DOD identifies four killed in Sunday's insider attack
The Department of Defense announced today the deaths of the four soldiers killed in Sunday’s “green-on-blue” attack in Zabul province. Killed were:
• Sgt. Sapuro B. Nena, 25, of Honolulu, assigned to 2nd Battalion, 3rd Infantry Regiment, 3rd Stryker Brigade Combat Team, 2nd Infantry Division, Joint Base Lewis-McChord, Wash.,
• Spc. Joshua N. Nelson, 22, Greenville, N.C., assigned to 202nd Military Intelligence Battalion, 513th Military Intelligence Brigade, Fort Gordon, Ga.,
• Pfc. Genaro Bedoy, 20, of Amarillo, Texas, assigned to 52nd Infantry Regiment, 3rd Stryker Brigade Combat Team, 2nd Infantry Division, Joint Base Lewis-McChord, Wash.
• Pfc. Jon R. Townsend, 19, Claremore, Okla., assigned to 1st Battalion, 23rd Infantry Regiment, 3rd Stryker Brigade Combat Team, 2nd Infantry Division, Joint Base Lewis-McChord, Wash.
The DOD news release only stated that the four died “of injuries suffered when their position was attacked with small arms fire.”
Earlier Wednesday, KUAM News on Guam reported that the governor’s office identified Nena as having been killed in Afghanistan. Gov. Eddie Calvo issued a statement on behalf of his family and Lt. Gov. Ray Tenorio and his wife, offering their heartfelt condolences to their family.
No other information about Nena was available.
Nelson’s father, Brian, told WITN in eastern North Carolina that he was notified Sunday that his son was killed.
Nelson — who married his wife, Quinisha, in 2011 — left in May for his first deployment, according to his father.
In a video on the station’s website, Nelson’s father remembered his son.
“Josh was approximately 18 months,” Brian Nelson said. “His first drum set was my daughter’s doll house. And everywhere he went, he took that doll house and two spoons.”
In a report in the online editions of the Lubbock (Texas) Avalanche-Journal, Bedoy’s high school football coach Bryan Welps remembered him as a courteous young man.
“Genaro was a good kid,” said Welps. “He always worked hard for me. He was very nice and respectful. He had a passion for doing the right thing.”
Welps said he and Bedoy discussed the decision to join the Army.
“I thought it would be good for him,” Welps said.
Bedoy is survived by a wife and infant child, according to Avalanche-Journal.
In online editions of the Tulsa (Okla.) World, Townsend’s mother, Karen Nelson, said her son wanted to join the military or law enforcement for years, but was foremost friendly and outgoing, and willing to share his faith.
“[He] had music in his heart and soul,” she said. “He was very God- and church-oriented. He loved sharing with other kids about God, about music.”
A 2011 high school graduate, the Townsend married his wife, Brittany, when he was on leave this spring and the couple spent only a few days together before he returned to Afghanistan, Nelson told the Tulsa World.
“Before he was killed, he called me almost every day until Thursday,” Nelson told the paper. “He was a young man [who] wasn’t afraid to say, ‘I love you,’ or hug you. He never, ever failed when he walked out that door to say, ‘I love you.’ He was so full of life and energy.”
