"It wasn't a checkpoint but a patrol which immediately opened fire after they trained their light on us," Sgrena said.

Mr Joyner failed to give the complete quote, at least the one from AFP:
"They continued shooting and the driver couldn't even explain that we were Italians. It was really horrible," she added.

"The Americans and Italians knew about (her) car coming," Pier Scolari said on leaving Celio hospital.
"They were 700 meters (yards) from the airport, which means that they had passed all checkpoints."
Friday's shooting was heard by Berlusconi's aides who were on the phone with one of the intelligence officers, said Scolari. "Then the US military silenced the cellphones," he charged.

There are too many uneducated people permitted to speak in this world - I don't care if I sound like a facist. :)

Thanks ,James Joyner
Peoria Illinois

1) An Italian car was speeding towards a check-point and the US troops after being subjected to a series of VBIEDs tried to warn the car to slow down and when that failed fired into the vehicle.

2) The CENTCOM was so afraid of this Italian journalist that they issued orders to all the logical checkpoints to shoot-up the car carrying her (assuming they have good intel on the make, color and model). When the car does show up, instead of killing everyone in it, the troops decide to go half-way leaving the target wounded but alive. Then in a sign of incredible disclipine, no one in the entire chain of command tells the press.

Any other theories? (I know the one Air America chose)

Bryan's point about the evidence of the vehicle is essential. The AP is now reporting that the US military does not know what happened to the car--very interesting indeed, missing evidence.

SGRENA: SCOLARI, IT WAS A PLANNED AMBUSH
(AGI) - Rome, Italy, March 5 - An ambush is Pier Scolari's verdict on the shootout which the journalist from the Manifesto paper underwent whilst being freed yesterday. Scolari is Giuliana Sgrena's partner and was giving his theory on the shootout which cost the secret service agent, Nicola Calipari, his life in order to save Giuliana's. In fact, according to Pier Scolari, Giuliana had come to know about something that maybe the Americans didn't want divulged. "Please can the Italian government do something about this. Either it was an ambush, as I believe, because Giuliana had some information... or we are at the mercy of idiots, frightened boys who shoot at anyone they come across. All this has hit the headlines because it happened to Giuliana. But what about if it had happened to the Iraqis. Nobody would have known about it". (AGI) -

But she *does* work for Il Manifesto