By Donna Leinwand Leinart and Elizabeth Weise
Article from USA TODAY
BONNEY LAKE, Wash. – In his dress uniform, Staff Sgt. Robert Bales's chest would boast the ribbons and medals of a decade of exemplary service: Three good conduct medals, six Army Commendation medals, two Meritorious Unit commendations and a slew of combat and service ribbons.
In Bales' own words, his motives were pure. He told a military publication proudly that after the bloody battle of Najaf in 2007, he and his fellow soldiers helped the people who had tried to kill them earlier that day. "I think that's the real difference between being an American as opposed to being a bad guy," Bales told the Northwest Guardian.
And in the eyes of a loyal wife, the father of her two young children would still do his duty, even after he was passed over for a promotion last year. "It is very disappointing after all of the work Bob has done and all the sacrifices he had made for his love of his country, family and friends," Karilyn Bales wrote in a family blog called The Bales Family Adventures.
STORY: Combat stress could be part of suspect's defense
Bales, 38, the soldier accused of killing 16 Afghan villagers, mostly women and children, now awaits his fate in a solitary cell in the military jail at Ft. Leavenworth, Kan., Col. James Hutton said in a statement.
Bales allegedly sneaked off his small post in the Panjwai district in Afghanistan's unruly Kandahar province, a Taliban stronghold, around 3 a.m. last Sunday, walked to two villages where he entered homes and shot, stabbed and burned sleeping families, including nine children.
Although Bales and his family resented his expected fourth deployment, little in Bales' past suggests he harbored unharnessed anger or had become unhinged.
Senior military officials have suggested a combination of alcohol, combat stress and marital strife played a role in the massacre.
By Elizabeth Weise, USA TODAY
The home of Army Staff Sgt. Robert Bales, who is accused of killing 16 Afghan civilians, is located in Bonney Lake, Wash.
But Bales' attorney John Henry Browne, who said he spoke briefly to the soldier, said the couple's marriage is solid. Browne told reporters at a press conference that Bales, the day before the shooting, had seen a fellow soldier lose a leg after stepping on a buried mine. Browne said he, civilian lawyer Emma Scanlan and military defense counsel Maj. Thomas Hurley will meet with Bales this week.
"Public reports that Sergeant Bales' supervisors, family and friends describe him as a level-headed, experienced soldier are consistent with information gathered by the defense team," Browne said in a statement. "It is too early to determine what factors may have played into this incident."
Bales' family is "stunned in the face of this tragedy, but they stand behind the man they know as a devoted husband, father and dedicated member of the armed services," the statement said.
Bales grew up in Ohio. He played offensive guard on the high school football team and was elected sophomore class president, yearbook photos show.
In Norwood, a suburban community near Cincinnati, friends and neighbors reacted with shock.
"That's not our Bobby Bales," said Michelle Cadell, who with her brother Micheal Blevins grew up across the street from Bales and knew him from childhood.
Bales' parents, Bernice and Garfield Bales, raised five sons in Norwood. Bales is the youngest, she said. Cadell recalled Bales' childhood fascination with mechanical things. He would watch intently as neighbors worked on their cars, she said.
Blevins said Bales, who considered studying physical therapy in college, helped a neighbor family take care of a young man who had multiple physical disabilities. "You don't understand what a family-oriented man this was," Cadell said. "And it was more than his family. He had an extended family."
As a teen, he once confronted a group of rowdy youngsters who'd gathered in front of Cadell's home and told them to leave. When one of the men physically challenged Bales, he decked the challenger and the group left, she said. Then Bales apologized to Cadell's mother for the unseemly scene.
Blevins, who admired Bales and followed him around "like as a little shadow" when he was young, called Bales a "hero of the neighborhood … a good influence."
Bales "overachieved on the football field," said John Stacy, a high school friend of Bales who now is Norwood Middle School's dean of students. "He wasn't the biggest of guys. He worked hard."
After high school, Bales played football at College of Mount St. Joseph in Delhi Township outside Cincinnati, but then transferred to Ohio State, where his friends said he majored in economics. Ohio State officials told the Columbus Dispatch that Bales attended the school from 1993 to 1996, but didn't graduate.
Military records indicate he completed two years of college. Bales also spent time in Jensen Beach, Fla., where he opened an investment business that he registered with the state.
Bales, then 27, enlisted in the Army on Nov. 8, 2001, just two months after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks on New York and Washington. He was assigned to the Third Stryker Brigade in the Second Infantry Division, Browne said.
The next year, police arrested Bales at a Tacoma motel for allegedly assaulting a girlfriend. He completed 20 hours of anger management counseling and the case was dismissed in 2003.
A separate hit-and-run charge was dismissed in Sumner, Wash.'s municipal court three years ago, according to records. It isn't clear from court documents what Bales hit; witnesses saw a man in a military-style uniform, with a shaved head and bleeding, running away.
When deputies found him in the woods, Bales told them he fell asleep at the wheel. He paid about $1,000 in fines and restitution and the case was dismissed in October 2009, two months after he deployed for a third time to Iraq.
After the Army stationed him at Joint Base Lewis-McChord near Tacoma, Wash., he put down roots. He married in 2005.
Bales and his wife, Karilyn Primeau Bales, purchased a modest two-story house in Bonney Lake, Wash., in a working class neighborhood known as Lake Tapps. They had two pre-school aged children, a boy and a girl.
Bales deployed three times to Iraq. He served a year from Nov. 1, 2003, to Oct. 1, 2004, and returning again for 15 months beginning in June 19, 2006 to Sept. 22, 2007.
Bales, an infantry soldier, trained as a sniper and visual tracker in 2008 and completed a series of leadership courses, including the Warrior Leaders and Advance Leaders courses.
Neighbors said he spoke reluctantly and humbly about his wartime service.
"When I heard him talk, he said … 'Yeah, that's my job. That's what I do'," said Kassie Holland, a next-door neighbor. "I can't believe it was him."
During his 2007 deployment, a military history account indicates Bales participated in a critical battle in Najaf, Iraq, to rescue a downed Apache helicopter. "We discriminated between the bad guys and the combatants, and then afterward we ended up helping the people that three or four hours before were trying to kill us," Bales is quoted as saying in February 2009.
On April 1, 2008, he earned a promotion to staff sergeant. He deployed for a 10-month stint on Aug. 8, 2009, returning June 4, 2010, Army records show.
Browne said Bales suffered a minor head injury in 2010 as a passenger in a Humvee that flipped over. That accident may have caused a "traumatic brain injury" that could have contributed to Bales' distress at redeployment, he said. Browne also said Bales lost part of his foot in another incident.
An Army account of Bales' service record does not indicate he received a Purple Heart for any injuries.
After three deployments and two injuries, the military told Bales he would not return to the Middle East battlefields.
"The family was counting on him not being redeployed," and were "not happy" he was going back, Browne said.
He left for Afghanistan on Dec. 1.
Now the Bonney Lake house is dark, empty and up for sale. Two stacks of flattened, cardboard boxes and a child's sled filled the front porch and a bright flower wreath hung on the front door. Tools lay abandoned on the back deck. The remains of a child's birthday party are visible through the window.
The military moved the family to the base last week for their protection.
Ryan Hills, 34, his wife, Staci, and children share a back fence with the Bales, but had minimal contact. The couple seemed nice, they said.
"He was a super nice dude," Hills said. "We'd only really talked once, right after we moved in."
"They were quiet neighbors, no problems," he said.
Next door to the Hills family, a woman who declined to give her name said her family moved to the neighborhood three weeks ago and noticed that the Bales' home seemed to keep their lights on day and night. Then, on Thursday, the house went dark.
Hills said he's seen news reports that Afghans have threatened retaliation against Bales' family. He said he fears for the neighborhood.
"You never know," he said.
Contributing: Jim Michaels; Denise Amos Smith, Mark Hansel and Carrie Whitaker of the Cincinnati Enquirer, and Associated Press.
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