Byron Fouty
Specialist, United States Army
April 17, 1988 – July 9, 2008
Age – 20
Waterford, MI
Operation Iraqi Freedom
4th Battalion, 31st Infantry Regiment, 2nd Brigade Combat Team, 10th Mountain Division (Light Infantry), Fort Drum, NY
SPC Byron W. Fouty of Waterford, Michigan attended Walled Lake Central High School where he played football was a member of the drama department. After learning in his senior year the he wouldn’t be able to graduate on time, he opted to earn his GED and then joined the Army in July 2006. He has been missing in Iraq since May 12, 2007. He was among three members of the 2nd Brigade of the 10th Mountain Division captured by terrorists during an ambush.
On June 4, 2007, the terrorist group known as the Islamic State of Iraq declared two captured U.S. Soldiers dead and buried. The message mocked the United States in saying the bodies would not be returned nor found. Fourteen months of relentless efforts by U.S. and Coalition forces proved the terrorists’ taunts false.
Coalition Special Operations Forces accompanied by Soldiers from the 4th Brigade Combat Team, 3rd Infantry Division, recovered the remains and equipment of Staff Sgt. Alex Jimenez, of Lawrence, Mass., and Spc. Byron Fouty, of Waterford, Mich., west of Jurf As Sukhr on July 8, 2008, led to the site by one of the men who buried them.
Jimenez, Fouty, and Pfc. Joseph Anzack, of Torrance, Calif., all Soldiers from the 4th Battalion, 31st Infantry Regiment, 2nd Brigade Combat Team, 10th Mountain Division, were captured and four other Soldiers and their Iraqi interpreter killed during an attack May 12, 2007, outside Yousifiyah, Iraq – an area within the infamous “triangle of death.”
The body of Pfc. Anzack was later recovered from the Euphrates River downstream from the attack on May 23, 2007.
The search for Jimenez and Fouty continued over the following weeks with over 4,000 Soldiers conducting combat operations in support of their recovery. They disseminated posters, talked to the local population and engaged community leaders for help – and absorbed casualties among their own in the determined search that followed.
“The US Army Soldier’s creed states: ‘I will never leave a fallen comrade,’ expressing the belief that there is a bond between professional warriors that can never be broken – not even by capture or death,” said Maj. Gen. Michael Oates, 10th Mountain Division and current Multi-National Division – Center commander.
In June 2007, al-Qaeda in Iraq claimed responsibility for the attack in written postings and a propaganda video posted on extremist websites. Later that month, Coalition forces discovering some personal effects of Jimenez and Fouty, including their identification cards during a raid of a suspected AQI safe house near Samarra, Iraq.
In October 2007, Coalition forces recovered weapons issued to Jimenez, Fouty and Anzack in Fetuah, Iraq. The following month, video evidence depicting weapons and equipment taken from the captured Soldiers was discovered in Iskandariyah, Iraq. Each new finding gave intelligence experts more clues and more suspects, some of whom provided key names and information.
On July 8, the AQI leader led Coalition SOF and Soldiers from the 4th BCT to the site where the Soldiers secured the area. Once on site, however, the AQI leader could not determine the exact location, but led Coalition SOF to another suspect nearby he claimed had information about the burial site.
Coalition forces located and detained the suspect who, after identifying the original burial site, led them to another nearby site where he claimed he had moved the remains. Upon searching the area, Coalition forces discovered their remains and various equipment and clothing.
On July 9, a Criminal Investigation Division forensics team and an investigative officer from MND-C Headquarters traveled to the burial site to survey the area and collect evidence. Later that day, the remains of Staff Sgt. Jimenez and Spc. Fouty were transported by mortuary affairs personnel to Camp Victory, south of Baghdad and prepared for transportation to the United States. At 10:51 p.m., following a ramp ceremony honoring the fallen Soldiers, the airplane departed with Staff Sgt. Jimenez and Spc. Fouty aboard, headed for Dover Air Force Base.
Arriving in Dover, Del., July 10, the remains were transported where a medical examiner analyzed and confirmed they were Jimenez and Fouty. Shortly after positive identification was confirmed, the families of Jimenez and Fouty were informed by U.S. Army officers.
“I would have to say I consider it an honor to have been involved in the recovery of these two Soldiers,” Ruffcorn said.
BY STAFF SGT. MICHEL SAURET, MND-C PAO JULY 15, 2008,