Thomas Lowell Tucker
May 5, 1981 - June 19, 2006
Place of birth: Madras, Oregon, USA
Place of death: Iraq
Rank: PFC
Unit: 1st Battalion, 502d Infantry Regiment, 2nd Brigade, 101st Airborne Division (Air Assault)
Battles/wars: Post-invasion Iraq
Thomas Lowell Tucker (May 5, 1981 - June 19, 2006) Madras, Oregon, was a Private First Class of the U.S. Army. He was one of two U.S. soldiers kidnapped by the Mujahideen Shura Council during an attack that left a third soldier Spc. David J. Babineau shot to death on a roadside checkpoint on June 16, 2006, in Youssifiya, Iraq - an area known as the Triangle of Death.
Menchaca was assigned to the 1st Battalion, 502d Infantry Regiment, 2nd Brigade, 101st Airborne Division (Air Assault), Fort Campbell, Kentucky. PFC Kristian Menchaca also went missing in that incident. Residents in the area were offered $100,000 for any information leading to the finding of the soldiers but they refused, one witness even said: "I will not do it even if they pay one million dollars,"..."They deserve all that they are facing . . . we are living a hard life because of them."
On June 20, 2006, military sources reported that the bodies believed to be Tucker and Menchaca were found in Youssifiyah. The bodies of two U.S. soldiers were mutilated and booby-trapped, with IED's on the road leading to them. The director of the Iraqi defense military’s operation room Major General Abdul Aziz Mohammed told Reuters that the men were tortured and killed "in a barbaric way". Mujahedeen Shura Council, a group linked to al Qaeda, said in their statment: "We announce the good news to our Islamic nation that God's will was executed and the two crusader animals we had in captivity were slaughtered"..."And God has given our Emir, Abu Hamza al-Muhajer, the good fortune of carrying out the legitimate court's command in person." Pentagon spokesman Bryan Whitman, when asked about the claim by the Shura Council that it was holding the soldiers, said they have no independent confirmation of that report. Another US soldier was killed and eight were wounded during the search operations.
On July 3, PFC Tucker was honored in his home of Central Oregon beginning with a funeral service at Deschutes County Fairgrounds followed by a funeral procession, eight miles long, to Madras his home town where he was burried at Mount Jefferson Memorial Park Cemetary. Along with hundreds of local mourners of PFC Tucker and military dignitaries, the burial was also attended by Oregon Governor Ted Kulongoski, U.S. Rep. Greg Walden and others. Even after PFC Tucker's burial, banners, pictures and other signs of support remained on display around Madras.
Kristian Menchaca
May 29, 1983 - June 19, 2006
Place of birth: Houston, Texas
Place of death: Iraq
Rank: PFC
Unit: 1st Battalion, 502d Infantry Regiment, 2nd Brigade, 101st Airborne Division (Air Assault)
Battles/wars: Post-invasion Iraq
Kristian Menchaca (May 29, 1983 - June 19, 2006), Houston, Texas, was a United States Mexican-American Private First Class of the U.S. Army. He was married to Christina Menchaca of Big Spring in September 2005, before he deployed to go to Iraq.
Military Life
Menchaca was one of two U.S. soldiers kidnapped by the Mujahideen Shura Council during an attack that left a third soldier Spc. David J. Babineau shot to death on a roadside checkpoint on June 16, 2006, in Youssifiya, Iraq - an area known as the Triangle of Death. Menchaca was assigned to the 1st Battalion, 502d Infantry Regiment, 2nd Brigade, 101st Airborne Division (Air Assault), Fort Campbell, Kentucky. PFC Thomas Lowell Tucker also went missing in that same incident. Residents in the area were offered $100,000 for any information leading to the finding of the soldiers but they refused, one witness even said: "I will not do it even if they pay one million dollars"..."They deserve all that they are facing . . . we are living a hard life because of them."
On July 10, 2006, a video showing the bodies of Kristian Menchaca and Thomas Tucker was posted on an Extreme Islamist website, purportedly by al-Qaida in Iraq. Although the video does not show the actual executions, it shows the two corpses laid out on a road and being taunted by the alleged captors, who present the head of Thomas Tucker to the camera like a trophy, and stomp on the head of Kristian Menchaca.
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