Civilian Contractor Tyrone Woods, Retired Navy SEAL, killed in Libya Embassy Attack
CNN September 14, 2012
Tyrone Woods became a Navy SEAL after his mother suggested he join the military. Friday afternoon, Cheryl Croft Bennett will attend a ceremony to honor the life of her son Ty and grieve his loss after his death along side three other Americans in Tuesday’s assault on the U.S. consulate in the Libyan city of Benghazi.
Woods, who had retired from the Navy, handled security for diplomats and perished with fellow former SEAL Glen Doherty, computer expert Sean Smith and U.S. Ambassador Chris Stevens
On Thursday, a U.S. official confirmed Woods was among the dead. “Tyrone’s friends and colleagues called him ‘Rone,’ and they relied on his courage and skill, honed over two decades as a Navy SEAL,” said Secretary of State Hillary Clinton in a statement.
“In uniform, he served multiple tours in Iraq and Afghanistan. Since 2010, he protected American diplomatic personnel in dangerous posts from Central America to the Middle East. He had the hands of a healer as well as the arm of a warrior, earning distinction as a registered nurse and certified paramedic. All our hearts go out to Tyrone’s wife Dorothy and his three sons, Tyrone Jr., Hunter, and Kai, who was born just a few months ago.”
Civilian Contractor Glen Doherty, former Navy SEAL, ID’d as one of four victims in Libya U.S. Consulate attack
The 42-year-old was part of private security detail and was protecting Ambassador Chris Stevens; also worked against proselytizing by troops
New York Daily News August 13, 2012
A former Navy SEAL from Massachusetts was identified Thursday as one of the four Americans killed in the attack on the U.S. Consulate in Libya on the 11th anniversary of 9/11.
Glen Doherty, 42, of Winchester, Mass., was working a security detail in the volatile nation when he was killed Tuesday, The Boston Globe reported.
“I never thought he’d be another victim of 9/11,” his sister Katie Quigley told the newspaper. Doherty arrived in Libya just six days before his death in Benghazi.
Doherty was protecting Ambassador Chris Stevens and aiding the wounded after the consulate was blasted with rocket propelled grenades during a four-hour firefight, Quigley said.
Stevens and 10-year diplomatic veteran Sean Smith were also killed in the attack. A fourth victim of the attack remains unidentified.
Doherty was a lifelong thrill seeker whose past included stints as a ski instructor and at a flight school.
He spent seven years in the Navy, and belonged to a group that fought against religious proselytizing by U.S. troops.
He left military service to join a company that provides security for U.S. officials overseas, his sister said.
Since going into the security business, Doherty was sent back to Iraq and Afghanistan — and worked in Israel and Kenya, his sister told the Globe.
The family received word of his death on Wednesday afternoon.
igley said she believed the attack was not prompted by an anti-Islamic movie but was premeditated and timed to coincide with Sept. 11.
“Glen was highly trained,” she said. “He was the best of the best. He wouldn’t have gone down for some protest over a movie. This was serious, well-planned, well-executed.”
Mark McGowan, Ex Soldiers, Private Security Contractor dies in Afghanistan
Ex-soldier dies in Afghanistan
Mr McGowan had previously served in the Parachute Regiment.
It is thought he left the Army to become a private security contractor, joining the lucrative “circuit”, as it is known.
The 32-year-old was engaged to be married and had two young children, Manus and Mila.
No details surrounding his death were available last night.
Luke Duffy June 27, 2012
I regretfully announce the loss of yet another fallen comrade and great friend,
Marc McGowan, sadly passed away yesterday while in Afghanistan.
He was a man of great character and a true friend. Always quick to laugh and see the funnier side of almost any event and situation, Marc was a man that could be relied upon to carry you through even the toughest of times.
Marc and I served together in the Parachute Regiment where we developed a strong bond that remained to this day. He will be missed by everyone who knew him.
Sleep well my friend.
Bomb kills security contractor in Iraq’s north
A provincial police officer in Iraq says a roadside bomb has killed one security contractor and wounded three others working for a Turkish security company in the country’s north.
Col. Badkar Shokur says the bomb exploded Sunday morning as a two-vehicle convoy was traveling in the oil-rich city of Kirkuk, 290 kilometers (180 miles) north of Baghdad
Shokur says the four victims were Iraqis working for a Turkish company providing security for a Turkish construction project.
Security contractors are among the favorite targets for al-Qaida-linked insurgents who seek to undermine government efforts to attract foreign companies to Iraq help in post-war reconstruction
Please see the original and read more here
Soldier of Misfortune Justin Pope DynCorp
Claims of a cover-up in the killing of a metro Detroit man in Iraq
Metro Times June 6, 2012
Five years ago, after surviving one tour of duty in Iraq and another in Afghanistan, Cpl. Justin Pope left the Marine Corps to take a lucrative, high-prestige job with a private military contractor providing security at the American embassy in Erbil, Iraq.
From the time he was a kid growing up in Riverview, Pope always knew he would be in a uniform some day, protecting people. The new job would be an extension of that, providing the experience and advanced training that would further his career.
Instead, it brought an end to his life.
On the night of March 4, 2009, the square-jawed 25-year-old was in his room at the embassy compound when a single bullet from a 9-millimeter semiautomatic handgun fired at point-blank range entered his mouth, passed through his brain and exited the back of his skull.
That much, his family knows with heart-rending certainty, is tragically true.
What they refuse to believe is the official account of that killing, a story of mutual, reckless gunplay detailed in the files of the U.S. District Court in Gulfport, Miss.
That is where Kyle Palmer, a young man who went to war with Pope and claimed to love him like a brother, pleaded guilty to one count of involuntary manslaughter and was sentenced to three years in federal prison.
PTSD Casualty- Hidden war zone scars claim another soldier/civilian contractor’s life
Another Defense Base Act PTSD failure.
McIntosh took his own life in February in Harlingen, Texas. He was 35
Doug Robinson at Deseret News June 5, 2012
Dale McIntosh stands with children in Central America. McIntosh did private security work in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Dale McIntosh was no stranger to death. When it wasn’t everywhere around him, it was a constant threat, something that kept him literally looking over his shoulder for months at a time.
A former Marine, he hired himself out as a privately contracted bodyguard in the Middle East, where he lived on the edge and saw and did things so terrible that it haunted him. He survived firefights, ambushes, exploding cars, road mines, snipers and rocket-propelled grenades. In the end, he escaped without any wounds, or at least none we could see.
When he returned, he seemed to be the Dale that his friends remembered — charming, gregarious, warm, outgoing — but inside, he was hurting and disturbed. McIntosh brought demons home with him.
In 2006, I wrote a lengthy profile about McIntosh, then a student at Westminster who took time off from his studies to pursue quick money and an adrenaline fix in Iraq and Afghanistan. This is the postscript: McIntosh took his own life in February in Harlingen, Texas. He was 35
After graduating from Utah State, Dale served five years in the Marines — part of it in special ops — but felt unfulfilled because he never saw action. He compared it to being an athlete who never got in the game. Eager to use his military skills and see action, he signed on to do private security work. At the time, there was a big demand for security firms, the most famous and controversial of which was Blackwater. With a shortage of manpower, the U.S. government hired the firms to protect American interests and personnel in the Middle East. They were largely ungoverned by law, which did not make them popular at home or abroad. McIntosh spent six months in Afghanistan, five months in Iraq, two months in Bosnia and then another two months in Iraq before returning to Utah in the fall of 2005.
Doug Robinson has written at length about his friend Dale. Please read the entire story here
South African security trainer killed in Somalia
AP at Fox News April 28, 2012
A South African security trainer was killed by his bodyguard in Somalia’s semiautonomous region of Puntland, officials said Saturday.
Puntland’s government said in a statement Saturday that it had launched an investigation into Friday’s killing. The statement identified the man as Lodewyk Pietersen, and said he worked for Saracen International, a security firm that trains anti-piracy forces in Puntland. The statement said the South African was 55 and married with children.
South African foreign ministry spokesman Clayson Monyela said Saturday no official word has been received from consular staff handling South African interests in Somalia.
“We have not yet been alerted to such an incident,” he said.
The statement said the trainer was killed while accompanying Puntland’s maritime forces on a government-approved mission targeting pirates near Hul-Anod, a coastal area favored by pirates who use it as a base to hijack ships for ransom.
Pietersen was shot dead by his Somali bodyguard after an argument, according to a Puntland official who requested anonymity because he was not authorized to comment on the matter. The official said Puntland’s security forces were hunting for the killer
First new civilian medal presented posthumously to Norfolk suicide bomb victim Nic Crouch
Norwhich Evening News March 3, 2012
The first of a new set of civilian medals has been presented posthumously to a Norfolk man who died in a suicude bomb blast
But the small piece of metal carries a huge message of hope and comfort for the family of Nic Crouch.
The Civilian Service Medal recalls his service as a private security worker in the Middle East – and sees the fulfilment of a wish he penned in a poignant letter to his parents in north Norfolk in case he was killed.
After Mr Crouch died, aged just 29, in a suicide car bomb blast in Iraq in July 2010, his family received a letter saying: “If I should be killed in Afghanistan/Iraq and the media is interested, I should like them to know how I and all the other former soldiers contributed to the Great Game.
“I seek no personal glory, but many good Paras and ex-Servicemen have died supporting these operations with little or no recognition of their bravery.”
Now after an 18-month battle by his parents, who have moved from Trimingham to Sheringham since Nic’s death, Mr Crouch has been awarded the first of the newly-created Civilian Service (Afghanistan) Medals.
His father Clive Crouch said: “I am pleased we have managed to get a tick in the box for one of Nic’s requests. The medal is not just for him, but for all his colleagues, particularly those who made the ultimate sacrifice.”
With more and more civilian workers doing support duties for shrinking armed forces it was all the more important to get recognition for their service, which was a far cry from the mercenary “dogs of war” that some people associated with overseas security duties.
What Nic did was “duty in a tough environment” and the MP was pleased the posthumous medal was presented at the Foreign Office this week by Alistair Burt, the foreign secretary for Middle Eastern affairs.
“Bereavement is incredibly difficult particularly when a young man is involved, and when you feel there has not been proper recognition of what your child has done. It hurts profoundly,” said Mr Lamb, who hoped the award would help the family move on.
A Foreign Office spokesman said the Queen approved the introduction of the new medal last June, which would be awarded to UK civilians who, like Mr Crouch, had “served in direct support of Her Majesty’s Government’s objectives in Afghanistan since 2001.
“It recognises their dedicated work in this challenging, often dangerous environment. Their important work is integral to the achievement of a stable and secure Afghanistan,” he added, confirming Mr Crouch was the first recipient
Alan McMenemy ‘killed as he tried to escape’
The Telegraph January 5, 2012
The leader of the Iraq Shi’ite militia Asaib al-Haq has said that kidnapped British bodyguard Alan McMenemy had been killed in a clash with his abductors and that the group was willing to hand over his body without conditions.
Alan McMenemy, from Glasgow, was snatched by gunmen posing as police officers at the Iraqi Finance Ministry in Baghdad in May 2007.
He was kidnapped along with three other guards, all former soldiers, and Peter Moore, the IT expert they were protecting. Mr Moore was released alive in December 2009, shortly after the bodies of the three other guards were returned to Britain.
Qais al-Khazali, a Shi’ite cleric who leads the militia, said the four guards were killed when they tried to escape from their captors. He did not say when the escape attempt took place.
Contractor Chris Willden rescues children from freezing river
Former police officer Chris Willden didn’t hesitate when he realized children were trapped in an upside down car in an icy Utah river. He pulled his handgun, pushed it up against the submerged windows and shot out the glass.
Then he reached inside.
“I was trying to grab arms, but I couldn’t feel anything,” Willden said. “I’m thinking … ‘What are we going to do?'”
He turned to see up to eight other passers-by had scrambled down the 10-foot embankment to help after coming upon the accident along U.S. 89 in Logan Canyon on Saturday afternoon.
The driver, Roger Andersen, 46, of Logan, had lost control of the car as he tried to brake while heading northbound in slippery conditions. Andersen was able to free himself, but his 9-year-old daughter and 4-year-old son were trapped along with a second 9-year-old girl.
Highway Patrol Lt. Steve Winward said that after shooting out a window, the rescuers helped turn the Honda Accord upright in the Logan River and rescue all three trapped children.
“(The driver) was panicked, doing everything he could to get in through the doors, but they wouldn’t budge,” said Willden, who had jumped into the water with his own father.
“I remember thinking to myself, ‘You’re going to see some dead kids, get ready.’ I’ve got three of my own and it was going to be (an awful) start to the New Year.”
Willden said he tried unsuccessfully to open windows and doors. He then used his firearm just as he had done in training for his current job as a bodyguard and Department of Defense contractor.
One of the girls had found an air pocket and was breathing fine but was trapped in her seat belt. Willden cut it with a pocket knife and pulled her from the rear passenger window.
Triple Canopy PSC, Mark Fisher, Never Going Back to Iraq
The Fiji Times December 31, 2011 See Also at MsSparky
MARK Fisher is never going back to Iraq. Eighteen days of mental torture at the hands of the Iraqi military and the real threat of being executed at any time still replays through his mind.
Mr Fisher, who was freed by the Iraqi military after US intervention and flew home on Thursday, said he thought his life was over when soldiers ordered him and his team to kneel facing a wall and to put their hands behind their heads.
“I thought, ‘this is it’. The only thoughts going through my head were non-stop prayers. No amount of money is worth going through what happened to me and my team and no amount of training can ever prepare a person for what we experienced,” he said in the safety of his Votualevu home in Nadi yesterday.
Despite being set free on December 27, after spending Christmas in an Iraqi military cell, Mr Fisher has trouble sleeping.
The former Republic of Fiji Military Forces sergeant began working in 2009 as a contractor with Triple Canopy Incorporated ù a private company contracted by the US State Department to remove military equipment from forward operating bases (FOB) in Iraq after the US military pullout.
“That’s what we were doing when we got detained. We had just cleared a FOB when we were stopped five minutes down the road and taken to a military camp. Our captors said they had to make sure that we had the authority to remove the equipment we had with us,” the 41-year old explained.
“As far as we were concerned, we had the green light and the appropriate clearance to do so but the Iraqis thought otherwise.”
During the ordeal, Mr Fisher and his team of seven men, which included Americans and Iraqi nationals, were ordered to eat food that was thrown on the floor.
“We refused to eat it because the cell was filthy. Instead we ate fruits and bribed some of the soldiers to give us chocolates,” he said.
Although their phones were confiscated, Mr Fisher said a colonel, who was sympathetic towards them after experiencing being detained by Saddam Hussein’s regime, allowed them the use of his telephone to contact friends and relatives.
“The Americans called their embassy but I called my wife, Mariah and informed her of what had happened,” said Mr Fisher.
Mrs Fisher said she grew concerned after not hearing from her husband for a few days.
“We normally communicate via texting and when I hadn’t received anything from him for a few days, I knew something was up. When he called and told me he was detained and no one from Triple Canopy had come to see him and his men, I got really angry,” she said.
When she was finally contacted by Triple Canopy, an official said Mr Fisher and his men had been detained but they were being well looked after and housed in warm quarters.
“We were in a cold cell with no mattresses on the floor and it was winter,” Mr Fisher said.
“There was no heating and no blankets and we had to huddle to keep warm.”
When asked what got him through the 18-day ordeal and mental torture, the father of five said it was God and his family.
“The prayers and my faith plus the thoughts of my wife and five children kept me going, hoping for freedom,” he said.
The Triple Canopy team was released after US Congressman Peter King took up the case.
“If it wasn’t for him, I think we would still be there or worse still, who knows what could have happened to us.”
Private Security Contractor Afghanistan RFP
***ONLY CONTRACTORS THAT HOLD A CURRENT AFGHANISTAN MINISTRY OF INTERIOR PERSONAL SECURITY LICENSE AND ARE LICENSED / REGISTERED WITH THE AFGHANISTAN MINISTRY OF TRADE WILL BE CONSIDERED FOR AWARD, OFFERORS WHO DO NOT POSSESS THESE QUALIFICATIONS ARE RESPECTFULLY ASKED TO NOT RESPOND TO THIS REQUEST FOR PROPOSAL***
The CJSOTF-A Contracting Office, Camp Vance, Afghanistan is hereby issuing a combined synopsis/solicitation for Private Security Guard services for FLE Sar-e- Pul, Afghanistan in accordance with the attached SF 1449 and Statement of Work.
This is a combined synopsis/solicitation for commercial services prepared in accordance with the format in FAR Subpart 12.6, as supplemented with additional information included in this notice. This announcement constitutes the only solicitation; proposals are being requested and a written solicitation will not be issued.
The solicitation number for this requirement is H92237-12-R-0041, and this solicitation is being issued as a Request for Proposal (RFP).
The solicitation document and incorporate provisions and clauses included are those in effect through Federal Acquisition Circular 2005-53.
This requirement is unrestricted under NAICS code 561612 and is the Small Business Competitive Demonstration Program is not applicable.
A list of contract line item number(s) and items, quantities and units of measure (including options); a description of requirements for the items to be acquired; dates and places of delivery and acceptance and FOB point; applicable clauses; and the offer due date, time, and location are located in the attached SF1449 and Statement of Work.
The anticipated award date in response to this solicitation is anticipated 11 Dec 2011 and the point of contact for this requirement is LT Dominic Raigoza, email: cjsotfa.ko02@gmail.com (no commercial phone available).
Please see the original with links to documents at FedBiz Ops
Former Australian soldier and Private Security Contractor Gary Peters helps Gaddafi’s son Saadi escape Libya
A FORMER Australian soldier working as a private security contractor has admitted he helped Muammar Gaddafi’s son, Saadi, flee Libya last month.
Saadi’s longtime bodyguard, Gary Peters, has told Canada’s National Post that he was part of a team that drove Gaddafi’s third son across Libya’s southern border to Niger.
Mr Peters, now a permanent resident of Canada, returned to Toronto in September, suffering from an untreated bullet wound to his left shoulder received when the convoy was ambushed after crossing back into Libya.
“I’m not a mercenary,” Mr Peters told the Post, which said his account had been verified by several sources.
“I work for a person in particular, have done for years, for close protection. When we go overseas, I don’t fight. That’s what a mercenary does. Defend? Yes. Shoot? Yes. But for defence, for my boss, and that’s what happened. The convoy got attacked and two of us got hit.”
Mr Peters said he had provided security services to Gaddafi family members since 2004, and continued to do so during NATO’s campaign to oust the late dictator.
Though he worked mostly for Saadi, he also guarded Gaddafi’s other sons, Seif al-Islam and Hannibal, and said he had escorted Hannibal and his sister Aisha from Libya to Algeria in a convoy.
Mr Peters said he first met Saadi while serving in the Australian Army. Gaddafi’s son was visiting the 2000 summer Olympics in Sydney and Mr Peters was assigned to protect him.
After moving to Canada in 2002, Mr Peters said he worked “on and off” for the next two years as a close protection operative for security contractor Blackwater USA, which was barred from Iraq over a deadly 2007 shooting and later renamed Xe Services
Briton, Iraqi driver killed on roadside bomb targeting security firm cars
Kuna News Agency Kuwait June 19, 2011
BAGHDAD, June 19 (KUNA) — A security contractor of British nationality was killed Sunday along with an Iraqi citizen accompanying him on an assault targetting a convoy of security firm in Basra, south of Iraq.
A security source from the police said that the explosive charge exploded near to the intersection between Safwan town and Zubair district, 16 km west of Basra, when a convoy of SUVs of a security firm was passying by in what caused the death of the Iraqi driver, and a Briton security contractor who was with him in the car when it bumped into the roadside bomb.
The blow-up damaged the car in which was the security contractor, and inflicted heavy damages on the other SUV which were part of the autocade.
A security force cordoned off the scene, while the two bodies were transported to a nearby hospital, and investigation started into the accident’s circumstances.
Hashem Al-Luaibi, Basra governorate’s spokesperson, asserted to KUNA the incident, making clear that a Briton serving as a security contractor has been killed along with his Iraqi driver when an explosive charge targeted an autocade of four-wheel-drive cars of their company, west of Basra.
Private Security Contractor Adam Carney’s Family must pay to repatriate body????
Update April 5, 2011 6pm
Family Still Waiting to Bury Son who died in Afganistan
Two weeks after he died of a massive heart attack, former Atlanta police officer Adam Carney’s body is expected to be returned home from Afghanistan, where he was helping train that country’s nascent police force.
But his parents haven’t planned his funeral yet, saying Adam Carney’s employer, DynCorp International, has provided them with “non-answers” and conflicting information about when they could claim the 34-year-old Navy veteran’s remains.
“No mother wants to bury their son,” Wanda Carney told the AJC on Tuesday. “This has just been more torture. No one should have to go through this.”
The Carneys, who flew in from Ohio soon after learning of their son’s death on March 28, say they were informed Tuesday morning that he would be transported to Dover Air Force Base, where an autopsy will be performed. They hope to have the father of two back in Atlanta by the weekend.
“We couldn’t understand what took so long,” said Adam’s father, Michael Carney. “They kept saying, ‘We don’t know.’ Well, why don’t you know?”
A DynCorp spokeswoman said she understands the Carneys’ frustration but adds the delays were out of the company’s control.
With all the blood and misery we deal with here everyday you would think we could not be more outraged than we are today by this….
We’ll be announcing the name of the company asap.
Join law enforcement officers for fundraiser in honor of Adam Carney
DECATUR, Ga. – Former military officer and retired APD officer, Adam Carney died of an apparent heart attack in Afghanistan on Monday night. Carney worked overseas as a civilian contractor. The family must pay to have his body flown back to the United States and buried.
The family and Humble Heroes-Police Memorial are hosting a fundraiser on Tuesday, March 29 from 4:00 p.m. until 10:00 p.m. at Avellino’s Pizza at 902 W. College Avenue in Decatur. Avellino’s will, also, be donating a percentage of proceeds to the Law Enforcement Memorial Ride or the Unity Tour.
Carney’s brother, Josh, currently works as an APD officer and patrols the Zone 6 area. He is survived by a three year old and five year old.
Overseas Civilian Contractors
CIVILIAN CONTRACTOR CASUALTIES
THE BEST KEPT SECRET OF THE WARS
At Least 59 Civilian Contractor Deaths Filed on in Second Quarter of 2012
At Least 49 Civilian Contractor Deaths Filed on in First Quarter of 2012
At Least 418 Civilian Contractor Deaths in 2011
Our Fallen Contractors Memorial
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A United Nations Mine Action Employee has filed a lawsuit against
for negligence after stepping on a landmine resulting in an immediate below the knee amputation in an area previously cleared by and certified clear of landmines by Ronco Consulting.
The United Nations board of inquiry found that Ronco failed to find the mine that injured Mr Fartham as well as three other mines.
The complaint states that Ronco Consulting, acting through it’s agents and/or employee’s, breached it’s professional duty of care to Fantham and did not exercise the reasonable care and skill expected of professional mine clearance companies.
Ronco Settles Negligence Lawsuit with UN Mine Action Employee
Ex Pat 2011 Tax Information UPDATED
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