NOGUN-RI "WITNESS" CHARGED WITH FRAUD
25th Infantry Division Association Newsletter – page 4
Issue No. & Date not provided

Army veteran Edward Lee Daily, who figured in the story of refugee killings at Nogun-ri, South Korea in 1950 was charged earlier this year with scheming to defraud the federal government.

Daily falsely claimed he was a Korean POW and that he had been wounded by shrapnel, according to the U.S. Attorney’s office. Daily was cited by the Associated Press and several television networks in 1999 as a witness to accounts of South Koreans who said that the 7th Cavalry Regiment killed a large number of refugees at Nogun-ri. Daily later acknowledged he could not have been there at the time, and had learned about the episode second-hand.

From February 1986 to October 2001, Daily received compensation from the Department of Veteran’s Affairs and its predecessor, the Veteran’s Administration, based on an application he filed listing the injuries and claiming POW status. The benefits included $324,911 in monetary payments that were wired to his bank and $87,928 in medical care for his claimed service-related disabilities, according to government sources.

Daily was indicted on a charge of wire fraud. If convicted, he faces up to five years in prison and a fine of up to $250,000.

Despite the discrediting of its prime sources and claims by other "witnesses" that the Associated Press had misquoted them, the Associated Press has never relinquished the Pulitzer Prize awarded to it for the Nogun-ri stories that it published.