Vietnam veteran died from stage 4 brain cancer...after hearing there was nothing wrong with him?

Vietnam veteran dies after battling stage four brain cancer

News 4 San Antonio
by Darian Trotter
March 20th 2019

"They couldn't keep him at BAMC because there was nothing wrong with him," Poe said. "How can you tell me there's nothing wrong with him and less than a week later he has stage four brain cancer."

Ms. Poe says her husband Doyle died late Wednesday night.

SAN ANTONIO - There's an update to a story we first brought you Tuesday night about a Vietnam veteran battling a terminal illness.

Doyle Poe has since died from stage four brain cancer.

Brooke Army Medical Center or BAMC is responding to our report on Doyle Poe.

Poe's wife, Annette, reached out to us upset that he wasn't diagnosed with the terminal disease after repeated attempts to get him help.
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Warrior Transition Leader Mocked Soldier Suicides!

Just add this to the fact that they have been decreasing enlisted numbers at the same time suicide numbers went up. Then add this to the simple facts that the Army has been "addressing" the seriousness of suicide, or at least telling us that, and yet, here we are with another example of soldiers being mocked! Oh, sure this will get them to seek help especially when it comes after the reports from the Dallas Morning News about this type of crap happing to others in Texas Warrior Transition units

Soldiers angry, say social media post mocks suicide
KENS 5 News
Priya Sridhar
March 06, 2017

SAN ANTONIO - Soldiers at Brooke Army Medical Center's Warrior Transition Battalion are angry after they claim a senior enlisted leader posted a picture to social media that they believe mocks suicide.

The Warrior Transition Battalion helps injured and wounded soldiers transition back to their units or to civilian life.

A former soldier who used to work there told KENS 5 he believes the issue was swept under the rug. Many of the soldiers who are upset over these pictures don't want to be identified because they said they don't want to jeopardize their careers.

The picture that was allegedly posted by a senior enlisted leader at BAMC's Warrior Transition Battalion shows a snowman hanging from a ceiling.

"It's very disturbing, insensitive and childish. Somebody needs help. Anybody contemplating suicide, they don't need to see this. It's going to push them over the edge," said John Ornelaz, commander of VFW Post 76 and Army veteran.

Army veterans from VFW Post 76 said they are disturbed by the picture and want to speak out for their fellow active duty soldiers who are afraid to talk about it publicly.

"It hurts me, and it upsets me because there are services out there to help soldiers," said Richard Valenzuela III, an Army veteran.

One former soldier shared his concerns on JBSA's Facebook page. He said JBSA responded to his post last week saying that they take this seriously and will work to ensure that the information is passed to the correct leadership.

Since then, he said that post and the picture have been taken off JBSA's Facebook page.
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Congress Passed Another Bill Along With Gas

The solution in this case didn't amount to a hill of beans.

"something of trifling value; virtually nothing at all"

Why? Because Congress just kept repeating the same steps to appear to be doing "something" to address military suicides but much like beans being good for you, they come with a nasty thing that proves hard to digest as the odor just lingers in the air.

It is almost as if they just figured "hey we got a problem so we'll just renuzit" and call it something else and then no one will notice what we left behind.

Not the first time they did this.

Congress heard about "Wounded Warriors Treated as 'Slackers' at Hood, Bliss and Brooke"

"Col. Chris Toner, head of the Army Transition Command, acknowledged that there had been a pattern of "disrespect, harassment and belittlement of soldiers" at Warrior Transition Units (WTUs) at Fort Bliss, Fort Hood and the Brooke Army Medical Center in Texas from 2009-2013."

But why remember all that? Why bother to think about how long it had been going on when we all had the nice little feel good diversion like the non-existent battle to get the Clay Hunt Suicide Prevention Bill passed by Congress? It all starts somewhere before it comes home.

Original diversion, take your eye off the fact that they had pre-deployment psychological screenings. In other words, they were not suicidal before they were sent into combat. After that it is anyone's guess considering the Vice Joint Chiefs of Staff admitted they were not doing post-deployment screenings like they were supposed to.

Not so afraid to go into combat but afraid to admit they had problems because of it, yet hey, why not let Congress pass yet another bill on removing the stigma only to be followed up by reports like what was happening in Warrior Transition Units.

“Injured Heroes, Broken Promises,” a joint investigative project between The Dallas Morning News and NBC5 (KXAS-TV), examines allegations of harassment and mistreatment in the U.S.’ Warrior Transition Units, which were created to serve soldiers with physical and psychological wounds. Reporters David Tarrant, Scott Friedman and Eva Parks based their findings on dozens of interviews with soldiers, Army officials and medical experts, and hundreds of pages of military documents obtained through the Freedom of Information Act.

Why bother to actually listen to Generals saying stupid things proving all the talk we heard about doing all they could to remove the stigma and then jamming down their throats statements like this.

"Some of it is just personal make-up. Intestinal fortitude. Mental toughness that ensures that people are able to deal with stressful situations."

That quote came from General Raymond Odierno in 2013.

Here's another one.

"Wednesday, we lost a Fort Bliss Soldier to an apparent self-inflicted gunshot wound. I heard the tragic news as I walked out of a memorial service for another one of our Soldiers who decided to kill himself at home on Christmas Day so that his family would find him. Christmas will never be the same for his two young daughters he left behind," Pittard wrote at the time.

He continued, "I have now come to the conclusion that suicide is an absolutely selfish act. Soldiers who commit suicide leave their families, their buddies and their units to literally clean up their mess. There is nothing noble about suicide."

Later in the post Pittard wrote "I am personally fed up with Soldiers who are choosing to take their own lives so that others can clean up their mess. Be an adult, act like an adult, and deal with your real-life problems like the rest of us."

That quote came from Major General Dana Pittard of Fort Bliss

Maybe President Obama liked that message since later that same year in August, this happened.

"Major General Dana Pittard expects the President will discuss the health of the military and Fort Bliss' low suicide rate, as well as government budget cuts, also known as sequestration."

2012 was the highest suicide rate for members of the military but looks like no one is counting or remembering other than families and friends.

But hey, why not just do another bill and call it something else? After all, no one will notice what they already did and then blamed on someone else pretending they didn't just feed the hill of beans.

Fort Hood Soldier died after contracting illness in Afghanistan

Fort Hood Soldier Dies from Illness Contracted in Afghanistan
By: TWC News Staff
07/26/2014

A Fort Hood soldier has died in San Antonio after he contracted an illness in Afghanistan.

Army officials say Pfc. Donnell Hamilton Jr. died Thursday at Brooke Army Medical Center from an illness sustained in Ghazni Province, Afghanistan.
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Soldier's dying wife gives birth to son

Pregnant but Dying, Army Wife Gives Birth to Son
DIAGNOSED WITH CANCER 15 WEEKS INTO HER PREGNANCY, HER ONE WISH WAS TO HAVE HIM
Newser
By Elizabeth Armstrong Moore, Newser Staff
Posted Jul 4, 2014

"Just save my baby"

NEWSER) – When 21-year-old Army wife Yesenia Ruiz-Rojo went to the hospital in Fort Hood, Texas—almost 4 months pregnant, seemingly healthy, but experiencing excruciating abdominal pain—doctors discovered a gigantic tumor covering more than two-thirds of her liver. She was diagnosed with aggressive liver cancer and given two to four months to live, reports the US Department of Defense. Just save my baby, she said. But as Raul Palacios, chief of interventional radiology at Brooke Army Medical Center at Fort Sam Houston, explains, "There was nothing out there we found in conventional medicine that would offer her any hope" of that happening. "We weren't aware of anything in the past that had been tried successfully before."

Its size and location made the tumor impossible to remove, while chemo would likely kill the fetus. So experts from more than a dozen specialties decided to try a new treatment, called selective internal radiation therapy with Y-90.
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Spc. James T. Wickliffchacin died of wounds from IED

DOD Identifies Army Casualty
No. 677-13
September 22, 2013

The Department of Defense announced today the death of a soldier who was supporting Operation Enduring Freedom.

Spc. James T. Wickliffchacin, 22, of Edmond, Okla., died Sept. 20 at Brooke Army Medical Center in San Antonio, Texas, of injuries sustained when an improvised explosive device detonated near his dismounted patrol during combat operations in Pul-E-Alam, Afghanistan on Aug. 12.

He was assigned to the 6th Squadron, 8th Cavalry Regiment, 4th Brigade Combat Team, Fort Stewart, Ga.

Fort Bliss soldier died of wounds suffered in April

DOD IDENTIFIES ARMY CASUALTY

The Department of Defense announced today the death of a soldier who was supporting Operation Enduring Freedom.

Staff Sgt. Robert E. Thomas Jr., 24, of Fontana, Calif., died Sept. 13, at Brooke Army Medical Center, Fort Sam Houston, Texas, of wounds suffered during a non-combat related incident on April 21, 2013, in Maiwand, Afghanistan.

He was assigned to the 1st Battalion, 36th Infantry Regiment, 1st Brigade Combat Team, Fort Bliss, Texas

Wounded Warriors Discuss Transitions to New Lives

Wounded Warriors Discuss Transitions to New Lives
By Lisa Daniel
American Forces Press Service

WASHINGTON, Sept. 13, 2012 – Caregivers, National Guard, reserve support and sports for the wounded are the top Defense Department priorities for wounded warriors and their families, the deputy assistant secretary of defense for warrior care said today, as wounded warriors discussed their experiences with recovery.

John R. Campbell made the comments after listening to panelists at the annual Warrior-Family Symposium, sponsored by the Military Officers Association of America. The panel included four wounded warriors who spoke about their transitions to a new life after being wounded in battle.

Retired Marine Corps Master Sgt. William “Spanky” Gibson moderated the panel, along with Retired Marine Corps Col. Derek Donovan, vice president of the Fisher House Foundation. Gibson was a 35-year-old gunnery sergeant in Iraq in 2006 when he was shot through the knee. His left leg was amputated above the knee, but he started competing in triathlons while recuperating at Brooke Army Medical Center in San Antonio and has competed in more than a dozen races. In 2008, he went back to Iraq as the first above-the-knee amputee to return to a ground combat area of operations.

Gibson’s determination showed up early in his recovery, when he proved he could get himself to the second floor of a Fisher House room – the only one available – rather than stay in the hospital. “I went up and down those stairs for two hours, sweating profusely, just to prove I could do it,” he said.

Another panelist, retired Navy Petty Officer Benjamin Host, was with the Seabees in Iraq in 2004 when he suffered severe traumatic brain injury and post-traumatic stress disorder after being in a Humvee convoy accident. Host said he received “exquisite” military medical care that included three brain surgeries and repairing his fractured skull. But, he said, “it’s the in-between area where we get a drop-off” meaning a lack of oversight in the recovery process.

Although it took a legal battle, Host said, he was medically retired from the Navy earlier this year.
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Wounded warrior's rehab heroic, too

Wounded warrior's rehab heroic, too
Jonathan Gurwitz
Express-News columnist
Saturday, May 26, 2012

On New Year's Eve 2010, Lt. Larkin O'Hern was leading an infantry platoon of the 101st Airborne Division, clearing a Taliban compound in southern Afghanistan when a cache of explosives detonated.

The blast blew off O'Hern's left leg completely and shredded his right leg and arm. As darkness fell over the village of Howz-e-Madad, the only question appeared to be whether O'Hern — bleeding profusely — would be the final U.S. death in Afghanistan of 2010, or the first of 2011.
In fact, O'Hern would survive — a tribute to the advances in American military medicine, to the skill of medics and medevac teams, and to his own fortitude. When I met him last May, the triple amputee had just stood up for the first time on prosthetic limbs after more than four months of surgeries at Brooke Army Medical Center and grueling rehabilitation at the Center for the Intrepid.

At the time, the West Point graduate had set a goal of flying to Fort Campbell, Ky., to greet his returning battalion — standing. Twelve months later, I visited with O'Hern again. He was walking — with a cane, but nonetheless walking, and carrying a backpack. Did he make it to Fort Campbell?
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Denzel Washington went to Brooke Army Medical Center for visit, wrote check to build Fisher House

UPDATE
Not sure if this is a hoax or not now. I wanted to see if I could find some video on this story. With everyone walking around with cell phones that will turn anything into a video, it was possible. When I went searching, I found that there were more links to reports of this being a hoax than fact. The kicker is, it has been around since 2004 when he did in fact go there and did make a huge donation.

Actor Denzel Washington Spontaneously Paid for the Construction of a "Fisher House" During a Visit to Brooke Army Medical Center-Fiction! But He Came Through Later!

Summary of the eRumor
The eRumor describes a visit by actor Denzel Washington to "Brookes" Army Medical Center in San Antonio, Texas.
He saw the buildings known as "Fisher House," where families of hospitalized soldiers can say for little or no charge while visiting. He is described as having asked how much it costs to build one, pulled out his checkbook, and wrote a check for the full amount.

The Truth
Denzel Washington did make a visit to the Brooke (not Brookes) Army Medical Center (BAMC) in San Antonio, Texas, in December, 2004.

Among other things, he participated in a ceremony awarding Purple Hearts to three soldiers and visited several others.

He also toured the Fisher House facilities there, was impressed with what they were doing, and did indicate a desire to support it.

An eRumor got started that he dramatically pulled out his checkbook on the spot and wrote a check for the cost of building an entire house, which was not true.

Fisher House says the confusion may have come when an announcement was made later in that a new $1-million facility was going to be built.

It was at the same time as a mention that Denzel Washington had pledged a donation to Fisher House. Four months later, however, he came through "in a big way", according to the folks at Fisher House. They won't disclose the amount of his gift, but Fisher House spokesman James Weiskopf says it's one of the largest in the organization's history and that Denzel Washington has agreed to serve on the Fisher House board of trustees.

Fisher House is a program that provides special housing at each of the Army's major medical centers for the families of soldiers who are receiving medical treatment, often from being wounded on duty. Fisher house is either a facility or a group of facilities where family members can stay for no cost or reduced cost, which helps ease the burden of possibly having made a long and expensive trip to be by the bedside of a family member and to make it possible for even low income families to be able to stay close by.
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Rev. Doc

If this is true, it's pretty cool...
Remember this next time you walk up to the ticket window of your local movie theater with $10 in your hand.
The Media (Accidentally?) missed this one!!!!
Please read this: The troops oversees would like you to send it to everybody you know.

Subject: Denzel Washington, and Brooks Army Medical Center.

Don't know whether you heard about this but Denzel Washington and his family visited the troops at Brook Army Medical Center , in San Antonio , Texas, (BAMC) the other day. This is where soldiers who have been evacuated from Germany come to be hospitalized in the United States , especially burn victims. There are some buildings there called Fisher Houses. The Fisher House is a Hotel where soldiers' families can stay, for little or no charge, while their soldier is staying in the Hospital. BAMC has quite a few of these houses on base, but as you can imagine, they are almost filled most of the time.

While Denzel Washington was visiting BAMC, they gave him a tour of one of the Fisher Houses. He asked how much one of them would cost to build. He took his check book out and wrote a check for the full amount right there on the spot.

The soldiers overseas were amazed to hear this story and want to get the word out to the American public, because it warmed their hearts to hear it. The question is - why do:
Britney Spears, Lindsay Lohan, Paris Hilton, Tom Cruise and other Hollywood fluff make front page news with their ridiculous anticsand Denzel Washington's Patriotism doesn't even make page 3 in the Metro section of any newspaper except the Local newspaper in San Antonio .

A true American and friend to all in uniform!

This needs as wide a distribution as we can create.
Please share it!

U.S. Marine from Mobile who lost legs in Afghanistan determined to walk

U.S. Marine from Mobile who lost legs in Afghanistan determined to walk
Published: Sunday, July 03, 2011
By Roy Hoffman, Press-Register

Cpl. Christopher Montgomery, a U.S. Marine from Mobile, at the Center for the Intrepid, a rehabilitation facility at Brooke Army Medical Center in San Antonio. On Dec. 7th Montgomery was on patrol with the 3rd Battalion 5th Marines in Helmand Province, Afghanistan, when he stepped on an improvised explosive device. "I knew my legs were gone," he says. Montgomery, 23, is determined to walk, and move on with his life. "I have to reinvent myself," he says. (Photo courtesy of Montgomery family)

At Brooke Army Medical Center in San Antonio, Texas, Christopher Montgomery, a U.S. Marine corporal from Mobile, is learning to walk on artificial limbs.

Having lost his legs after stepping on an IED in Afghanistan, Montgomery spends arduous days in the hospital’s Center for the Intrepid, a rehabilitation unit.

“Everyone here has the same goals,” he says, “all the Marines, the Army guys, the Air Force. They want to walk again and go on with their lives.

“This place,” he says, “is pretty awesome.”

Since the explosion last December, Montgomery, 23, has received medical attention at several locales, from Landstuhl Regional Medical Center in Germany to Walter Reed Medical Center in Bethesda, Md.
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U.S. Marine from Mobile

Vietnam Vet Inspires Crowds

Vietnam Vet Inspires Crowds
contact Lauren Kalberer
Feb 27 2010 11:07PM
KXMBTV Bismarck
So often our soldiers carry their scars with them... whether on the inside or the outside.

This weekend, a Vietnam vet is showing his scars... to help others.

This is Dave Roever...

He is a Navy special forces veteran who was injured in 1969... after a hand grenade blew off next to his head.

Today he travels around the country and the world... to speak to all kinds of audiences... and hopefully inspire them.

He says after his injury, someone helped him... and he forever wants to pass on that gift of hope.

After 14 months in a hospital... He knows how injured soldiers feel... and wants them to know they don't have to feel alone...
read more here
Vietnam Vet Inspires Crowds

Operation Mend at UCLA helping soldiers recover better

Military, civilian medical communities team up to improve the lives of troops with severe disfigurements from war
By Charlie Reed, Stars and Stripes
Mideast edition, Saturday, February 6, 2010

Gunnery Sgt. Blaine Scott can now eat a cheeseburger without first having to tear it to pieces.

It’s a small yet significant triumph for the 37-year-old native of Kellerton, Iowa. In 2006, a roadside bomb in Iraq scorched 40 percent of his body, including his face. Three of his fellow Marines died in the attack.

Scott endured more than a dozen surgeries during the 18 months he spent recovering at Brooke Army Medical Center in San Antonio, where 800 troops wounded in Iraq and Afghanistan have been treated at its burn center since 2003. But it wasn’t until he returned to active duty and hooked up with Operation Mend at Ronald Reagan UCLA Medical Center that civilian plastic surgeons restored his ability to chew, gave him a new nose and further refined scars with another dozen surgeries.

"It’s good to get back to the way I was," said the married father of three, whose youngest son knows him only by the face scarred by war.

Advances in combat medicine and body and vehicle armor have made war more survivable for troops like Scott. Today, 3 percent of troops in Afghanistan and Iraq die from their wounds, compared with 19 percent during the Vietnam War and 25 percent during World War II, according to statistics provided by the Pentagon.

But the price of survival is often paid with severed limbs, disfigured faces and burned bodies.

Operation Mend is among a growing number of partnerships the military has forged with the civilian medical community to help the tens of thousands wounded in combat, many with severe disfigurements. And recent investments in reconstructive surgery research point to the military’s growing attention to improving life for war-mangled troops.
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http://www.stripes.com/article.asp?section=104&article=67806

Veteran Gives Insight on Suicide Prevention

Veteran Gives Insight on Suicide Prevention
By Army Sgt. 1st Class Michael J. Carden
American Forces Press Service

WASHINGTON, Jan. 12, 2010 – When retired Army Maj. Ed Pulido was medically evacuated from Iraq in August 2004, he knew tough challenges were ahead, as he’d have to learn to live without his left leg.


But as he sat in his hospital bed at Brooke Army Medical Center on Fort Sam Houston, Texas, he began to realize that recovering from his physical disability was only a small part of that challenge.

“When my leg was taken away … I sat in the hospital bed not knowing what was happening to me mentally,” said Pulido, who medically retired after a 19-year Army career. “I remember those three weeks at Brooke where I thought about the fact that as positive as I am, I hit that dark place, and those hidden wounds were the ones that would cripple me at times when I just didn’t understand.”

Post-traumatic stress had taken form, and depression and anxiety began to take their toll. Suddenly, suicidal thoughts began to surface, the Oklahoma native said.

Pulido shared the story of his struggles yesterday with an audience of more than 1,000 military and other government agency health-care workers and officials gathered here for the 2nd Annual Suicide Prevention Conference sponsored by the Defense and Veterans Affairs departments.

The weeklong conference began yesterday and goes through Jan. 14 to give department health-care professionals insight to each organization’s programs and best practices in suicide prevention. Nearly 100 veterans who’ve experienced suicidal thoughts, such as Pulido, are expected to share their stories of survival.
read more here
http://www.defense.gov/news/newsarticle.aspx?id=57470

Marine died of infection 4 months after bomb blast in Afghanistan

Waterbury Marine Dies Four Months After Bomb Blast

By CHRISTINE DEMPSEY

December 11, 2009


On Monday, in his Texas hospital room, the gravely ill Cpl. Xhacob LaTorre of Waterbury received a Purple Heart for the wounds he suffered in August from a roadside bomb in Afghanistan.

On Tuesday, he died of his injuries.

The Marine leaves behind his wife, Frances, and a 1½-year-old son, Javier. A 2005 graduate of Crosby High School in Waterbury, LaTorre was in the ROTC program. He would have turned 21 Saturday.

LaTorre's legs were severely injured when an improvised, explosive device detonated in the Helmand province of Afghanistan on Aug. 10. The bomb instantly killed a fellow Marine who had been on foot patrol with LaTorre, said his aunt, Carmen LaSalle.

His legs had to be amputated, LaSalle said. LaTorre had made progress, though, and was talking and eating at the Brooke Army Medical Center in San Antonio within weeks of his injury, she said.

Then infection set in, and his condition worsened, LaSalle said. When he was conscious, he screamed in pain, she said.

LaSalle, who helped her sister raise LaTorre, flew to see him for Thanksgiving. He was in bad shape, she said, and other family members flew in to say goodbye. He died at 9:50 a.m. Tuesday.
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Waterbury Marine Dies Four Months After Bomb Blast

Wounded warriors get heros' welcome at Andrews

Wounded warriors get heros' welcome at Andrews

Posted 10/2/2009

by Donna Miles
American Forces Press Service

10/2/2009 - ANDREWS AIR FORCE BASE, Md. (AFNS) -- Minutes after the hulking C-17 Globemaster III rolled to a stop on the tarmac here Sept. 28, two oversized ambulances backed up to its rear loading ramp to receive its precious cargo: 23 wounded warriors and sick or injured servicemembers in need of advanced medical care.

Most of the patients arrived from Iraq and Afghanistan after being stabilized at Landstuhl Regional Medical Center in Germany.

Several had serious combat injuries. A soldier who had been in a helicopter crash in Iraq was headed to the National Naval Medical Center in nearby Bethesda for specialized care for his head and other injuries. Another, suffering serious musculoskeletal injuries from a mine-resistant, ambush-protected vehicle accident outside his forward operating base in Afghanistan, was en route to Walter Reed Army Medical Center in Washington for treatment.

Another patient, severely wounded in a rocket-propelled grenade attack in Afghanistan, remained on the aircraft to be flown directly to the burn unit at Brooke Army Medical Center in San Antonio.
read more here
http://www.af.mil/news/story.asp?id=123170970

Army Sgt. 1st Class Kevin Dupont wounded in Afghanistan succumbed to injuries

Army Sgt. 1st Class Kevin Dupont, who grew up in Chicopee, dies from injuries following explosion in Afghanistan
by The Republican Newsroom
Wednesday June 17, 2009, 2:41 PM

By HOLLY ANGELO
hangelo@repub.com

CHICOPEE - Army Sgt. 1st Class Kevin A. Dupont succumbed to his battle injuries Wednesday morning following a three-month fight for his life.

Dupont, a 1976 Chicopee High School graduate, was burned over 65 percent of his body on March 8 after the Humvee in which he was riding in Afghanistan ran over an improvised explosive device. He died at Brooke Army Medial Center in San Antonio, Texas, where he had been treated for deep third-degree burns and had undergone weekly skin grafts.

"He developed bacteria in his blood," said Bruce E. Socha, a close family friend who went to high school with Dupont. "I always held out hope because Kevin was never a guy down for the count. I realize his quality of life would have been an issue if he pulled through, but we just wanted to hear his voice."
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Army Sgt. 1st Class Kevin Dupont

Spc. Jonathan C. O’Neill succumbs to wounds suffered in Afghanistan

DoD Identifies Army Casualty


The Department of Defense announced today the death of a soldier who was supporting Operation Enduring Freedom.



Spc. Jonathan C. O’Neill, 22, of Zephyrhills, Fla., died June 15 at Brooke Army Medical Center in San Antonio, Texas, of wounds suffered June 2 in Paktya, Afghanistan, when an improvised explosive device detonated near his vehicle. He was assigned to the 549th Military Police Company, 385th Military Police Battalion, 16th Military Police Brigade (Airborne) at Fort Stewart, Ga.
http://icasualties.org/oef/

Wounded Kentucky GI found dead at Fort Sam

Wounded Kentucky GI found dead at Fort Sam

By Scott Huddleston - Express-News Another soldier recovering from war injuries died this week in his barracks at Fort Sam Houston, the Army said Wednesday.

Spc. Franklin D. Barnett Jr., 29, was found dead in his room Sunday afternoon, according to a release from Brooke Army Medical Center. Barnett, who was hurt in Afghanistan, had been assigned to C Company of the Warrior Transition Battalion since Oct. 15.

Barnett's death, at least the third in less than three months involving members of the battalion, is under investigation.

Earlier this year, Spc. Craig Reginald Hamilton and Warrant Officer 1 Judson Erick Mount, also members of the warrior transition battalion, died on post. Army officials have not released details in either death, citing ongoing investigations.

Hamilton, 35, of Milford, N.H., had been injured at Fort Sill, Okla. He died at Fort Sam on March 27.

Mount, a 37-year-old former San Antonian, was badly wounded in a car bomb blast near a market in Iraq. He died April 7.
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http://www.mysanantonio.com/military/47693722.html

Sgt. Darron Mikeworth's wounds show human spirit and family's love

Injured GI gets new face – and anonymity

By Sharon Cohen - The Associated Press
Posted : Sunday Apr 26, 2009 8:40:57 EDT

SAN ANTONIO — His first glimpse in the mirror was largely a blur.

Sgt. Darron Mikeworth had just come out of a drug-induced coma — his mind was still in a fog and he was so weak he could barely stand.

Three weeks before, in Iraq, a suicide bomber had raced up to the right side of his Humvee, igniting a barrel of explosives that tore into the machine gunner’s face. He nearly died.

Mikeworth awoke in a hospital bed, thousands of miles away.

He was relieved he still had his arms and legs. He was thrilled, too, that his ears had survived the blast. But he had wounds he could not see, life-changing wounds. His wife, Dea, helped break the news: His face was in bad shape. His left eye was useless.

And there was more.

At first, Mikeworth was too groggy to absorb it all. He was caught up in hallucinations of basketball players shooting hoops in the hospital, of cars on the highway floating in air. He didn’t know what was fantasy and what wasn’t — until he shuffled into the physical therapy room and stood numbly before a full-length mirror.

“I just had to keep telling myself I’m NOT going to wake up out of this one,” he says. “THIS is not a dream. THIS is real.”
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Injured GI gets new face – and anonymity