Army News, news from Iraq, - Army Times

House: Release report on Tillman death

Buried in the $124 billion House version of the wartime supplemental appropriation is an order to the Defense Department to release a report on the April 2004 death in Afghanistan of Army Spc. Patrick Tillman.

Tillman, who gave up a professional football career to join the Army after the 2001 terrorist attacks, was killed in what was later revealed to be a friendly-fire incident, although his family initially was given another story in which Tillman was killed by enemy forces.

Tillman turned down a contract with the Arizona Cardinals to enlist in the Army and, along with a brother, became an Army Ranger. His unit was in eastern Afghanistan when he was shot during a firefight.

What made the incident all the worse for the family was that Army leaders knew Tillman had been killed by friendly fire but did not tell them, which helped feed complaints from the Tillmans and other families that they were not being told the truth about war casualties.

After questions were raised about the Army’s ability to investigate itself, the Defense Department Inspector General’s Office in August 2005 started its own review of the incident and the Army’s handling of the investigation. Who knew what, and when, and why Tillman’s family wasn’t told the truth before a very public funeral, are among the issues being investigated.

The committee orders the full incident report on the circumstances surrounding Tillman’s death to be released to his family and to Congress within one month after the bill becomes law.

“How the Army and the Department of Defense handled this investigation is inexcusable,” the House Appropriations Committee says in its report accompanying the supplemental bill. “It has been nearly three years since the beginning of the Army’s investigation and the Tillman family still has no resolution on the death of their son.”