering the "illegal street racing" reputation of the tuner culture. On October 1, another 100,000 leaflets asking for information about Bigley were distributed by the British Foreign Office in Baghdad. Despite this, Underground was commercially very successful, and inspired a sequel. I'm just one person.". This, plus the increasingly arcade-like controls, became points of controversy for Need for Speed fans. He doesn't care about me. Instead of hundred-thousand dollar exotics, Underground featured vehicles associated with the Import Scene.

In the video, Bigley again begged for his life, saying, "Tony Blair is lying. All races take place in a city at night. facility in Guantanamo Bay. A complete reimagining of the series' formula, NFSU offered a career mode featuring a storyline, and a garage mode that allowed players to fully customize their cars with a large variety of brand-name performance and visual upgrades. A third video was released on September 29 showing Bigley chained inside a small chicken-wire cage, wearing an orange boiler suit apparently intended to be reminiscent of those worn by inmates at the U.S. Its premise (highly tuned, customised cars participating in illegal street races) was likely inspired by the Import Scene and the movies The Fast and the Furious and 2 Fast 2 Furious. Bigley's family, particularly his brother Paul, was successful, with the help of the Irish government, in eliciting support for Bigley's release from Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat, King Hussein of Jordan, and Colonel Gadaffi of Libya, who made public statements. It is part of the Need for Speed series of games.

The Muslim Council of Britain condemned the kidnapping, saying it was contrary to the teachings of the Qur'an and sent a senior two-man delegation to Iraq to negotiate on Bigley's behalf. Need for Speed: Underground (NFSU) is a racing video game, developed and published by Electronic Arts in 2003. In his home city of Liverpool, Christian and Muslim religious and civic leaders held joint prayer sessions for his safe return. On September 24, 50,000 leaflets prepared by the British Foreign Office, asking for information about Bigley's whereabouts, were distributed in al-Mansour, the wealthy district of Baghdad Bigley had been living in. Sinn Féin leader Gerry Adams made two appeals, one on September 30 and a second on October 7.

Higgins made an appeal on al-Jazeera. Irish Labour Party spokesman on foreign affairs Micheal D. It was hoped this status would aid his release, as Ireland did not participate in the 2003 invasion of Iraq, and the Irish Government issued Bigley an Irish passport in absentia, which was shown on al-Jazeera television. Around this time it emerged Bigley's mother, Lil, 86 years old at the time of his abduction, had been born in Dublin and was therefore an Irish citizen; this meant Bigley himself was also an Irish citizen from birth.

Clearly exhausted and highly emotional, Bigley spoke directly to Tony Blair: "I need you to help me now, Mr Blair, because you are the only person on God's earth who can help me." The video was posted on Islamist websites and shown on al Jazeera television. A second video was released on September 22 by Bigley's captors, this time showing Bigley pleading for his life and begging British Prime Minister Tony Blair to save him. government was quick to deny the releases were imminent, putting a further strain on America's claims that it was not an occupying power. However, the U.S.

Ammash could be released immediately, stressing that this was about to happen anyway, as no charges had been brought against the women. Taha and Dr. The Iraqi provisional government stated that Dr. [1].

custody, but it is not known to what extent these reports were out-of-date by the time of Bigley's kidnap. News reports had earlier suggested that other Iraqi women were indeed being held in U.S. Both women participated in Iraq's biological-weapons program, according to the United Nations weapons inspectorate. Huda Salih Mahdi Ammash.

Rihab Taha and U.S.-educated Dr. custody were two so-called high-profile Iraqi scientists, British-educated Dr. The British government issued a statement saying it held no Iraqi women prisoners, and that the only two women known to be in U.S. It was also reported that a Special Air Service (SAS) team had been placed on standby in Iraq in the event that a rescue mission might become possible.

British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw and Prime Minister Tony Blair personally contacted the Bigley family several times to assure them that everything possible was being done, short of direct negotiation with the kidnappers. After Armstrong and Hensley were killed, the British government and media responded by turning Bigley's fate into Britain's major political issue during this period, leading to subsequent claims that the government had become a hostage to the situation, as President Jimmy Carter had arguably done during the 444-day Iran hostage crisis in 1979-81. . After Bigley's death, it emerged that the British Secret Intelligence Service (MI6) had launched a rescue operation that had allowed Bigley to escape for a brief period, but he was recaptured at a roadblock, taken back to the Tawhid and Jihad safehouse, and beheaded shortly afterwards.

Using voice-recognition technology, the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) has claimed that al-Zarqawi personally carried out the beheadings. Videos of the killings were posted on Islamist websites and on at least one U.S.-based "shock" site specializing in violence and pornography. Armstrong was beheaded on September 20 when the deadline expired, Hensley 24 hours later, and Bigley over two weeks later, despite the intervention of the Muslim Council of Britain and the indirect intervention of the British government. The kidnappers said they would kill the men within 48 hours if their demands for the release of Iraqi women prisoners held by coalition forces were not met.

On September 18, the Tawhid and Jihad ("Oneness of God and Holy War") Islamist group, led by Jordanian Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, released a video of the three men kneeling in front of a Tawhid and Jihad banner. All were subsequently beheaded. The three men were civil engineers working for Gulf Supplies and Commercial Services, a company working on reconstruction projects in Iraq. citizens.

Kenneth John Bigley (1942 – October 7, 2004), was a civil engineer from Liverpool, England, who was kidnapped in the al-Mansour district of Baghdad, Iraq on September 16, 2004, along with Jack Hensley and Eugene Armstrong, both U.S.