The Crash Mat

“jakarta_al” left a comment on one of my other posts about Body Doubles highlighting another problem with the footage we saw from The Mobile Phone Guy.

I’ll let “jakarta_al” explain:

I would like to voice my concerns (grave) having watched the execution’s cameraphone video; you see, after “Saddam” drops the scene goes dark and the camera shakes so much you cannot see what is happening in the very grainy video. Based on this video evidence we cannot say reasonably that Saddam Al-Tikrit did not simply fall through onto a mat below the gallows.

I did some more research on the video after reading this. “jakarta_al” is indeed correct – the video goes from what was otherwise a very clear and well lit viewpoint into a dark, confused and shaky period. When the footage returns, we are presented with what appears to be (again very dark) footage of Saddam’s body hanging. Was this a continuous shot? Was there a cut in the film here?

Curiously, in the second half of the video the head of “Saddam” (note that we never actaully see the rest of the body) is shown to be at the same hight, or even slightly below, the camera. Why is this? Surely if The Mobile Phone Guy is standing next to the body, “Saddam”’s legs would infact be touching the same floor that he is standing on.

As “jakarta_al” alludes to, perhaps there was simply a crash mat below the gallows, allowing Saddam to land without injury on the hard concrete floor of the chamber. Could “Saddam” simply be sitting on the floor when this half of the film was shown, posing for the cameras with the rope around his neck?

Clearly there are a lot of unanswered questions here.  Rest assured that I will continue my investigations until the truth has been uncovered.