A photo from Baghdad of an Iraqi policeman shortly after he was killed in a drive-by shooting, and of a grieving colleague, have drawn at least three protests from readers. They believe such an explicit photo of the dead person was inappropriate for Stars and Stripes. It ran in the Mideast and Europe editions of Aug. 22 and the Pacific edition of Aug. 23.

Kim Ellison wrote from Garmisch, Germany: "I understand that this newspaper is for military personnel and those associated, but I do not know for whom it is worse, someone who has actually experienced a tragedy like this, or someone seeing it for the first time."

Executive Editor Robb Grindstaff said the staff discussed the photo at length. "Ultimately, we decided the news value of this photo, along with the emotion on the face of a grieving colleague, made this one worth publishing," he said. "We chose not to put it on page one due to the graphic nature, which we knew might be disturbing to some of our more sensitive readers."

The photo was unusual and powerful. The dead man, his face clearly visible, was slumped in the front seat of a vehicle. The colleague was reaching into the vehicle, and was clutching the victim's shirt; an expression of pure suffering was on his face. For me, the drama of the moment is what justified running the photo. (Another colleague of the victim's was pictured, doubled up in anguish, on the front page, without the victim being shown. The photo that has been criticized appeared on page 7 of the Europe edition, and page 5 of the Mideast and Pacific editions.)

That said, the norm at Stripes has been to avoid photos of identifiable dead persons. I believe that should continue unless the editors believe there are very strong reasons for publishing such a photo, knowing it will disturb some. It would be sad if such images were shown indiscriminately.