Showing posts with label Boston MA. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Boston MA. Show all posts

Wednesday, May 6, 2015

Chairman Joint Chiefs Marine General Is Boston Strong

Obama chooses Marine Gen. Joseph Dunford Jr. as Joint Chiefs chairman 
89.3 KPCC
Lolita C Baldor
AP
May 5, 2015
Obama referred to Dunford's native Boston, saying he's the "very definition of Boston strong." But Obama added, "the only downside in my book is as a White Sox fan, there is yet another Red Sox fan who I'm going to have to be dealing with."
President Barack Obama tapped a highly respected combat commander as his next chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Tuesday, signaling that the battles against al-Qaida and Islamic State militants threatening the Middle East and the West remain top priorities for the nation's military despite years of trying to change the focus to Asia.

Announcing his selection of Marine Gen. Joseph Dunford Jr. during a Rose Garden ceremony, Obama said America's armed forces must be ready to meet a broad range of challenges, and that Dunford has proven to be one of the military's most highly regarded strategic thinkers.

"We have to keep training Afghan forces and remain relentless against Al Qaida. We have to push back against ISIL and strengthen forces in Syria and build moderate opposition in Syria," said Obama, using an alternate name for the Islamic State group. "We have to stand united with our allies in Europe and keep rebalancing our posture as a Pacific power. We have to keep investing in new capabilities to meet growing threats, including cyber attacks."

As the U.S. started to look beyond the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, the Pentagon had begun to increase its focus on the Asia Pacific region, where the North Korea threat was escalating and China was flexing its military muscles. But that has been eclipsed by the march of Islamic State militants across Syria and Iraq, and the group's effort to expand to other regions and import the fight to the West.
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Sunday, March 29, 2015

Woman Charged with Stealing from Disabled Vietnam Veteran Was Care-taker

Care assistant charged with stealing from disabled veteran
WCBV News Boston
Mar 28, 2015
$128,500 stolen from a disabled Vietnam War veteran

BOSTON —A grand jury in Boston has indicted a personal care assistant on charges she stole nearly $128,500 from a disabled Vietnam War veteran for whom she was caring.

The Suffolk County grand jury Thursday indicted 48-year-old Michelle Allix of South Boston on eight larceny charges. Arraignment was set for April 16.
read more here

Saturday, March 28, 2015

Iraq Veteran, Army Ranger Boston Officer John Moynihan in Coma

UPDATE
Boston officer improving after surgery to remove bullet
The Associated Press, March 29, 2015
Decorated Boston cop, Iraq veteran in coma after being shot in face 
South Coast Daily News
March 28, 2015

The suspect in the shooting hopped out of the stopped car on Friday evening and opened fire on officers, striking Officer John Moynihan just below his right eye and an apparent bystander in her arm, police Commissioner William Evans said

BOSTON (AP) — A police officer who was honored for his role in the aftermath of the Boston Marathon bombing was in an induced coma fighting for his life early Saturday after being shot in the face during a traffic stop, authorities said.

The suspect in the shooting hopped out of the stopped car on Friday evening and opened fire on officers, striking Officer John Moynihan just below his right eye and an apparent bystander in her arm, police Commissioner William Evans said.

Other officers returned fire and killed the suspect at the scene, Evans said. The woman suffered a flesh wound and was in good spirits, and three other officers were taken to a hospital with stress-related problems, he said.

The names of the suspect and wounded woman weren't immediately released.

Moynihan, 34, is on the police Youth Violence Task Force and is a highly decorated military veteran, Evans said.

He is a former Army Ranger who served in Iraq and was honored at the White House in May with the National Association of Police Organizations TOP COPS award. 

Moynihan received the award for being one of the first responders in Watertown following the April 2013 gunbattle with the Boston Marathon bombers.

Moynihan had helped transit police Officer Richard Donohue, who was shot in the leg and nearly bled to death when police tried to apprehend Tamerlan and Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, Lieutenant Michael McCarthy said. read more here

Wednesday, March 25, 2015

Day From Hell For Iraq Veteran Didn't End

Veteran kept his cool in crisis but faces legal fallout 
Boston Globe
By Thomas Farragher
Globe Staff
March 25, 2015

When Jeff Lorditch went off to work early that morning, his wife of nine years and his young son slept soundly in their beds. In the quiet of that dawn, there was no trace of the tumult and tears just over his horizon.

He got to work to discover he was fired. Laid off, he says. In any case, on that mid-October morning of 2013, his job was gone.

When he got back to his home in Auburn about 9 a.m., his 7-year-old boy had left for school.

He walked in to find his wife in bed with another man. And he knew the guy. It was his brother, visiting from New Mexico.

“I think every married guy probably runs through that scenario in their head at some point,’’ Lorditch, 34, said. “I know I had.

And I never knew how I was going to react and hoped I would never have to find out. But I walked in and it took me a few minutes to actually register what was going on.

“I just couldn’t process it. I did a lot of pacing. I know I did some yelling. I said some things I never say.’’

What happened next, supported by statements given by his wife and brother to the Auburn Police Department, is important because it shows that Lorditch, an Iraq combat veteran and honorably discharged US Marine, is capable of vast restraint.

His mind was racing, his temper understandably elevated. “The one thing that stuck with me is that neither of them was attacking me and I live my life by this,’’ he said. “The only time violence is ever justified is in self-defense. So even though I was going through hell at that moment, they were not attacking me.’’

Lorditch, a gun collector and former Marine marksmanship instructor, unloaded a gun he kept in the living room in front of his wife and brother, made no threats, and then left the house.
read more here

Monday, February 16, 2015

Boston VA Error Delayed Florida Veteran's Burial

VA error delays Palmetto veteran’s funeral, angers family
Tampa Tribune
Howard Altman
Tribune Staff
February 11, 2015

When the family of Korean War veteran Willie Mitchell Jr, went to bury the Palmetto man, who died Jan. 25 at age 81, their sorrow was compounded by shocking news.

Mitchell could not be laid to rest at Sarasota National Cemetery as planned, because when the family tried to schedule a burial they were told he died more than six years ago.

The error, it turned out, was the result of a Department of Veterans Affairs employee at the Boston regional office inputting the wrong Social Security number, giving a man who died in 2008 the same number as Mitchell, according to Michael Nacincik, spokesman for the VA’s National Cemetery Administration, which oversees burials at national cemeteries.

Mitchell, who served in the Army, is now scheduled to be buried at 10:30 a.m. Friday at the Sarasota cemetery, but his family is upset over the ordeal.

“We are angry that we have to go through this all over again,” Brian Mitchell, of Tampa, said about having to rearrange his father’s funeral. The family is also upset that it took a call from a reporter to get a straight answer.

“No one contacted us to tell us what happened,” Brian Mitchell said.

Nacincik, in an email to The Tampa Tribune, apologized “for the inconvenience and additional stress to the family caused by extended time it took for us to determine burial eligibility. We are thankful for Mr. Mitchell’s service to our nation and are honored to provide him the burial he deserves this Friday at Sarasota National Cemetery in Florida.”
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Tuesday, February 10, 2015

Brian Williams Ditched Medal of Honor Event for SNL

UPDATE
Brian Williams Suspended From NBC News For 6 Months
Where were all these stories before Stars and Stripes decided to report on them?
Veteran recounts Brian Williams ditching Medal of Honor event for SNL
Stars and Stripes
Patrick Dickson
February 10, 2015
Santangelo wrote an angry letter to Williams a week after the banquet. “In an act of egotistical, blatant self-promotion, you deceived the (Medal of Honor) Recipients, declined to break bread with them and disrespected them.
WASHINGTON — Brian Williams’ on-air apology last week rang hollow to a number of veterans. Perhaps none more so than Boston firefighter Neal Santangelo.

In Sunday editions of the Boston Herald, Santangelo recounted for columnist Peter Gelzinis how, at the last minute, Williams had told organizers of a 2006 Congressional Medal of Honor banquet in the city that a “pressing engagement” would prevent him from serving as master of ceremonies and keynote speaker, as he’d agreed to do six months earlier. 

He would instead only have time to greet the audience. As members of the committee that arranged the event, Tom Lyons and Santangelo were disappointed, but arranged for a police escort to rush Williams to the airport to catch his plane back to NYC. After the banquet, as they and other committee members relaxed in the hotel lounge, Santangelo’s wife phoned from their room to say she knew why Williams had to bail out.

She was watching the NBC Nightly News anchor ham it up with Seth Meyers and Amy Poehler in a Weekend Update sketch on “Saturday Night Live.” read more here

Friday, January 9, 2015

The best within some defeats the worst a few can do

Wounded Times
Kathie Costos
January 9, 2015

It always seems to end this way. Someone decided to use their time and energy to make the world a worse place but they end up making it better. How many times have we gone through  horrific acts only to rediscover the best of what we can offer each other?

It happened right after the first bomb went off in Boston at the marathon. One bomber was killed and the other is getting ready to go on trial.

The Boston Marathon bombings and subsequent related shootings were a series of attacks and incidents which began on April 15, 2013, when two pressure cooker bombs exploded during the Boston Marathon at 2:49 pm EDT, killing 3 people and injuring an estimated 264 others. The bombs exploded about 12 seconds and 210 yards (190 m) apart, near the finish line on Boylston Street.


Instead of running away after the first bomb went off, people ran to help the wounded.

Twelve seconds later, another bomb exploded. More ran to help not knowing if there would be another one or not. The will to help overcame their fear.

It happened in France. The murderers didn't get away with it. Oh, not just the crime itself but they didn't get away with what their goal must have been. Sure people were afraid but they overcame that fear, gathered together while the murderers were still running around and they sent a message. "Not Afraid"


I Am Charlie’: ’Je Suis Charlie’ goes viral after France attack People gather in solidarity of the victims of a terror attack against a satirical newspaper, in Paris, Wednesday, Jan. 7, 2015. Masked gunmen shouting "Allahu akbar!" stormed the Paris offices of a satirical newspaper Wednesday, killing 12 people, including the paper's editor, before escaping in a getaway car. It was France's deadliest terror attack in living memory. (AP Photo/Thibault Camus)

I have a feeling they were at least a little afraid but their need to show they were not willing to live in fear was remarkable.

Now it looks as if there has been some closure.
France: Raids kill 3 suspects, including 2 wanted in Charlie Hebdo attack
CNN
By Greg Botelho
Updated 3:01 PM ET, Fri January 9, 2015

(CNN)A pair of dramatic raids Friday in France led to the killing of three terrorists -- one suspected in the fatal shooting of a policewoman, the other two in the massacre at the offices of Charlie Hebdo magazine -- and to the freeing of at least some of those they were holding hostage.

The French government's work is not over. There's still a lot of healing to do, a lot of questions to answer about how to prevent future attacks, and the fact that a woman wanted in the policewoman's shooting remains at large.

Still, as Interior Minister Bernard Cazeneuve said, "The nation is relieved tonight."
read more here

Closure for the murderers anyway. As for the people, this will go on and on long after the names of the murderers have slipped off memories of the days people stood up to murderers and said WE WIN! Not defeated. Not forced to hide their love for other humans, the need to be connected with mercy and compassion.

That is what murderers never really understand. They can take a life but they can't take the best we have out of the living.

Average people do it all the time. Some run to help while others, understandably, run away. It is just the need to help is stronger than self-preservation.

It happens in the military when average men and women decide they want to do whatever they can to be of service to others. Among the many careers they could train for, they pick the hardest one of all.

They join during peacetime like they did between the major wars Gulf War (1991) and Afghanistan (2001) and Somalia (1993) Haiti (1994) Kosovo (1999) They did it all even after veterans of Vietnam were mistreated by the public for years.

There were many examples of compassion in Vietnam. Because brave photojournalists we were shown exactly what that looked like.
For everyone of the wounded, many more decided to risk their lives to help them survive. In this picture there are at least 7 others risking their lives for this 1 wounded soldier.

It is the depth of their ability to care for others more than themselves that causes so much pain and grieving.  The more they feel, the more they feel it all.

It is by that same strength they can overcome the worst that is happening inside of them.  That same strength can help them heal.  They just need to look at things in a different way because while they were focusing on the worst man was capable of doing to others, the best man was busy doing all he could do for others.

There is no cure for PTSD but no one is frozen the way they are today.  They can heal.  They can get better and live happier lives.  They still have a lot more to give to others and thank God they do because the best that is within them has not seen the end of their story.

Friday, October 10, 2014

France Presents Legion of Merit to Boston WWII Veteran

Boston WWII veteran to receive France’s highest honor
Boston Globe
By Kiera Blessing
GLOBE CORRESPONDENT
OCTOBER 10, 2014

David Charter is pictured (right) in this undated photo.

A 90-year-old World War II veteran from Boston is to be named a Knight of the French Legion of Honor, the highest distinction in France, on Thursday.

David Charter, born and raised in Dorchester, enlisted in the US Army Air Forces at 18 and flew 43 missions, fighting in infamous battles like D-Day and the Battle of the Bulge.

“I was always frightened,” Charter said of his time at war. But “it was a job that had to be done, and I did it. ... France understood what we had to go through.”

The Legion of Honor, established in 1802 by Napoleon Bonaparte, was opened to US military veterans 10 years ago, on the 60th anniversary of D-Day. Charter is one of hundreds of veterans in New England to have received the honor since, and one of about 100 from Boston, said Timothy Deer, assistant to the consul general at the French consulate in Boston.
read more here

Sunday, August 17, 2014

Boston Red Sox Remember Major General Harold Greene

Red Sox honor general killed in Afghanistan
Harold Greene was Red Sox fan
WCVB News
August 17, 2014
The family of Maj. Gen. Harold Greene, from left, daughter-in-law Kasandra, son Matthew and daughter Amelia, is honored during the fifth inning of a baseball game between the Boston Red Sox and the Houston Astros in Boston, Saturday, Aug. 16, 2014
AP Photo/Michael Dwyer



BOSTON —The Red Sox had a moment Saturday night to honor Maj. Gen. Harold "Harry" J. Greene, who was killed in Afghanistan earlier this month. He was born in Boston and was a big Red Sox fan.

His family wore Red Sox jerseys and stood on top of the dugout when his picture was shown on the center-field scoreboard after the fifth inning. They received a standing ovation. Greene, the highest-ranking U.S. military officer killed in combat since the Vietnam War, was buried with full honors Thursday at Arlington National Cemetery.

The 55-year-old two-star general went to Afghanistan in January. It was his first deployment to a war zone.
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Friday, July 25, 2014

Vietnam Veteran once paralyzed walks to wed

Love’s ‘double delight’
Longtime couple weds at rehabilitation center that aided groom
Boston Globe
By Derek J. Anderson
GLOBE CORRESPONDENT
JULY 25, 2014
When Dennis O’Brien was admitted to a rehabilitation center in Roslindale six weeks ago, he was caught in a nightmare: diagnosed with a rare disorder and paralyzed from the neck down.

But on Thursday afternoon, life took a dramatic turn for the 66-year-old Vietnam veteran. O’Brien, able to walk now and standing with only a cane in the Hebrew Rehabilitation Center, married his longtime girlfriend Dorothy K. Smith in front of family, friends, and staff.

“It was a double delight,” said O’Brien, who was discharged the same day. “We had a marriage today, and I got to walk out the door when we were finished.”

O’Brien was diagnosed with Guillain-Barre syndrome, a disorder that causes the body’s immune system to attack the nerves.
read more here

Monday, April 28, 2014

Quiet Boston Marathon Hero Receives Soldier's Medal

Boston Marathon hero awarded Soldier's Medal
US Army Corps of Engineers
By Bernard Tate
Headquarters
Posted 4/28/2014

BOSTON-- Many Americans have seen the shaky photos and videos taken when the bombs exploded at the finish line of the Boston Marathon on April 15, 2013. Among the many people who went to the aid of the injured, there are glimpses of runners who stripped off their shirts to tie tourniquets around the shattered limbs of bomb victims.

One of those unknown runners was Col. Everett Spain, an Army engineer who is earning a doctorate in management at the Harvard Business School. On April 18, in a ceremony on the school's Baker Lawn, Spain received the Soldier's Medal, the Army's highest award for valor in a non-combat situation.

But Spain has shunned any publicity, avoided interviews with the civilian news media.

"First and foremost, I was brought up to believe that military officers should never seek praise for themselves," Spain said. "Our purpose is to serve others through character and leadership."


Despite Spain's modesty, his actions are a matter of public record in images taken during the Boston Marathon attack. He was only about 100 yards from the finish line when the bombs exploded.
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Monday, April 21, 2014

Boston Strong Survivor with PTSD Gained Strength From Soldiers

Soldiers Inspire Boston Marathon Bombing Survivor to Run Again
People Magazine
By JOHNNY DODD
04/20/2014
"Army Lt. Col. Brett Sylvia not only helped counsel Clark, but also oversaw the soldiers who reached out to her. Sylvia says he and his men understood what the 37-year-old mother of two was going through and what she needed to hear."

When the Boston Marathon starting gun goes off Monday, runner Demi Clark will have a group of soldiers to thank as she heads out over the 26-mile course.

Clark says she struggled with post-traumatic stress disorder after becoming the final runner to cross the finish line while bombs exploded and debris rained down around her during the 2013 race.

"So many people around me were hit with shrapnel," recalls Clark, whose left eardrum was blown out by the blast.

"I had such massive guilt that I walked away uninjured."

Within months of the blast, the guilt and memories of the victims, the blood and severed limbs she'd seen, took its toll on her. She began seeing a therapist, who diagnosed her with PTSD.

"I wasn't sleeping, and I was anxious whenever I went into public spaces," she recalls. "I just wanted to close the drapes and become a hermit."
read more here

Nashville Double Amputee Rolling in Boston Marathon

Wounded Nashville vet in today's Boston Marathon
The Tennessean
Heidi Hall
April 21, 2014
(Photo: Photos by John Partipilo / The Tennessean )
What Marine-turned-marathoner Benjamin Maenza calls his arrogance, other people might call his valor. Or tenacity.

Or insanity.

Because Maenza finished his first marathon in 2011, only a year after an IED in Afghanistan efficiently shredded both his legs to above the knee. He used a handcycle to churn out those 26.2 miles without a day's training, and he was hooked.

At 9:22 a.m. today in Boston, the Lipscomb University student will start his seventh marathon. But this one will be like none he's finished before.

He will meet people who lost their limbs — not defending their nation overseas as he did, but because they simply wanted the exhilaration of running in the world's most famous marathon. Three people died and more than 250 were injured when a bomb exploded at the Boston Marathon finish line on April 15, 2013. Some survivors are expected back, some of them in handcycles such as Maenza's.
read more here

Saturday, April 19, 2014

Fort Drum Soldiers in Afghanistan Running Marathon in Remembrance

Fort Drum soldiers to run shadow Boston Marathon in Afghanistan
Watertown Daily Times
By GORDON BLOCK
TIMES STAFF WRITER
PUBLISHED: FRIDAY, APRIL 18, 2014
ARMY PHOTO
From left, Capts. Mike Giaquinto, Matt Peterson and Stephanie Stuck of the 101st Airborne Division pose with Boston Marathon shirts in Afghanistan before today’s running of a shadow race comparable to the Boston Marathon.

Days before runners take to the streets for the Boston Marathon on Monday, deployed Fort Drum soldiers and other military personnel will take part in their own version of the iconic race today in Afghanistan.

Rather than the windy roads by sites like the Ashland clock tower and Boston College, or the crushing climb of Heartbreak Hill, 600 entrants from a range of units and countries will run 26.2 miles on the roads of Bagram Airfield.

This year’s race was organized by Capt. Lukasz Willenberg, a chaplain in the 10th Mountain Division’s headquarters who ran in Boston last year.

The Barrington, R.I., native completed the race, for a fourth consecutive year, about two hours before a set of bombs went off near the race’s finish line at Copley Square.

After a beautiful day of running and beating a personal best time, “all the magic of that day was ruined.” Capt. Willenberg said he and other entrants planned to run in honor of soldiers who have died in Afghanistan, along with victims of last year’s bombings in Boston.
read more here

Tuesday, April 15, 2014

Boston Iraq Veteran-Fallen Firefighter Was Ready To Run Marathon

Fallen firefighter was set to run Boston Marathon
Michael Kennedy's dad taking loss 'one second at a time'
WCVB News
By Jack Harper
Apr 14, 2014

BOSTON —The father of a Boston firefighter killed in a fire in March is remembering his son, who ran to help the victims of last year's Boston Marathon and was training to run this year's race.

A funeral was held for Firefighter Mike Kennedy, who was one of two firefighters killed while battling a fire in Boston.

Wearing a fundraising shirt carrying his son's nickname, Dork, Paul Kennedy said he remembers wonderful times with his only son, including Mike's first Boston Marathon.

"I was close to the finish, and I saw him chugging along and waved. He saw me and stopped. I was in front of the Lenox Hotel. He turned and gave me a hug," he said.
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Amputee Afghanistan Veteran Running Boston-Strong

Army veteran who lost entire left leg in Afghanistan combat plans to run in Boston Marathon
By LARRY LARUE
The News Tribune
April 14, 2014

TACOMA, Washington — The first six times Edward Lychik told his physical therapist he wanted to run again, she was noncommittal, and with good reason.

The combat veteran's left leg had been amputated at the hip socket, and doctors had told him if he walked again, it would be on crutches.

Lychik ignored that diagnosis and kept talking to his physical therapist, Alicia White.

"The seventh time he said he wanted to run, I went in to see our prosthetist and said, 'We've got a problem," White said. "No one with this kind of amputation had ever run before, not like Edward wanted to run.

"We were still coming up with a walking leg, and he wanted to run mountain trails. He was talking about a marathon!"

An Army combat engineer at the age of 20, Lychik turned 21 in Afghanistan on a day that changed his life.

"I was riding in the back of our group and I was shot by a recoilless rifle," Lychik said. "The medic in the same vehicle, 'Doc' Padgett, saved my life, got tourniquets on both my legs so I didn't bleed to death. He did it with one hand wounded by shrapnel.

"I'd been through two explosions there already, had my one-man vehicle blown up. So I thought I knew what had happened. At one point I touched my left leg and thought I felt bone, and someone pulled my hand away and said 'Don't do that.'
read more here

Friday, March 28, 2014

Team Minuteman marching thru Boston to save veterans

26.2-mile march to raise awareness of mental illness among military veterans
Boston Globe
By Jacqueline Tempera
GLOBE CORRESPONDENT
MARCH 28, 2014

Walking 26.2 miles is a physical feat in itself, but imagine trekking the distance while carrying an extra 50 pounds.

That is what a group of 100 people will attempt early Saturday morning, all to raise awareness about mental illness and suicide among military veterans, according to US Army Captain Justin Fitch.

“We do this to represent the burden our brothers and sisters are carrying,” said Fitch, who said he struggled with post-traumatic stress disorder after his first tour in Iraq in 2006. “We carry the weight that they can no longer carry themselves.”

The group, dubbed Team Minuteman, will walk the route of the Boston Marathon while carrying weighted rucksacks. This journey, called “Carry the Fallen” will raise money for Active Heroes, a charity group working to build a military family retreat in Shepherdsville, Ky.

Teams across the world will complete similar walks, said Fitch.

Fitch has served two tours in the military. The first, a 15-month tour in Iraq in 2006, and the second, a seven-month stint as a support officer in a special operations unit in 2009, he said.

After his first tour, he said, he suffered PTSD and depression and contemplated suicide.

“I was in a very dark place,” said Fitch. “But I got help and came back even stronger. Some aren’t so lucky.”
read more here

Thursday, March 13, 2014

Marine from California tackled robber in Boston

Marine comes to aid in purse-snatching
Boston Globe
By Travis Andersen
GLOBE STAFF
MARCH 12, 2014

An intrepid US Marine from California chased and tackled an alleged purse-snatcher in Boston’s Chinatown neighborhood Tuesday night, then held the suspect until police arrived, Suffolk District Attorney Daniel F. Conley’s office said.

A statement from Conley’s office said Demetrick Nealy, 26, of Roslindale grabbed a 41-year-old woman’s purse from behind as she walked down Beach Street at about 7:30 p.m.

A Boston police report said the woman told officers that she “ran after [Nealy] yelling that her purse had been stolen.”

She was heard by the Marine, a 23-year-old lieutenant from Corona, Calif., who chased Nealy for about four blocks and tackled him on Stuart Street, said Conley’s office and police.

“This young man saw what was happening and sprinted into action,” Conley said in a statement.
read more here

Friday, January 3, 2014

Iraq veteran told he'd never run again, will run Boston Marathon

Moving forward
Disabled Iraq War veteran from North to run Boston Marathon for charity
BY RICK FOSTER SUN CHRONICLE STAFF
January 2, 2014
Disabled Iraq War veteran Nick Sousa, 27, says he's running the Boston Marathon to help people as they strive to recover from spinal cord injuries.
(Staff photo by Tom Maguire)

NORTH ATTLEBORO — A disabled Marine veteran says he’ll run in the Boston Marathon to help people attempting to recover from spinal cord injuries.

Nicholas Sousa, 27, an Iraq War veteran, has been accepted as one of three people who will run in April’s race to raise funds for The Journey Forward, a Canton charity that uses a specialized exercise program to help people recover from debilitating injury.

Sousa is attempting to raise at least $7,500 to support his effort on behalf of the charity.

The North Attleboro resident, who served with the Marines from 2005 to 2010, injured his ankle in a training accident, but kept quiet about it, fearing he would not be allowed to deploy with his fellow service members.

“There was a lot of damage,” Sousa said. “They told me I would never be able to run again.”
read more here

Sunday, December 22, 2013

Soldier honored for aiding victims of Boston Marathon bombings

JBLM soldier honored for aiding victims of Boston Marathon bombings
The Olympian
BY KARI PLOG
Staff writer
December 20, 2013

Paul Cusack had certain expectations about running his first Boston Marathon just a short drive from his hometown of Westwood, Mass.

Then the unexpected happened.

Cusack, a 42-year-old Army sergeant, was part of a group representing the 2nd Battalion, 75th Ranger Regiment from Joint Base Lewis-McChord. He finished the 26-mile race under sunny skies just as the Red Sox sealed a victory at nearby Fenway Park, culminating in what appeared to be a perfect spring day.

The euphoria was shattered by two explosions near the finish line on Boylston Street. The blasts, 13 seconds and 200 yards apart, created an atmosphere of chaos. Brothers Dzhokhar and Tamerlan Tsarnaev were responsible for the attack, which killed three people and injured more than 200.

“You take certain expectations with you overseas, and you take other ones when you’re in your hometown,” Cusack told The News Tribune shortly before a ceremony Friday to honor his swift actions to help victims in the April 15 attack. “The wounds suffered by the people were definitely like what you see overseas, unfortunately.”

Cusack, who was given the Soldier’s Medal, was one of 14 medal recipients at the ceremony at Lewis-McChord. The Soldier’s Medal is awarded for acts of heroism not involving conflict with an enemy.
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