I wrote over the weekend , in part about a man named
Major Ricardo A. Crocker, U.S. Marine Corps, killed in action in Iraq. I
wondered aloud what his friends called him, postulating that we'd never
know.
I was
wrong.
His friends called him
"Rick."
Got an email today, from one of his
friends:
Thanks for the
article-excellent job. And thanks for your service--it is much appreciated. God
bless.
Following is a cut
and paste of the obituary for Rick Crocker (mentioned in your blog) that ran in
the Los Angeles Times. Services will be held on Thursday, and will be attended
by a huge number of local law enforcement as well as military personnel. He
touched a great many lives.
Santa
Monica Police Det. Gregg Kapp pauses in memory of his colleague, whose life-size
cutout photograph in combat gear was kept at the
station. (Ken Hively /
LAT)
And here's the
obituary:
May 29,
2005
MILITARY
DEATHS Marine
Corps Reserve Maj. Ricardo Crocker, 39, Redondo Beach; Dies in Grenade
Attack By Jocelyn Y. Stewart,
Times Staff Writer
In the style of a war correspondent, Marine Corps Reserve Maj. Ricardo A.
Crocker sent regular dispatches to his colleagues at the Santa Monica Police
Department, e-mails and photographs of life on the battlefield in
Iraq.
"Two Marines killed,
several wounded," he wrote Aug. 21. "I was hesitant to write about this,
however, it's the reality of this place. Everyone in the battalion is getting
through this."
In the
style of true friends, Santa Monica officers e-mailed encouraging messages, sent
care packages to Crocker's division and kept a spot for him in the station where
he worked: A life-size cutout photograph of Crocker in his combat gear stands in
the detective squad
bureau.
"It was like he
was still here," Police Chief James T. Butts Jr. said Saturday. "We'd see his
image every day. We'd read the
e-mails."
On Thursday
morning, Crocker, 39, a nearly 10-year veteran of the Santa Monica Police
Department, was killed in a rocket-propelled grenade attack in Iraq's Al Anbar
province — a vast desert region that stretches west from the cities of
Fallouja and Ramadi to the Syrian border. It is now the epicenter of the
nation's insurgency.
Crocker's death has been a tough blow for members of the department, Butts
said.
It was Crocker's
second tour of duty, "and the expectation was he'd be back, just like he was
before," Butts said.
Family members declined to be
interviewed.
Crocker, who
was known as "Rick," was the son of a Navy veteran, Butts said. He spent part of
his youth at the El Toro Marine base, graduated from high school in Maryland and
then enlisted in the Navy. Later he joined the Marine
Corps.
According to the
Department of Defense, Crocker was most recently assigned to the 3rd Civil
Affairs Group, Marine Corps Reserve at Camp Pendleton. As part of Operation
Iraqi Freedom, his unit was attached to the 2nd Marine Expeditionary Force
(Forward).
That was one name - one
pulled at random from the Sunday paper. One of over one thousand, six hundred
and fifty.
Words fail.
Posted @
08:13 PM
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Posted in
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Sendit
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Credo
"Sign on, young man, and sail with me. The stature of our homeland is no more than the measure of ourselves. Our job is to keep her free. Our will is to keep the torch of freedom burning for all. To this solemn purpose we call on the young, the brave, the strong, and the free. Heed my call, Come to the sea. Come Sail with me." - John Paul Jones
"Pardon him, Theodotus; he is a barbarian, and thinks that the customs of his tribe and island are the laws of nature" --George Bernard Shaw, "Ceasar and Cleopatra"
"And those who were seen dancing were thought to be insane by those who could not hear the music."--Friederich Nietzsche
