Two Marines killed when gunman opens fire

MILITARY DEATHS
Marine Lt. Col. Benjamin J. Palmer, 43, Modesto; shot and killed in Afghanistan
He and another Marine had just sat down for lunch with other members of a Marine advisory team inside an Afghan civil order police compound when a gunman dressed in an Afghan police uniform opened fire, killing them.

By Bob Pool, Los Angeles Times
July 3, 2011
Growing up in Modesto, Benjamin J. Palmer enjoyed playing soprano bugle. So he thought of joining the Marine Corps in hopes of becoming part of its elite drum and bugle corps.

Instead, he became a Marine Corps specialist in air command and control and rose to the rank of lieutenant colonel.


Palmer was three weeks into a yearlong deployment in Afghanistan and just three days shy of chalking up a quarter-century with the Marines when he was shot and killed May 12 inside an Afghan civil order police compound in Lashkar Gah, the capital of southern Helmand province, on the Pakistani border.

Palmer, 43, and Sgt. Kevin Balduf, 27, of Nashville, had just sat down for lunch with other members of a Marine advisory team when the attacker opened fire, Marine Corps sources said. The shooter was wounded in an exchange of gunfire before being tackled; he was taken into custody by Afghan police.

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Marine Lt. Col. Benjamin J. Palmer