St. Paul Paper Probes Another 'Soldier Suicide'

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St. Paul Paper Probes Another 'Soldier Suicide'
Submitted by davidswanson on Fri, 2008-06-27 14:51.

By Greg Mitchell, Editor and Publisher


NEW YORK “I’m not going back to Iraq,” Army Sgt. Benjamin Miller, 24 told friends back home in Minnesota. And, indeed, he is not. Three days ago, he was buried, having committed suicide while home on leave. He had been scheduled to get out of the service in January but was “stop-lossed.”

For several years, E&P has covered (sometimes alone among the media) the suicides of U.S. military personnel in Iraq or when they returned home. In most cases, the news only emerges because a local reporter gets on the case. It happened again this week, with the reporter this time Elizabeth Mohr of the St. Paul Pioneer Press.

"It just came out of left field," Miller's sister, Kate Nalipinski, told Mohr. "Ben was so happy-go-lucky that something like this was so out of character for him."

Mohr observed, “Family members say he seemed frustrated and detached. He spoke of cleaning up the carnage of suicide bombings and the unmistakable smell of death."

Miller had enlisted in 2005 and served a 12-month tour in Iraq. The miltiary sent him there again in 2007. And kept him there for 2008, after a stop-loss ruling. By March, Miller's personality began to change. "It started to weigh on his mind that he wasn't supposed to be there," Nalipinski said.

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