Is it possible Elder killed himself ? All this has been true since the founding of the American military, but a sense of disorientation has increased in recent years, as wars that were never good to begin with began to lose moral shine. The murder of Vanessa Guilln, a 20-year-old United States Army soldier, took place inside an armory at Fort Hood, Texas, on April 22, 2020, when she was bludgeoned to death by another soldier, Aaron David Robinson. In death, she is no longer a daughter or a sister or a partner. Fort Hood is one of 800 United States military bases around the world, the third largest in the country. THE MURDERS AT FORT HOOD | Vanity Fair | July/August 2021 They checked into a nearby hotel and returned at 8 a.m. the next day. This was true of many I met at Fort Hood, including press officer Major Gabriela Thompson, my tour guide on base, who told me she joined to pay off her student loans: "It was my ticket out," she said, echoing other soldiers' sentiments about how the military had rescued them from hardscrabble existences. He died in 1879, leaving a troubled legacy that is only now beginning to be questioned. Maxwell Hockin, 26, was. The next day, Wedel-Morales failed to show up for duty, and the day after that, he was classified as absent without leave, making him one of the thousand or so soldiers who go AWOL in any given year. IMCOM is not responsible for the content of links outside home.army.mil. They pointed glumly to past cases, some of which there were public records for and others I could find no traces of in the official files. I felt a bad vibe there, Lupe says, referring to Fort Hood. Alabama Obituaries - Latest Obituaries in Alabama - Echovita Army report finds Fort Hood soldier Vanessa - The Texas Tribune Rosecrans, shot four times, was found three miles from his vehicle. His killers were never looked for properly and thus never found. . The story appears in the July/August 2021 issue of Vanity Fair.I enthusiastically recommend this article. His body was mostly intact but for his hyoid, which was never found. All are former soldiers. (Fort Hood) A soldier in the 1st Cavalry Division was found dead Saturday in his company area, according to a statement from. Atop these sedimentary layers of desecration, displacement, and disorientation, the War Department set out to build a base that would go on to serve as a footnote to nearly every war in modern memoryKorea, Vietnam, Bosnia, Iraq, and Afghanistan, but also Grenada, Panama, and the Cuban Missile Crisis. And so his disappearance was no surprise, his father told me. There was a deep cut above his left eye, and cuts all over his legs. Fort Hood soldier found safe with family after failing to show up for Such moral injury deteriorates social trust, which is then "replaced by the settled expectancy of harm, exploitation, and humiliation from others," resulting in despair and violence to self and to others. The purported motto of the Army was family first, mission second, Gary Shafer, a noncommissioned officer who served at Fort Hood from 2012 to 2018 and who knew Wedel-Morales through the car-club scene, told me. At least 39 Fort Hood troops died or went missing last year. So when, the following spring, Fort Hood offered a $15,000 reward for information about Guillen, then raised it to $25,000 in June, Kim called to demand the same. No skid marks were apparent, nor did anyone hear the crash. From here, wars are launched. (Among 1.29 million members of the U.S. military, 65,000 are immigrants, according to The Washington Post.) From the age of 18, the only thing I knew how to do was kill people, Ring wrote on the website of his fathers veterans rights organization. The numbers are distressing. Alvis Franklin Bentley. Boots and hat at Vanessa Guillens memorial, Killeen TX, Jeffrey Epsteins Decades-Long Relationship. Curiously, a few hours after the officers picked up Casteel, he went silent online. She pleaded not guilty. On August 17, Sergeant Elder Fernandes, 23, disappeared. On April 29, it was Private Joshua Barnwell, 19. The discovery in 2020 of the dismembered and burned remains of Vanessa Guillen, a Fort Hood soldier who disappeared on April 22, 2020, sparked outrage from central Texas to . (He was found a day later.) I will tell you everything." That September, Wedel-Morales, who was from rural Oklahoma, was due to be honorably discharged from the military. Fernandes had just been stationed at Fort Hood in January. Fort Hood was founded in January 1942 as a training ground for tank destroyers, selected for its varied terrain. Inside the Rash of Unexplained Deaths at Fort Hood | Vanity Fair The numbers are distressing. Fort Hood hurriedly put up a $25,000 reward for Wedel-Morales as well. Sewell is the latest soldier to disappear from the base after a series of soldiers disappeared in the past few years. On the night of August 19, Wedel-Morales went out to Club Fuego, located in a desolate strip mall about 10 miles east of Fort Hood. ), On July 3, a fortnight after Wedel-Morales's body was found, Specialist Miguel Yazzie, 33, died at Fort Hood after his repeated requests to see a doctor were denied, according to Carma Johnson, whose brother died at Fort Hood. One of the first times she stepped onto the base, a rosary she had been carrying in the palm of her hand tore apart, its beads scattering over the concrete ground. The base might have continued to devour its soldiers had it not been for a missing soldiers family whose rage, love, and devotion would attract the attention of the media, celebrities, and later the White House, sparking congressional and military investigations. That American imperialism is imploding, and the blast force radiates inward. Also that year, Marine Lance Corporal Maria Lauterbach was raped by her superior, which she reported. He was assigned to the 1st Armored Brigade Combat Team, 1st Cavalry Division. In 2018, a soldier was allegedly shot and killed in her front yard by her husband at Fort Campbell, in Kentucky, which also has one of the highest rates of suicide in the Army. None of the grunts I spoke to was surprised by the number of casualties. Fort Hood has been the center of a bizarre and horrific set of tragedies in 2020. Had one of them stood in for Guillen during roll call? At 9:30 p.m., Mayra, Cruz, Guillen's other sister Yovana, and Yovana's boyfriend set out for Fort Hood. My caution wasnt entirely unfounded. = Link to a nongovernmental site. ARMY-WIDE IMPLEMENTATION STATUS. A young soldier found dead at Fort Hood has been identified, but his cause of death remains hidden. Killeen was named after another disappointing man: Frank Killeen, an assistant general manager to the Gulf, Colorado & Santa Fe Railway. Hazel Buck Blackwell, whose family lost their farm, homestead, barns, orchards, and adjoining land when the base took over, said the closest thing might be the unexpected death of someone you loved very much. It was a heartrending, searing experience, central Texas historian GraDelle Duncan said, leaving lifetime marks on all, and actually killing some from the psychic devastation that followed. A few hours later, Robinson, who had mostly been playing video games, escaped Fort Hood by car. Killeen itself sits on an especially brutal stretch of central Texas, along the Balcones Fault, which separates the high plains of the Hill Country to the west from the grand prairies and limestone plains of the east, and along which runs Interstate 35. Women, who make up 17 percent of active-duty military, were doubly bereft, and the case files were awash with stories of the dead. On April 29, it was Private Joshua Barnwell, 19. Two witnesses had seen Robinson roll a black cargo box out of the arms room and through the parking lot, where he loaded it into his car and drove away, contradicting an earlier affidavit from three soldiers who falsely claimed they had seen Guillen departing the arms room earlier. On August 13, Staff Sergeant Bradley Moore died during a land navigation exercise on the base. Death Notices | kdhnews.com - The Killeen Daily Herald Fernandess family told me they have never been interviewed. 27 soldier deaths, violence cast shadows over Fort Hood After a chase along Rancier Avenue, the same street near which Lovell was found dead, Robinson shot himself and died. These figures eclipse American casualties in Afghanistan and Iraq in the same year. Later Fort Hood confirmed it was for violating quarantine. Later that year, Private Dakota Lee Stump left his barracks to report for work less than a mile away but never arrived for formation. Death Notices Famous Deaths Search Wednesday, March 01, 2023 Audrie Talmadge "A.T." Powell 10 hrs ago Services for Audrie Talmadge "A.T." Powell, 78, will be held at 1 p.m. Saturday at Salado. Fort Hood concluded Chee had died in training. At the Dollhouse, he got to know Penny Morales, a dancer and mother of two. Dozens of people were killed, died by suicide, or went missing from the Texas military base last year alone. US Army Since then, Vanessa's family and their attorney Natalie Khawam have tried to shine a spotlight on a string of deaths at the central Texas installation. It was ruled a suicide until her father noticed her broken nose, black eye, loose teeth, and burns on her genitals. Jennifer Anthony Lovells sister, Temple Tx. On August 11, a higher-up called Fernandes's mother, Ailina, to tell her that her son had not shown up for work for two days. Radically transparent, low cost versions of high cost generic drugs. 60.2 (births per 1,000 women 15-44 years of age) Teen Birth Rate. Highway renamed & dedicated to late Fort Hood soldier . Killeen was named after another disappointing man: Frank Killeen, an assistant general manager to the Gulf, Colorado & Santa Fe Railway. Maxwell Hockin. Fort Hood's toxic culture? Red flags raised over mysterious She doesnt belong to the Army anymore, AnaLuisa Tapia, a local organizer, told me. It was a "heartrending, searing experience," central Texas historian Gra'Delle Duncan said, "leaving lifetime marks on all, and actually killing some" from the psychic devastation that followed. 'He did not deserve to die:' Fort Hood soldier's mother wants answers (Fort Hood refused all official interview requests for this story, citing ongoing investigations. On May 19, military investigators went through Robinson's phone and learned that he had called his girlfriend, Cecily Aguilar, multiple times on the night of April 22, as late as 3:30 a.m., from a town 20 miles east of Fort Hooddespite his claim he had been with Aguilar that night. Victoria a friend of Gregory Wedel-Morales at the site of his remains, Killeen TX. 2023 Cond Nast. Nov. 30, 2022. Is it possible Elder killed himself? Military bases are the last piece of the homeland that soldiers see before they are deployed to fight and the first glimpse of home when they return. They are part of Killeens population of 151,000, many transient and very young, two thirds of whom have military ties. Last December, an internal investigation found that Fort Hood's culture, environment, and leadership resulted in women feeling "vulnerable and preyed upon," with no reliable recourse for their very real sense of duress.
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