Sampley rescued Copp from Laos

There are many people whose lives were affected by Ted Sampley, who died Tuesday at 62 in Durham. None was affected more so than Jim Copp, though.

Copp, a New Orleans native and retired teacher now living in Hampstead, is an activist who worked alongside Sampley to help bring attention to the plight of Vietnam veterans who were prisoners of war or deemed missing in action by the U.S. government.

Copp and Sampley made several trips to Southeast Asia in attempts to convince the U.S. government that POWs were still being held by communists.

On one such trip during October 1988, Copp - who landed in Southeast Asia three days before Sampley - said he was captured with an American female freelance journalist by members of the Laotian Army.

Copp said he was held in a 9-by-9-foot cell that had a half-inch of water on the floor. There was a small 6-by-2-inch window in the cell that was about 12 feet up one wall, Copp recalled.

"I really thought I was going to die in there," Copp said. "I lost more than 70 pounds while I was captured."

According to Copp, he and the journalist were held in captivity for 41 days - until Sampley, backed by thousands of fervent supporters, threatened to overrun the Laos embassy in Washington, D.C.

At that point, after Copp said money was raised to fly the pair back, he and the journalist were released by the Laotians.

"His audacity got me out of prison," Copp recalled. "He was bold and he wouldn't back down.

"I owe him my life."

Copp met Sampley at a Wilmington mall during the mid-1980s. Sampley was wearing an Army jacket with a distinctive patch on it and Copp - a Vietnam veteran -asked him about it.

After Sampley told Copp about the POW/MIA issue that Sampley was so dedicated to, Copp immediately became an advocate.

That led to decades of work between the two to call attention to the POW/MIA issue.

Now, Copp said he's going to miss Sampley, who'll be eulogized at 3 p.m. today at Tanglewood Church of God at 2103 Rouse Road and buried at 3 p.m. Monday at the Dyson Family Cemetery in Ivanhoe.

"He represented the highest ideals of this country for the military," said Copp, who'll be at the funeral today. "He was everything good that you can associate with a soldier.

"That was Ted Sampley."

Bryan C. Hanks can be reached at (252) 559-1074 or at bhanks@freedomenc.com. Check out Bryan's blog at http://bhanks.encblogs.com.