Former POW Jessica Lynch discharged from Army

CHARLESTON, W.Va. -- Former POW Jessica Lynch, the Iraq war's most recognized soldier, has been honorably discharged from the U.S. Army.

"As of now, she is not a member of the military anymore," her lawyer, Stephen Goodwin of Charleston, said Wednesday.

Lynch, 20, of Palestine suffered multiple broken bones and other injuries when her 507th Maintenance Company was ambushed in the southern Iraqi city of Nasiriyah on March 23.

Her rescue on April 1 from an Iraqi hospital by special forces quickly made an American hero out of the petite blonde, who joined the Army to get an education and become a kindergarten teacher.

She returned home last month to a hero's welcome after a long stay at Walter Reed Army Medical Center. She revisited the hospital for the first time last week for a checkup.

It was during that trip that Lynch was granted a medical discharge, which she had earlier requested, Goodwin said.

Lynch will continue physical therapy at Camden-Clark Memorial Hospital in Parkersburg, where she has been treated since her release from Walter Reed. She can walk with crutches, but is still recovering from her injuries.

She hopes to improve enough to travel to Colorado in November to celebrate Thanksgiving with her fiance, Army Sgt. Ruben Contreras Jr., and his family.

Goodwin said he wasn't sure if Lynch is receiving medical disability. Calls to the U.S. Army were not immediately returned Wednesday.

While it was first reported that Lynch's injuries came after she fought off her captors, military officials later said she was injured after her Humvee utility vehicle was hit by a rocket-propelled grenade and crashed into another vehicle.

Knowledge that the initial report was false did little to change how Americans felt about their hero.

Lynch has not spoken publicly about her ordeal, but has said through a spokesman that she plans to tell her story in a book to be published by the end of the year.

"Like any citizen, she is now free to enter into a contract," Goodwin said.

Goodwin said Lynch had not signed a book deal with anyone as of Wednesday, although Pulitzer Prize winning reporter Rick Bragg has been a guest at the Lynch home to do research. The New York Times has reported Bragg will be paid $1 million to tell Lynch's story.

Bragg resigned from the Times in May in the aftermath of a plagiarism scandal at the paper stemming from Jayson Blair's coverage of Lynch's ordeal. The newspaper published an editor's note saying that a freelancer who had reported the bulk of an unrelated story under Bragg's byline should have received credit.

NBC plans a TV movie starring Laura Regan that has been developed without Lynch's authorization, while CBS abandoned its plans for a Lynch movie.