buschwhaked
NAXJA Forum User
- Location
- Colorado Springs
My Army unit has umm....issues
This stuff has been going on for the last year. We even made the national press a while back. While there is no excuse for this behavior, we keep going to the absolute worst places in the world at the worst times.
http://www.gazette.com/articles/old-53558-today-police.html
Soldier arrested in shooting death part of troubled unit
Comments 61 | Recommend 7
May 11, 2009 - 7:03 AM
MARIA ST.LOUIS-SANCHEZ and DAVE PHILIPPS
THE GAZETTE
Thomas Woolly, a Fort Carson soldier arrested Sunday in the shooting death of a 19-year-old woman, served two tours in Iraq with an infantry unit that suffered heavy casualties in combat and has been responsible for violent crime since returning home.
Woolly, 24, was a heavy machine gunner in the 4th Infantry Division's 2nd Battalion, 12th Infantry Regiment.
Members of the 500-soldier unit, nicknamed the Lethal Warriors, have been involved in stabbings, beatings, brawls, domestic violence, shootings, at least two attempted murders and four homicides in Colorado Springs. Another soldier who served with the unit in Iraq has been accused of murder in California.
The unit has also been plagued by drug abuse and suicide. The most recent suicide was Spc. Leland "Cal" Tyrone, 23, who killed himself in a barracks at Fort Carson on Dec. 20, 2008.
Woolly, who was arrested on suspicion of manslaughter in the death of Lisa Baumann, is only the latest soldier from the unit to be involved in violence after returning from Iraq:
· Louis Bressler, Bruce Bastien and Kenneth Eastridge were charged with killing two soldiers and stabbing a woman on her way to work in the fall of 2007.
· Jomar Vives and Rudolfo Torres were charged in random drive-by shootings of three people on Colorado Springs streets in May and June of 2008. Two died.
· John Needham is charged with beating a woman to death in San Clemente, Calif., in September 2008.
Details of Woolly's crime are sketchy. According to police and family members, Woolly and Baumann were drinking and playing cards with friends Saturday night in a apartment at 4116 Westmeadow Drive.
At 3 a.m. Sunday police received a call of shots fired.
Baumann was declared dead at the scene. Woolly also shot himself, and was treated for a minor leg wound.
Soldiers who served in Woolly's regiment say many returning soldiers carry loaded weapons everywhere and drink heavily to bury the symptoms of combat stress.
Woolly was arrested Sunday afternoon on suspicion of manslaughter.
Manslaughter, as opposed to murder, indicates that a killing is not premeditated or intentional, said Sgt. Steve Noblitt, a police spokesman.
Woolly posted $10,000 bond and was released from jail Monday.
Baumann's death is the 11th homicide this year in the city.
Both victim and shooter had troubled pasts.
In the past two years, Baumann had been arrested for driving drunk and burglary and her dad had kicked her out of his house, her brother, Perry Greene said. But she was trying to clean up her life and get back to her family in Illinois.
"All she wanted to do was straighten out and come home," said Greene. "But she never got the chance."
Woolly was profoundly injured and in the process of being medically discharged from the Army.
The Oklahoma City native enlisted in the Army a month after graduating from high school in 2003.
He was assigned to the Lethal Warriors and patrolled door to door on foot in the deadliest places in Iraq. His unit suffered some of the highest casualties of any Fort Carson unit. They fought in the Sunni Triangle between 2004 and 2005 and in the center of Baghdad during the vicious sectarian fighting from 2006 to 2007.
At the time, they were part of the 2nd Infantry Division's 2nd Brigade Combat Team, which had 111 soldiers killed and more than 400 wounded in two tours in Iraq - accounting for about half of all casualties at Fort Carson. It is not unusual to see members of the unit with multiple Purple Hearts for being injured in battle.
Woolly was one.
He was injured by a large road-side bomb, according to soldiers in his unit.
During his second deployment, Woolly wrote on his Classmates.com profile, "ive been blown up by ieds (roadside bombs) had rpgs (rocket propelled grenades) and automatic machine gun rounds fly not a foot over my head mortared almost everything that could happen has happened ... I've lost some good buddies over here and its crazy to think that they are gone it just makes you think of how good you had it a civilian and why in gods name did you join the military but its a thing we all deal with here and we fight on to the next fight which come more and more each day its crazy."
Not long after Woolly made the entry, a rocket propelled grenade slammed into his Humvee while he was in the gunner's turret, according to Needham, who is out on bail awaiting his murder trial. Woolly was blown out of the truck.
"He was a nice guy, but like everyone else in the unit, he was suffering from stress and depression," Needham said through his father, Mike Needham, Monday.
Woolly's grandmother, Gladys Woolly, reached at her home in Oklahoma City, said her grandson suffered multiple concussions in repeated bomb blasts that killed other soldiers.
"He was blowed up so many times until it damaged his brain and he couldn't be a soldier no more. He had to get out of there," she said.
According to Fort Carson, Woolly had been transferred to the post's newly created Warrior Transition Unit, which takes soldiers with physical and psychiatric problems who are in the process of leaving the army.
It is unclear whether Woolly's injuries were physical, mental, or both.
His grandmother said he was scheduled to be discharged in two weeks.
The Army would not comment on his medical condition.
This stuff has been going on for the last year. We even made the national press a while back. While there is no excuse for this behavior, we keep going to the absolute worst places in the world at the worst times.
http://www.gazette.com/articles/old-53558-today-police.html
Soldier arrested in shooting death part of troubled unit
Comments 61 | Recommend 7
May 11, 2009 - 7:03 AM
MARIA ST.LOUIS-SANCHEZ and DAVE PHILIPPS
THE GAZETTE
Thomas Woolly, a Fort Carson soldier arrested Sunday in the shooting death of a 19-year-old woman, served two tours in Iraq with an infantry unit that suffered heavy casualties in combat and has been responsible for violent crime since returning home.
Woolly, 24, was a heavy machine gunner in the 4th Infantry Division's 2nd Battalion, 12th Infantry Regiment.
Members of the 500-soldier unit, nicknamed the Lethal Warriors, have been involved in stabbings, beatings, brawls, domestic violence, shootings, at least two attempted murders and four homicides in Colorado Springs. Another soldier who served with the unit in Iraq has been accused of murder in California.
The unit has also been plagued by drug abuse and suicide. The most recent suicide was Spc. Leland "Cal" Tyrone, 23, who killed himself in a barracks at Fort Carson on Dec. 20, 2008.
Woolly, who was arrested on suspicion of manslaughter in the death of Lisa Baumann, is only the latest soldier from the unit to be involved in violence after returning from Iraq:
· Louis Bressler, Bruce Bastien and Kenneth Eastridge were charged with killing two soldiers and stabbing a woman on her way to work in the fall of 2007.
· Jomar Vives and Rudolfo Torres were charged in random drive-by shootings of three people on Colorado Springs streets in May and June of 2008. Two died.
· John Needham is charged with beating a woman to death in San Clemente, Calif., in September 2008.
Details of Woolly's crime are sketchy. According to police and family members, Woolly and Baumann were drinking and playing cards with friends Saturday night in a apartment at 4116 Westmeadow Drive.
At 3 a.m. Sunday police received a call of shots fired.
Baumann was declared dead at the scene. Woolly also shot himself, and was treated for a minor leg wound.
Soldiers who served in Woolly's regiment say many returning soldiers carry loaded weapons everywhere and drink heavily to bury the symptoms of combat stress.
Woolly was arrested Sunday afternoon on suspicion of manslaughter.
Manslaughter, as opposed to murder, indicates that a killing is not premeditated or intentional, said Sgt. Steve Noblitt, a police spokesman.
Woolly posted $10,000 bond and was released from jail Monday.
Baumann's death is the 11th homicide this year in the city.
Both victim and shooter had troubled pasts.
In the past two years, Baumann had been arrested for driving drunk and burglary and her dad had kicked her out of his house, her brother, Perry Greene said. But she was trying to clean up her life and get back to her family in Illinois.
"All she wanted to do was straighten out and come home," said Greene. "But she never got the chance."
Woolly was profoundly injured and in the process of being medically discharged from the Army.
The Oklahoma City native enlisted in the Army a month after graduating from high school in 2003.
He was assigned to the Lethal Warriors and patrolled door to door on foot in the deadliest places in Iraq. His unit suffered some of the highest casualties of any Fort Carson unit. They fought in the Sunni Triangle between 2004 and 2005 and in the center of Baghdad during the vicious sectarian fighting from 2006 to 2007.
At the time, they were part of the 2nd Infantry Division's 2nd Brigade Combat Team, which had 111 soldiers killed and more than 400 wounded in two tours in Iraq - accounting for about half of all casualties at Fort Carson. It is not unusual to see members of the unit with multiple Purple Hearts for being injured in battle.
Woolly was one.
He was injured by a large road-side bomb, according to soldiers in his unit.
During his second deployment, Woolly wrote on his Classmates.com profile, "ive been blown up by ieds (roadside bombs) had rpgs (rocket propelled grenades) and automatic machine gun rounds fly not a foot over my head mortared almost everything that could happen has happened ... I've lost some good buddies over here and its crazy to think that they are gone it just makes you think of how good you had it a civilian and why in gods name did you join the military but its a thing we all deal with here and we fight on to the next fight which come more and more each day its crazy."
Not long after Woolly made the entry, a rocket propelled grenade slammed into his Humvee while he was in the gunner's turret, according to Needham, who is out on bail awaiting his murder trial. Woolly was blown out of the truck.
"He was a nice guy, but like everyone else in the unit, he was suffering from stress and depression," Needham said through his father, Mike Needham, Monday.
Woolly's grandmother, Gladys Woolly, reached at her home in Oklahoma City, said her grandson suffered multiple concussions in repeated bomb blasts that killed other soldiers.
"He was blowed up so many times until it damaged his brain and he couldn't be a soldier no more. He had to get out of there," she said.
According to Fort Carson, Woolly had been transferred to the post's newly created Warrior Transition Unit, which takes soldiers with physical and psychiatric problems who are in the process of leaving the army.
It is unclear whether Woolly's injuries were physical, mental, or both.
His grandmother said he was scheduled to be discharged in two weeks.
The Army would not comment on his medical condition.
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