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Twice she broke down in tears and the court had to call a recess, she says. William Lavigne II, 37, pictured above, was found in Fort Bragg on December 2. "Mark and Billy had a brotherly relationship and (the second Delta operator) was the papa bear that put them in line, Leshikar's sister described. Each year, they hold a string of events in California, Arizona, New Mexico, Texas, North Carolina, and Virginia, where they sell merchandise, take donations, and raffle off items such as bottles of wine printed with portraits of fallen Delta Force soldiers, concealed-carry holsters, and pistols painted in the colors of the American flag. Because I had been in for 18 months. As to any potential discharge, were not able to comment due to Privacy Act protections., When Connecting Vets reached out to CID on Fort Bragg regarding the deaths of Leshikar, Lavigne and Dumas, spokesperson Christopher Grey said: All I am releasing is it is a homicide investigation. I asked him if I could take a picture in front of their logo to send to my instructor, she says. Leshikar's daughter said that, Uncle Billy was acting strange and that's why I let my daddy in, to the house. Scanlon claims that Vallejo raped her that night, and says that the trauma still haunts her to this day. Connecting Vets contacted Cumberland County Sheriff's Office to obtain a copy of the full incident report, but was told that it will only be released with a court order from a judge. Money Minute, What's next for experimental AI projects in the C4ISR sphere. Theres no doubt that he was charged in Cumberland County, yet strangely, there is no trace of his arraignment or indictment in a publicly accessible database of North Carolina court records. Special Forces soldier, William Lavign, who was found - KonnieMoments When this happens, when you don't have the prosecution of the right guy, it's a string of human misery. I think Ian, he said Will shot at him. Throughout the whole night he kind of acted like a celebrity, Scanlon says. After I gave my statement, the CID agents left the room. He was investigated in 2018 after fatally shooting his friend, Sgt. Alycia Stokes written testimony read. In his heart, he was all for defending people who could not defend themselves, his mother said about her late son. The Special Forces of the U.S. Army are based out of Fort Bragg, as is the powerful and secretive Joint Special Operations Command, making this spot, inland of the Eastern Seaboard, the central node in the United States global special-operations complex. Soldier and veteran found dead at Fort Bragg were BOTH 'being "The shooter's own words bury his ass because there is no screw driver. For good reason: The person or persons who killed Lavigne and Dumas remain at large. Four months before the night in question, Cumberland Countys Alcoholic Beverage Control received a tip from a police officer in Hope Mills, another satellite town of Fort Bragg, about a party occurring in downtown [Fayetteville] in which donations would be accepted, an ABC agent wrote in an affidavit attached to a warrant to search the warehouse and seize alcohol. This is why people don't have any faith in the justice system, Ciolino continued. The tipster also indicated that drugs would be present, the affidavit attested. Spokeswoman Christina Howell said she could not elaborate on the specifics of what happened because stories of individuals at the scene appeared to differ about why they were there and how they know each other, but that it did not appear to be a random incident. Sometimes it only happens because someone with a dog in the fight gets involved. He is courteous, with an iron handshake, and gives his name as Joe. In the event of a terrorist strike, international hostage situation, or loose nuclear weapon, its Delta or Team 6 that the president will call on to respond. When questioned about the apparent inconsistencies in the Army's investigation and the Cumberland County Sheriff's investigation, USASOC spokesmen Col. Tage Rainsford said: It is my understanding that the CID investigation of MSG Lavigne came to the same conclusion as the Cumberland County Sherriffs Office in that it was justifiable and no charges were filed. Two men found dead at Fort Bragg: Update : This ain't Hell, but you can He returned the phone to his wife Laura days later saying he found it between the driver's seat and center console of Leshikar's car. I dont think they go around on shooting sprees. It was the last time they would ever speak. Once at Lavigne's residence, Leshikar's family say the friend took Leshikar's phone. As I wrote in The Fort Bragg Murders, Lavignes dozen-plus deployments to Afghanistan, Iraq, Somalia, and elsewhere had left him addled with trauma and addicted to hard drugs and alcohol. This industrially zoned property, which Vallejo rented from a chemical company, is cut off from any obvious street access, being surrounded on all three sides by train tracks, storage buildings, and scrap yards. She looked up and saw Scanlon emerge from the warehouse and start toward the only outlet to the street, a narrow strip of dirt parallel to the train tracks. Because every man with a dark beard or a hat terrified me., But, the statement continued, I am strong. This list of Delta Force members includes both current and former notable members of the United States Army's 1st Special Forces Operational Detachment-Delta, a tier one special mission unit and part of Joint Special Operations Command. Everything revolved around drinking booze and hooking up. Sgt Lavigne was a Green Beret and Delta Force member. Joseph Morman, Scanlon says. Scanlons SVC her fifth discouraged her from attending, she says. . His death certificate states his last place of residence was in Hope Mills. Lavigne later said in a statement to police he was removing the car's battery. Instead, everything was hushed up. What the defense has to say, you dont want to hear. Calls to Cumberland Country Sheriff's Office detectives to ask specific questions about the investigation went unanswered and the Sheriff's Office did not respond to requests for further comment. I was too scared to go to stores, the gym, and other crowded places. FBI joins Army investigation into 2 bodies found on Fort Bragg Two men found dead at Fort Bragg identified as USASOC - Army Times He was host of the event at Macs that night. He transferred to Fort Bragg three years later to attend the JFK Special Warfare School, the completion of which entitles a soldier to wear a coveted green beret. Click hereto sign up for our weekly newsletter. No reporters attended the subsequent court-martial, and no transcript was made of the proceedings. A news release from the FBI in February stated that the bodies of the men were found near a Fort Bragg training area. She says he grilled her on the quantity of alcohol she had consumed, implying that inebriety had inclined her toward promiscuity. We all knew him, says Roy Lynn Parker, 35. Foul play suspected in deaths of sergeant and veteran at Fort Bragg We are not granting interviews at this time., If you murder a guy who is one of your most elite soldiers in the world and no one gives a shit, it is bothersome, Ciolino said. 1st Special Forces Command ruled that Leshikar's death was in the line of duty, and of no fault of his own. It appears that a lot goes on here.. His spiral into drugs and paranoia culminated in him shooting at a man on the streets of Fayetteville in July 2020. There are no coincidences in life like this. I wanted this all behind me.. The samples proved a match to Vallejos DNA. Most Delta Force soldiers keep a very low profile. Tina watched Vallejo walk up behind Scanlon, causing Scanlon to dart off, according to the statement Tina gave Matrafailo. Court documents state that Dumas broke into an apartment in Walkertown with the intent to terrorize and injure an occupant of the building, on April 11, 2020. She told me, I feel like I just got raped.. And when it comes to courts-martial for whatever crime where the accused is a Navy SEAL or Green Beret, they can be more full of anomalies and surprises than a cheap legal thriller. The nurse took swabs from Scanlons vagina and cervix, and collected as evidence her soiled underwear. Sgt Lavigne was a Green Beret and Delta Force member. In 2020, The New York Times, Associated Press, and CNN would cover the sexual-assault allegation against a Navy SEAL on a base in Iraq. Special Forces Command decided he died in the line of duty, while the local sheriff's office ruled his death a justifiable homicide, all while Lavigne, continued his work with Delta Force. LaVigne was assigned to the Headquarters and Headquarters Company of the U.S. Army Special Operations Command and had been in the Army for 19 years. It was on a public docket, so people can go look it up, says Col. Kazin; however, it was not necessarily on everyones radar.. Soldier and veteran found dead at Fort Bragg had longtime ties to the My (biased) experience, too. The founder and CEO of the nonprofit is a 39-year-old man, Cristobal Lopez Vallejo, who goes by the alias Cris Valley. What the prosecution has to say, you already know, she remembers the SVC telling her. The record states Dumas yelled police open the door after knocking. In his mug shot, Vallejo appeared freshly shaved, his beard gone. He always had something in his hand, Locklear says. St. Louis man telling stories of his thousands of 'capture or kill Scanlon was looking forward to getting the ordeal over with. Delta Force is the Army's special-mission unit for counterterrorism and hostage rescues. As reported in the Army Times, MSG William J. Lavigne was found dead in the training area of Ft. Bragg in North Carolina. Thereafter, things moved very slowly toward a trial. William F. Garrison: Retired Major General. The third was a superficial grazing wound across the left side of his neck, the bullet arching at a 45-degree downward angle, the bullet passing from back to front. RIP, bro., One year later, the authorities have identified no suspects, arrested no perpetrators, and disclosed nothing about the evidence theyve gathered to date. Scanlon and Tina arrived at Macs shortly before 10 p.m. A number of motorcycles were parked out front. The three Delta operators who had been at the warehouse that night took the stand, as did the retired bomb technician, the two civil-affairs officers, and the dancing bartender, as well as the red-haired widow. Ms. Among some operators, the result can be an unhealthy sense of entitlement, in the words of a Special Operations Command internal ethics review made public in 2020. The examination revealed multiple small lacerations on her vulva, as well as a contusion and four scratch marks on her left flank and lower back, from the hood of the car. William Lavigne II, 37, pictured above, was found in Fort Bragg on December 2. Master Sgt. Army records show Dumas served in the Army as a property accounting technician from November 1996 to March 2016, separating as a chief warrant officer 3. Lavigne was a member of the Coast x Coast club and a good friend of Vallejos. On Sept. 30, he arrested Vallejo on a felony warrant for second-degree rape, second-degree sex offense, and sexual battery. Scanlon says reporting the alleged attack, and the subsequent ordeal, hurt her military career. Scanlons testimony was that she had told her special-victims counsel about seeing the Green Berets widow, albeit months after the fact, and that she had instructed the SVC to inform the prosecution of her belated recollection. 1st Class Mark Leshikar. Shortly after she and Tina arrived at Macs the night of the fundraiser, Scanlon recognized the Coast x Coast clubs logo from a Facebook photo of her old ROTC mentor, the ex-Delta soldier, which made her implicitly trust Vallejo and his crew, she recalls. So Leshikar's death remains in conflict. She took him for a run-of-the-mill special-forces veteran, retired from the Army or otherwise discharged, because shed been taught that its against regulations for active-duty personnel to solicit donations for a military cause, and that was the whole point of the Coast x Coast Foundation. A news release from the FBI said investigators are looking to create a timeline of the locations and activities of Timothy Dumas Sr., 44, and Master Sgt. I ask whether Cris Valley is in attendance. He had entered a plea of not guilty. What we noted was a warehouse that appeared to pull double duty as a gym and party location, the ABC officer wrote in an email to a colleague. . Her superiors didnt know about the former, and she herself had reported the latter. The police department promptly fired Matrafailo, who had allegedly done the same to two other alleged rape victims. And I was in law enforcement for all of the years that he was growing up so I was very hard on my kids, tried to make them strong and independent. Scanlon was not excluded from the proceeding, a spokesman wrote in a statement. That August, two investigators, Maj. Brent Goodwin and Arthur Chancellor from CID, paid a visit to the Leshikar family. The death certificates say the two men were found about 3:30 p.m. Dec. 2, in the woods on Fort Bragg. The second man, whose name was not disclosed, was an army veteran previously stationed at the North Carolina military base. There were several people present, and the ABC officers learned that the men were military with security clearances. Out of deference to their service of our nation, the ABC officers let them off with a verbal warning. In his statement to police later that day he said that Leshikar was acting paranoid and believed that they were being followed, and that their conversation was being listened to by a third party. She still didnt know that Vallejo was an active-duty soldier, much less that he was on Delta Force. This is not how I wanted my time. Its not going to be good for you., For the jury, it must have been a somewhat close call, because they submitted at least 18 questions to the witnesses. This Week on SOFREP: A Delta Operator Found Dead, Russian Mercenaries Whoever they are, they were capable of taking out one of the worlds most skilled and experienced gunfighters, without leaving any apparent clue for the FBI or CID to follow. Fort Bragg officials announced that the Master Sgt. Green Beret and Army veteran found dead at Fort Bragg were facing I held really, really tightly to my [family members] hands and stared straight ahead, she says. Anecdote, family member was [redacted] group, got recruited to Delta, turned them down. According to the Leshikar family, the investigators said they had no real jurisdiction over Lavigne since Leshikar was killed off post. He was addicted to Tramadol and self-medicated with . Subsequently, the Army swapped out her SVC four separate times. Are walking blood banks coming to a field hospital near you? Efforts to reach these people by phone were unsuccessful. The main one came back and said, Because it occurred in Fayetteville, we cant help you.. Sad as it is, that happens a lot. At the time he met Scanlon, who was nearly 10 years his junior, Vallejo was a sergeant first class. Even if she werent actually barred from the trial by order of the court, she believed that she had to stay in the witness room until called, and according to Scanlon, the SVC did nothing to correct the misapprehension. It is not clear how the men knew each other. The rest of the court-martial is a black box to her, because she spent it sequestered in the prosecutions witness room, which she says she was not permitted to leave. But the warehouse had no plumbing; there was only a portable toilet out back. She said that this friend got in his vehicle and was driving to Lavigne's house to help sort things out when he allegedly got a second, frantic phone call from Lavigne saying he had killed Leshikar. He was not a quiet professional, she says, using a term that special-operations generals came up with in the 1980s to describe themselves, and since repeated endlessly in the news media. I said, No, find someone else. Seeking to impeach Scanlons credibility and establish that she had tried to conceal the existence of an eyewitness, Poppe sought and obtained the SVCs testimony on this point. Green Beret gunned down by his best friend, a Delta Operator Former Commander of Delta Force from 1985 to 1989. William LaVigne II, 37, and Army veteran Timothy Dumas, 44. I knew I would never find out what really happened that night, that her son had been killed. In August 2016 just two weeks before he met Scanlon he threw out the first pitch at a Padres game in San Diego. Officials have identified Master Sgt. Poppe does not find it remarkable, he says, that he simultaneously represented two members of the most elite military unit in the United States, one suspected of murder, the other accused of rape. After taking her statement and reviewing her text messages, Detective Matrafailo drove her the three blocks to the warehouse in an effort to identify the precise location. He had done three combat rotations with Delta Force two in Afghanistan and one in Iraq but she never guessed that he was a trained killer, in her words. Someone might easily have connected the rape case to the unexplained shooting of a Green Beret by a fellow Special Forces soldier three months earlier. The doctrine, long a target of legislative reform, bars soldiers and sailors and Marines from recovering damages resulting from wrongful acts by the military. As a result, she says, she had to retell her ordeal to five different SVCs, some of whom were unprepared or missed meetings. Lavigne was charged with two felonies in 2019. At the time the body was rolled no screw driver was found, the Medical Examiner's report states. LaVigne also was involved in other Cumberland County cases that never resulted in charges, records show. Dumas was an Army veteran who previously served as the property book officer at 7th Special Forces Group before serving in the same role at Fort Bragg for nine years, according to his LinkedIn profile. He was a part of Leshikar's funeral service, she said. Erin Scanlon wants to go on the record again so that her alleged attacker is identified as Delta Force. Two US servicemen, one who was a member of the elite Delta - Reddit The 37 year old deployed 14 times and was a member of the Delta Squad, an elite special operations force which of course necessitates a wide variety of skills and training to join. Delta Force operator found dead on Ft. Bragg had a dark past - Audacy Why didnt you tell anyone about the witness that came around the corner? she remembers him asking. The bullet fragments under the carpet tell you this guy was shot while he was laying on the carpet incapacitated, he said. A subsequent SOFREP investigation. Consider the bombshell testimony that relieved ex-SEAL Eddie Gallagher of murder charges in 2019 or Trumps intervention in the Fort Bragg court-martial of Mathew Golsteyn, a Special Forces officer who admitted on live TV to killing an unarmed man. Fort Bragg Delta Force Master Sgt. He was quietly court-martialed and acquitted. More than she questions Vallejos acquittal or the jurys decision, Scanlon simply wants to know what happened at the court-martial. No awards. Billys about to be questioned, or face some sort of retribution. There have not been any arrest(s) and we are not releasing any additional details at this time, Shelly Lynch, a spokeswoman for the FBI in Charlotte, said in an email this week. Master Sgt. One woman who was much better acquainted with both men, and the whole Coast x Coast crew, is an ex-soldier whom Ill call Jane for the sake of anonymity. First Class Mark. The girl then mimicking how her father collapsed to the floor. But I know they dont feel how I would feel if I shot somebody.. Scanlon and Vallejo both continued to live in Fayetteville and work on Fort Bragg. PART OF AUDACY NEWS. After that, she put up no more physical resistance. One penetrated his neck and lodged in his back. The shot placement tells you everything you need to know. In the military and in popular culture, their kind is revered. He was taught how to survive behind enemy lines, resist interrogation, and escape from POW camps. Whether the friend also secured Lavigne's phone is unknown. How the Army Finds Out Who Has What It Takes to Join Delta Force Either way, Scanlon was immersed in an unfamiliar process and taking her cues from military lawyers and the judge, all of whom outranked her. Looking back on the court-martial, it was a solid case and my testimony was powerful, Scanlon says, but I was this lowly lieutenant up against Delta Force and USASOC and JSOC, and all that entails. He was the foundation of my family, Leshikar's mother, Tammy Mabey said of her son. Training program helps transitioning service members build their VA careers, 2 US Army helicopters crash in Alaska, killing 3 soldiers, Japanese Breakfast's Michelle Zauner tells Glennon Doyle she is 'afraid of her mental health', Half million PACT Act claims have been filed at VA as budget battle looms, Honoring survivors of military sexual trauma. Parker says that Lavigne once gave him money to cover some court costs. In this regard, Poppe says that she was a commissioned officer a lieutenant who got caught having sex in a compromising position with an enlisted man, Vallejo, technically her military inferior. Its possible that it was expunged, a clerk tells me. It's like winning the lottery twice in a couple years, that's what these odds are.. I firmly believe that I had to be his victim because I was strong enough to report him., She never got the chance to lay any of this on Vallejo, or the court. But Scanlon was in the courtroom on the first day of trial, and Rolling Stone obtained the trial record, which includes a list of witnesses, the lawyers written motions, the judges orders, his instructions to the jury, and other documents that make it possible to reconstruct much if not nearly enough of what happened. Delta Force's Dirty Secret - Rolling Stone A nonprofit associated with the club, the Coast x Coast Foundation, raises money through annual cross-country motorcycle rides to honor fallen special operators. Scanlon previously told her story to Ella Torres of ABC News, who published a thorough report on her case in 2020, and The Fayetteville Observer covered aspects of it in 2019. One of the four Delta Force soldiers present that night was a 33-year-old from Michigan, Master Sgt. Those deleted files were the only record of the testimony the jurors chose to believe over hers. Unlike Tier 2, or white, special-operations forces, made up of ordinary Green Berets, Army Rangers, and Navy SEALs, JSOC units operate under Title 50 of the U.S. Code, which was controversially reinterpreted after 9/11 to permit the military to carry out covert actions, defined by the statute as foreign operations where it is intended that the role of the United States will not be apparent or acknowledged publicly.. The jury should have been brought to the location at night, she says. . They were officers in the Judge Advocate Generals Corps, assigned to the Special Forces. Because she was already guilty of one instance of fraternization, with the staff sergeant to whose house she had been headed to that night, she had a motive to lie and pretend that the encounter with Vallejo was nonconsensual, in Poppes theory of the case. For reasons that remain a mystery, Lavigne had pulled out the .40-caliber sidearm he carried and double-tapped his best buddy right in front of two horrified little girls, his daughter and Leshikars. From March 15 to 19, Leshikar and Lavigne were on vacation with their families at Disney World in Florida. He never denied having sex with Scanlon, but maintained that it was consensual. She understood that beyond a reasonable doubt was a high burden of proof, and evinced no particular desire to see Vallejo in prison. The Coast x Coast Foundation raised $450,943 in tax-free contributions from 2016 to 2020, according to IRS records. And then hes taken out. In September 2015, he went on the Fox affiliate in Colorado Springs, Colorado, with a military dog named Gunner. Attempts to reach these people by phone were unsuccessful, but pretrial filings show that at least two of them were summoned to buttress Vallejos defense of consent. Nances legal reasoning may have been sound, but it still resulted in a rape counselor providing testimony against her own client at trial, a result that another judge might have bent over backward to avoid. This was in violation of regulations that forbid fraternization, or close personal relationships between officers and enlisted soldiers, but as the staff sergeant wasnt in her unit or her chain of command, she thought of it as little more than a peccadillo. William Lavigne III, 37, on Dec. 1-2. William Lavigne and Timothy Dumas were found dead at a training site on Fort Bragg, North Carolina. The trial record shows that Vallejos defense called eight additional witnesses. On Sept. 8, 2021, the Coast x Coast club holds a public event in Fayetteville, at their usual haunt, Macs Speed Shop. I was pissed that another obstacle had gone up, she says. He spent 20 years in the most secretive and elite unit in the U.S. military, the U.S. Army's Delta Force. Its like someone didnt want him to talk. She adds, Im scared to say words like this out loud.. When her contract was up in 2019, she resigned from the Army. He loved weapons. Locklear shows me the spot where she says he once threw a knife into the trunk of a tree in the front yard, which is littered with hundreds if not thousands of cigarette butts. A senior defense official told ABC News in late March 2018 that the shooter was an active-duty member of a Special Missions Unit, known as Delta Force. And that was the reason why my case was handled the way it was., Well after midnight, with Paddys about to close down, Vallejo invited Scanlon and Tina to the after-afterparty at a place he called Warehouse 13. Thinking it was some kind of lounge or club, they took a cab to the location on Worth Street in downtown Fayetteville, only to find that it was literally a warehouse. His truck, a black quad-cab Dodge Ram, was found some 40 miles away, in Scotland County, burned to a fucking crisp, according to his 24-year-old son. Like maybe Im making a bigger deal out of it than it was., It is not your fault, her friend responded, and it is a big deal., Monday morning I went into work, Scanlon says. I know this was specifically Delta Force, but its like this across the whole of USASOC, using an acronym for the U.S. Armys Special Operations Command. Investigators ask that anyone with information about the deaths of LaVigne and Dumas call the FBI Charlotte office at 704-672-6100 or Army CID at 910-396-8777. the deaths of Master Sgt. No more than 10 minutes after arriving, Scanlon sent a text message to a 25-year-old staff sergeant, another soldier at Fort Bragg, whom she occasionally hooked up with. It didnt necessarily mean they didnt believe me. Unfortunately, her experience with the military-justice system greatly set back her career, and would overshadow her whole time in the Army. He was originally set to be tried in civilian court, but Army prosecutors assigned to Special Forces swooped in at the last minute and caused the Cumberland County district attorney to drop the charges so that Vallejo could be tried by the military. Reach Jack Murphy:jack@connectingvets.comor@JackMurphyRGR.Want to get more connected to the stories and resources Connecting Vets has to offer? So who did, and why? USASOC declined to comment based on concerns about privacy, but pointed out that a police investigation and a line of duty report have different burdens of proof.
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