Miscommunication on Soldier's Death

update

Soldier alive, despite phone call to family

By Tom Vanden Brook - USA Today
Posted : Tuesday Sep 15, 2009 20:55:07 EDT

WASHINGTON — Raymond Jasper was on a camping trip in New York state with his wife, Robin, when he got a phone call about his son, a soldier in Afghanistan.

“I saw the look on his face, and I asked him, ‘Is Jesse hurt? How bad is he hurt?’ ” Robin Jasper recalled Monday. “He said, ‘He’s dead.’

“He dropped the phone, and we both hit the floor sobbing.”


It wasn’t true.

Their son, Staff Sgt. Jesse Jasper, 26, had not been killed in Afghanistan. The Army says the incorrect news was delivered to the Niagara Falls, N.Y., family by mistake by a member of an informal military support group. And it has the Jaspers looking for some answers.

“No family should have to go through this,” Robin Jasper said.

Lt. Col. George Wright, an Army spokesman, said the Army does not notify families of soldiers’ deaths by phone. An officer and a chaplain meet with families in person to break the news, he said.

Wright said the error came from a support group outside the Pentagon that helps families cope with a death.

“It was not malicious,” Wright said.
read more here
http://www.armytimes.com/news/2009/09/gns_family_wrongly_informed_091509/

Family told son is dead 1:56
A Niagara Falls couple is mistakenly told by military officals that their son is dead. WGRZ's Andrew Pierrotti reports.


Miscommunication on Local Soldier's Death
Andrew Pierrotti 25 mins ago


Staff Sgt. Jesse Jasper is alive and fighting for our country in Afghanistan.

On Sunday, his family received a phone call from a military liaison. It turns out it was the wife of another soldier informing other family members that someone in Sgt. Jasper's battalion died.

The military says it was "miscommunication" and they regret how the situation unfolded.

Robin Jasper, Sgt. Jasper's mother, says it was an awful experience. She related to 2 On Your Side, how her husband reacted, "and he said, somebody needs to take the phone. I said, 'Did Jesse get hurt?' He said Jesse is dead, and he dropped to the floor and my sister, and I fell to the floor with him and we sobbed."

A few hours later, they make the call to military officials to get the details. What they get is an unexpected response. "He said Jesse Jasper is not dead. I don't know why somebody would have called you. He said usually they would show up at your door, "said Raymond.

They get more confirmation when his son calls from Afghanistan. "When I told him, he said, 'Dad, I don't know how this happened, but I will be going to my commanders tomorrow and find out why they called you and told you that I was dead.' "

Army public affairs say the military always notifies families of solider deaths in person.
http://www.wgrz.com/news/local/story.aspx?storyid=70247&catid=13

Soldier Alive Despite Conflicting Message to WNY Family
A Western New York family wants answers from the military. On Sunday, they got news their son had died while serving in Afghanistan, but just hours later they found out it wasn't true.
Miscommunication on Local Soldier's Death
Staff Sgt. Jesse Jasper is alive and fighting for our country in Afghanistan. the 26-year-old is from Niagara County

Another update to this story
Correction: Soldier wrongly reported dead story
Soldier wrongly reported dead story
(AP) – 1 day ago
BUFFALO, N.Y. — In a Sept. 15 story about a family that received a telephone call from the U.S. Army incorrectly saying that their son had been killed in Afghanistan, The Associated Press misspelled the surname of another soldier who was killed. His correct name was Army Sgt. Tyler A. Juden, not Judin.