parents receive locked casket from Iraq - smash it open

[donsu]

http://buzzflash.com/mailbag/05/09/mai05241.html

-snip-

Subject: FEMA Wants No Photos of Dead 9/7

Just like Operation Iraq Freedom. No photos of the dead.

I went to the Bring the Troops Home Tour in Evanston, IL last night. I heard many heartbreaking and breathtaking speakers. Many were Gold Star Parents. Some were anti-war and Peace activists. There was a Blue Star wife - her husband is awaiting deployment to Iraq in November. One of the most heartbreaking story I heard was that told by the father of a soldier who - if I have the timeline correct, was scheduled to return from Iraq, and was killed reportedly by his own hand, just hours before his return. The family wanted to attend his return in Dover. They were denied. They were told that this soldier had committed suicide (only minutes after a phone conversation with his family) but were not allowed to see his body.

They requested an open casket funeral. They were denied and discovered the casket had been locked shut. They finally convinced a person at the funeral home to open the casket in order to see their son before he was to be buried. They discovered he had been shot in the back of his head. They were told by his fellow soldiers that this happened when he was showering following his phone call. Upon further investigation, they also learned (from his friends in the military) that his own firearm had not been used. Days later, when they went to the funeral home they learned that the worker who had opened the casket for them to see their beloved son had been fired from her job.

No photos. No viewings. Not at Dover, nor at the funeral home. If they don't see their beloved family members, then this government can say whatever it wants. The stories are just that - stories. They don't have to make sense. They don't have to be true.

Now no photos. No viewings. Not in New Orleans. Not in the Superdome. Not in the nursing homes. Not in the streets. The stories will be just that - stories. They won't have to make sense. They won't have to be true.

We must keep the lies of being safe at home alive. No matter how many dead we have.

We must have accountability and we will never get it from this government. We will have more lies, more tax breaks for the rich, more moneys for Halliburton. This government must be impeached! (can we impeach a government?)

There is a march and rally at the White House on September 24. People are coming from all over the nation.

We must show our disgust and anger toward this administration's lack of humanity. Please join the thousands already committed to demand accountability and change.

Leslie Evanston, IL
-snip-
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evidence

[freemen2005]

1. GET THIS OUT INTO THE MAINSTREAM NEWS!!!!

shocking proof of how the military holds itself unaccoutable to the very people it supposedly serves and protects.

[Selteri]

2. Nominated and very well written.

Thank you for those eye opening words that are so poetically accurate. This administration has gotten so bad that they are caling obvious murders a suicide so they don't have to work out the details of how completely and truly inept they are.

I suggest a demand for independant autopsy of all the 'suicides' from Iraq, how many of them are real?

[Just Me]

3. Uhhhh,....

:cry:

[Solly Mack]

4. I've said it before and I'll say it again -the military WILL LIE about HOW

a soldier dies

They can't hide it when a soldier does die...but they can and DO lie about HOW all the time.

and that's exactly why the government is banning pictures of the dead from Katrina. they want to hide the HOW...they know what we all know....many died after the fact, from not getting help in time...Katrina didn't kill them - the government's inaction did.

[txaslftist]

7. Let's not forget plain old homicide.

No autopsies means no way of knowing if a person died from a beating or drowned. No autopsies means no way of knowing if a bullet is from a weapon stolen from a Wal-mart or a soldier's rifle.

[Solly Mack]

11. it means the truth (whatever it may be) will never be known

[Sadie5]

8. Good for the parents

It's about time that something like this was done to expose their lies!


I will post it on a few other message boards I post on.

[psychopomp]

31. You have made an important point

Photos of people who died from exposure or dehydration (e.g. found in areas above water) would show the extent of the damage caused by not going in sooner.

[teenagebambam]

5. Sad to say.....

....this is a longstanding problem in the military. My brother died in 1975, ruled by the Navy to be a suicide, though that ruling was contradicted by every military person my parents spoke to, including the officer who accompanied the body back to the states.

[displacedtexan]

6. When my cousin died in Vietnam...

My aunt got an extremely eloquent letter from the DOD, describing the generic details of his "heroic" death...

Gary had arrived in Vietnam the day before and was on his way via helicopter to his unit when the copter crashed into a tree.

It was obvious to me (in JR. High at the time) that my cousin's name had been inserted into a well written form letter.

[MADem]

19. It IS a form letter

You can find a version of it in every personnel manual for every branch of service. The lawyers will tell you, if you are a supervisor of the deceased or in command, to be VERY careful in writing to the families, thus the form letter was developed.

Here's a sample--I grabbed the html version for those who do not have ADOBE http://64.233.161.104/search?q=cache:lPQgLKdb88UJ:https://134.11.61.26/CD8/Publications/FORSCOM/FORSCOM%2520HQ%2520Memo/FORSCOM%2520HQ%2520Memo%2520600-8-1%252020020801.pdf+military+condolence+letter+personnel&hl=en

I am troubled by the number of curious deaths that have been reported out of Iraq this time around. I know how I have conducted preliminary investigations in the past, and it seems to me these PIO's are not even looking at the autopsy reports, or something more nefarious is happening. In any event, it dishonors the rest of the personnel in uniform when this sort of shit happens.

[IndyOp]

9. Shot in the back of the head & declared a 'suicide' -

Maybe he threatened to return home and tell what he had seen?

:grr:

[Mr_Spock]

10. This is a complete outrage.

We are going to be hearing horrible stories about this awful time in our history for years to come. I can't believe how insulated we are from the awful truth of the Bushitler administration. Keep fighting for the truth people...

[DoctorMyEyes]

12. I'm sorry

If this is true it's horrible - but, I cannot imagine that parents would break into a casket - discover signs of foul play and then what? Go home? The funeral home worker was fired?

Who wouldn't have called the police right there from the funeral home at that very minute?

I don't know the writer, and I don't know the parent - maybe something was "lost in translation"?

[oxbow]

27. I agree. If it was my son, there would have dam well been an investigation

something smells rotten in this story

[mopinko]

13. just like mamie till

emmit till's mother told the moving story of demanding that her son's casket be opened at the funeral home where it was brought, double locked, to studs terkel, for his book "will the circle be unbroken". the she threatened to return with a sledge hammer, iirc. there was a radio version, that had her interview. it was a three hanky story.
these families need to bring their own pry bars.

[Cleita]

14. Dare we say the "G" word, genocide?

Because that's what they are trying to cover up regarding the Katrina deaths.

Apparently, there is so much malfaesance going on in Iraq, we need to demand the arrest of Donald Rumsfeld and put him on trial to get at the truth.

Don't be afraid to use the "G" word.

[The Backlash Cometh]

15. Sounds like a hit?

[derby378]

16. Before we go any further...

Is anyone willing to document this event for us?

Or is this just another "friend of a friend said..." urban legend?

Details, people.

[Brother Buzz]

17. This father was lied to, also...

Dead Soldier's Dad Finds No Enemy in Iraq
by Rebecca Romani

ESCONDIDO, California - Fernando Suarez del Solar is a busy man. He is busy opening boxes, counting pills, counting bandages; he is busy checking everything in the boxes that come addressed to him from all over the United States.

Suarez stops for a moment. "There are other boxes," he says, "many of them in San Francisco, in New York, in Chicago. So many boxes."

<snip>

"Jesus was walking like this," says his father, imitating a crouching walk, "when he stepped on a cluster bomb."

But Suarez found out this part of the story only much later. At first, he and his family were told Jesus had been shot in the head, an image that horrified his parents. Later, he was told his son had stepped on an Iraqi mine and there was an investigation pending.

But a reporter with the 'San Diego Union Tribune' newspaper called Suarez to confirm elements of a story he was writing and told him his son had stepped on an unexploded ordinance, information that Bob Woodruff of ABC News later confirmed because he had been embedded with the soldier's unit.

According to the Union Tribune, Jesus lay wounded for two hours, bleeding out. He died en route to hospital.

"I can understand the confusion at first," says Suarez, "but why continue to lie to me?"

<snip>

The day of the funeral, Suarez asked to spend time alone with his son. Armed with university training in forensic medicine, he examined the corpse and found that, indeed, something had ripped through the right side, removing pieces of hand, foot, upper thigh and groin.

"At that point," says Suarez, I knew."

And now his fury is palpable.

"The Americans dropped about 20,000 cluster bombs. Only 20 percent exploded. My son didn't die in the front lines from enemy fire; he died because of the military's negligence."

"You know," Suarez del Solar says thoughtfully, enunciating every word, "there are people who say I give aid and comfort to the enemy. I never spoke with Bush, he never sent me anything, but the people of Iraq I met, THEY comforted ME for my loss! I have yet to see the enemy."

In the shadow of the glass case that holds his son's picture, as well as the Mexican and American flags, Suarez del Solar goes back to organising medicines, in the hope that some Iraqi parent will not have to do what he has done -- bury a child killed in the war.

http://www.commondreams.org/headlines04/1230-01.htm

[progressoid]

18. WTF???

What is happening to my country?

[tom_paine]

25. our country was murdered on 12-12-2000

The Old United States of America.

It's just that now, 5 years later, is the corpse beginning to stink.

[Bernardo de La Paz]

20. Is the father pursuing a murder investigation and a coverup investigation?

Is the father pursuing a murder investigation and a coverup investigation?

Seems like a wrongful death and that a number of people will have committed themselves to paper on it.

Seems like the funeral parlor employee would have a case for wrongful dismissal.

Please keep us informed on how these cases progress.

[GreenPartyVoter]

21. Oh God!

------------------------------------------------------
Ditch Bu$h and save the Gulf: http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=106&topic_id=22507&mesg_id=22507

Then save the nation!
http://timeforachange.bluelemur.com/electionreform.htm

[SaintLouisBlues]

22. Here's another suspicious death of a service member in Iraq

More details in the mysterious death of LaVena Johnson

UPDATE: Pfc. Johnson's death ruled a suicide by the Army. More here.

Norm Parish of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, the primary reporter on the unexplained death in Iraq of Pfc. LaVena Johnson, has an additional piece in today's paper: LaVena's father suggests that his daughter's body shows evidence of a physical assault.

The father of Army Pfc. LaVena L. Johnson says his daughter had a disfigured lip, loose teeth and a wound on the left side of her head when he reviewed her body this week.

John Johnson said those discoveries are key reasons why he fears that foul play may have been involved in his 19-year-old daughter's death July 19 near Balad, Iraq.

http://www.waveflux.net/archives/001770.php

Now ruled suicide. I'm surprised they didn't say she was shot trying to escape.

[B Calm]

23. Why isn't this in the news?

[defiant1]

24. Do you really need to ask??

Cuz it's fucking horrible news.

:puke:

[BamaBecky]

26. God Damn Them to Hell!..n/t

[seemslikeadream]

28. Here's a little more

www.lewrockwell.com/rogers/rogers166.html

But here is where the story takes a most horrifying and repulsive turn; here is where the story turns into an abomination that will nauseate any American who has ever served – or known someone who has served – in our once proud Armed Forces. Shortly before his death, Juan Torres Jr. had called his father from Bagram Air Force Base. Juan Jr. was overwhelmed with fear. He was distraught because of rampant drug abuse, drug dealing, and trafficking among officers and enlisted men inside of Bagram. He was especially upset that officers, as high up as Captains, were involved with this drug trafficking and their superior officers were doing nothing to put a stop to it.


www.mirror.co.uk/news/tm_objectid=15935356&method=full&siteid=94762&headline=steel-reels-hid--pound-150m-of-cocaine--name_page.html


STEEL REELS HID £150M OF COCAINE
COCAINE with an estimated street value of £150million has been seized in Holland in one of the biggest busts ever in Europe.

Thousands of brown bags of the drug, weighing 4,600kg, were found hidden in 12ft reels of steel cable at Rotterdam port.

They were in two shipping containers sent from Venezuela and bound for Iraq via Belgium.

Dutch officials arrested 11 men and two woman from six countries after the discovery.

Another suspect, a 45-year-old Colombian, died after falling from the window of a flat in Amsterdam during a raid, police said.

Belgian authorities later arrested four people when the containers arrived in Antwerp minus the drugs. Spain has also held a number of suspects.

Antwerp police said: "We're talking a major operation here."
Last month's bust was kept secret until the arrests were made.
Police also found 260kg of cocaine in containers attached to a ship's hull in Carboneras, southern Spain, it emerged last night.

[paineinthearse]

29. Time out!

Was the viewing done at a private funeral home? Was the soldier since buried?

This family needs to pay a visit to the local District Attorney.

This soldier was "suicided", and all who participated in the coverup are accessories AFTER THE FACT to murder!

Use the criminal justice system to investigate the Army's conspiracy.

OR IS THIS AN URBAN LEGEND?

[meisje]

30. Urban Lengend/rumor/bullshit

ok then, show some proof