NEW BEDFORD, Mass. -- The sendoff for Staff Sgt. Joseph Camara last
winter had long passed, but the seven fading American flags and a
message wishing him luck continued to hang from the porch of his home in
the city's South End.
His family learned yesterday that there will be no homecoming for
Camara, a veteran National Guardsman and New Bedford police officer. He
was one of two soldiers assigned to the 115th Military Police Company of
the Rhode Island National Guard who was killed on Monday outside of
Baghdad.
Lt. Col. Michael B. McNamara said that Camara was in the front passenger
seat of a Humvee that was blown apart by an "improvised explosive
device," better known as a land mine. Sgt. Charles Caldwell, of
Providence, who was manning the machine gun atop the vehicle, also was
killed.
Camara was in charge of the three-person unit that was on patrol Monday
morning.
"My understanding is that the people who died, died instantly," said
McNamara.
In New Bedford, an old whaling city in Southeastern Massachusetts, word
spread that one of its sons had become a casualty of the conflict in
Iraq.
Around noon, Col. William Babcock, a casualty notification officer for
the Rhode Island National Guard, got word from the National Guard base
in Fort Drum, New York, that Camara had been identified as one of the
fallen soldiers.
Babcock drove to New Bedford and met with Police Chief Carl Moniz.
Babcock, Moniz and a female police officer went to Camara's apartment to
deliver the tragic news. They met with Camara's wife and mother.
"The grief was tremendous," Moniz said. "It was a very, very bad thing
that they experienced today."
A steady stream of red-eyed friends and family members quietly filed
into the tidy white vinyl-sided triple-decker with lavender shutters at
13 McGurk St., where Camara, 40, lived with his wife, Anna, and their
three children, Matthew, Angela and Ashley.
The family politely declined to speak to several reporters, but they
brought out a framed-photograph of Camara in his light blue New Bedford
police uniform and cap. He had been a police officer for four years.
The Rev. John Sullivan, the police chaplain and pastor at St. Lawrence
Church, stopped by for a few minutes in the afternoon.
"There's a lot of family there," he said. "There seems to be a lot of
family support."
A neighbor, Ivo Furtado, and his family crossed the street with a
bouquet of flowers and paid their respects.
Furtado, a stonemason, said that Camara was a strong family man who
spent all his free time with his children, playing sports and carting
them to various activities. Camara worked the midnight to 8 a.m. shift
patroling the city's North End, so he was available to pick up his kids
from school in the afternoon. Furtado said the family also took karate
classes together.
"He was a loving husband, a loving father," he said. "He was always
doing something with the kids."
Furtado said the flowers were a small gesture.
"There's very little we can do, but it's our way of saying, 'Thank you.'
"
New Bedford Mayor Frederick M. Kalisz Jr. said he had just wrapped up a
television interview yesterday when he learned about Camara's death. He
said there appears to be no end to the conflict in Iraq that President
Bush declared was over last spring.
Camara's death -- exactly four months after Mr. Bush's declaration --
made the distant war a reality.
"We haven't experienced this since the Vietnam era," Kalisz said. "It's
one of our own. It's a police officer."
Kalisz said he did not know Camara personally, but he did remember
meeting him in 1999 when he was a recruit training to be a city police
officer. He said Camara made an impression on him because he was 36,
considerably older than the other recruits.
Apparently, Camara was fulfilling a dream.
"He was excited about being a police officer," Kalisz said. "He was
very, very proud of that fact."
Camara had been in the Rhode Island National Guard for 21 years, and his
assignment in Iraq was his first overseas. He was among 360 soldiers
from three Rhode Island Guard military police units -- the 115th, 118th
and 119th -- that were deployed to Iraq last February. Their assignment
was expected to last up to year.
Kalisz said that there are nine city employees, including three other
police officers, who are on active duty in the National Guard.
Moniz, the police chief, said that his 270-member police force was
mourning Camara's death. He said many were shocked that their fellow
officer would not be returning.
"The guy was one of us," Moniz said. "He was a well-respected police
officer. He was a good guy. But you can't compare the loss we are
feeling with the loss that his family has experienced."
It's unclear when Camara's remains will be returned to Massachusetts.
National Guard and New Bedford officials said they would be willing to
assist the family with funeral arrangments or tributes to the soldier.
