Army says Afghan losses affected Lewis-McChord soldier killed by police

TUCSON, Ariz. — An Army investigation has found that a Joint Base Lewis-McChord soldier who was killed when he opened fire on police in Utah last year was deeply affected by his deployment to Afghanistan.

Spc. Brandon Barrett deserted his unit, suffered an apparent mental breakdown and died in a shootout with Salt Lake City police on Aug. 27. A police officer was wounded.

The Army report provided to his family in Tucson and shared with the Arizona Daily Star concluded he saw so much mayhem during his yearlong deployment that he was deeply affected.

At least three times during his year overseas with the 5th Stryker Brigade, Barrett, a 28-year-old infantryman, saw comrades killed or wounded by suicide bombers or explosives.

"Spc. Barrett had experienced significant losses in combat that affected his behavior and actions leading up to the incident" in which he died, the report said.

The report recommended several changes to help troops returning from combat to Joint Base Lewis-McChord. Those include a telephone hotline and better documentation of AWOL soldiers.

Officials at the base were slow to react and failed to notify the soldier's family when the first hints of trouble surfaced, according to the report. Those oversights have left his family agonizing over whether the death was preventable.

"My family and I strongly believe that if notification had been made in a timely manner, Brandon would be with us here today," Shane Barrett, a Tucson police detective, said of his younger brother. "We could have at least had the opportunity to help him."

The Army denied Barrett a military funeral, enraging many combat veterans.

No one at Army headquarters has read the report on Barrett's case because it wasn't sent up the chain of command and wasn't required to be, said a spokesman, George Wright.

Despite the signs that he was having problems after returning from combat, including an on-base drunken-driving arrest, superiors did not consider Barrett at risk of postwar problems.

He was sent to a substance-abuse program but was not examined for underlying mental-health issues, the report said.

"Those certainly are red flags," H. Clarke Romans, executive director of the Tucson chapter of the National Alliance on Mental Illness, said of the self-reported symptoms.

But Ken Mroczek, a psychologist who counsels war veterans at the Tucson Vet Center, said not every soldier who reports such things is a candidate for major problems.

"We can look backward and say, 'This person should have been identified,' but there are so many people who go through those problems," Mroczek said. Often, they are "normal phases" of postwar adjustment.

After his DUI, Brandon Barrett came to Tucson to stay with his parents, Gail and Bill Barrett, on what they assumed was a normal leave. They didn't learn until weeks later that their youngest son had gone AWOL and was sending dark messages to comrades.

In a text message nine days before his death, he said he had purchased 500 rounds of ammunition and was going to show the Army "why they shouldn't (mess) with recently deployed soldiers," the Army report said.

The friends reported the messages, but the Army did not warn authorities in Utah.

The Salt Lake Tribune reported in October that Army investigators were worried that Barrett might commit a mass shooting but took no action.

Several days later, Brandon Barrett said he planned to return to the Army. Instead, he drove to Salt Lake City and dressed as if preparing for battle.

Wearing camouflage and body armor, and toting 1,000 rounds of ammunition and several personally owned firearms, he told passers-by outside a downtown luxury hotel he was "in training."

He fired when police arrived. Police fired back, killing the soldier in what his family views as a "suicide by cop."