The tragic story of 1st Sgt. Jeff McKinney
All the warning signs were there, but could anyone have saved 1st Sgt. Jeff McKinney?
By Kelly Kennedy - Staff writer
Posted : Sunday Jun 8, 2008 11:18:45 EDT
In a home movie, 1st Sgt. Jeff McKinney sings softly to his new son while his wife, Chrissi, gives the baby a bath. McKinney teases tiny Jeremy about this, his first nude video.
Someday, McKinney says, the family will show off the footage to Jeremy’s first girlfriend.
“Cause that’s how our parents did us,” McKinney sing-songs. “You’ll be 15, 16 years old, and you have your first date ... .”
It won’t ever play out that way, though. The McKinneys made the movie during his two weeks of home leave halfway through what was supposed to be a 15-month Iraq war deployment. He spent the break bonding with his new son and talking to his 18-year-old son, James, about going to college.
But everything changed July 11 in the bright sunshine of Adhamiyah, Iraq. That day, while out on a simple meet-and-greet patrol, McKinney stepped out of his Humvee and yelled.
“F--- this!”
He raised the barrel of his M4 to his chin and squeezed off one shot.
The first sergeant — who sang Sesame Street songs to his men and teased them just enough to make them feel like family — left his soldiers shattered.
At first, they scrambled to find the sniper who they believed must have fired the shot. When they realized the truth, they wondered how Top could have deserted them.
“That’s not First Sergeant McKinney,” his driver, Spc. Anthony Seashore, who witnessed his death, later told investigators. “Never.”
His family also felt blindsided. McKinney had no history of mental health issues. But as his parents and wife accumulated documentation from the investigation into McKinney’s death, the case became clearer.
The leadership demands of an Army at war, the untold emotional and physical injuries of combat and the unrealistic stoicism of a dedicated soldier all collided in tragedy.
McKinney had been on the scene after a 500-pound bomb left five of his soldiers and an Iraqi interpreter dead; he was in a vehicle when another bomb blew up just two feet away, almost killing him and his men; he had consoled a soldier who lost a leg to a roadside bomb.
And he had stopped eating, stopped sleeping and become convinced he was not doing enough to keep his soldiers safe.
But even after a soldier found him sitting in a wooden supply shack, staring emptily into space, even after his face grew gaunt from weight loss, even after he was unable to form the thoughts necessary to give a morning briefing, McKinney kept going out on patrol.
And that is the part that everyone — soldiers, commanders and family — must now struggle with, each and every day.
go here for more
http://www.armytimes.com/news/2008/06/military_suicide_060808w/
You can read more of his story from here
http://woundedtimes.blogspot.com/2007/12/part-3-blood-brothers-not-us-were-not.html
Hello. I read your article about the 1st Sgt. that recently committed suicide. I wanted to tell you my story. My husband was in the 278th TN National Guard and he committed suicide on May 16, 2008. Here is my story:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.pbs.org/newshour/extra/video/blog/2008/11/military_sees_rise_in_troop_su.html
Sincerely,
Tracy Eiswert
Please, help me spread the word about veteran suicides! Send this link to everyone you know. P.S. The VA has denied all my appeals for a 100% rating................
Hi Tracy,
ReplyDeleteI am so sorry. I just watched the video. It's happening too often and families like your's have to suffer because we don't take care of them well enough.
When I heard you say "no one told me" I started to cry. That's the biggest problem of all.
Two thirds of the American public never heard about PTSD. I've been doing outreach work with veterans and their families for 26 years simply because, no one told me either.
I met my husband 11 years after he came home from Vietnam. My father said "that guy has shell shock" but we didn't think it would get worse. After all, he had been home a long time. He got worse. No one told me about a secondary stressor pushing him over the edge. What I know about PTSD, I had to teach myself and read all the clinical books along with whatever I could get my hands on. I've been doing this ever since and we've been married for 24 years now.
The problem is, most of the people like me are just too hard to find. Most of the emails I get come in the middle of the night when a veteran or a spouse finds one of my videos by accident. If your husband had the help he needed, or even found me in time, or anyone else, he could still be here and that really breaks my heart for you and your children.
I'll do a post with a link to PBS right now.
I know it will give you little comfort but in all of this, the way you stepped forward and talked about what happened to your husband, may end up saving a lot of lives.