View Full Version : SFC Daniel Crabtree
SFC Crabtree was an 18B (USASOC News Release not available yet)
Falls officer killed in Iraq
Community mourns guardsman, who leaves wife, young daughter
By Kymberli Hagelberg
Beacon Journal staff writer
Flags were flown at half-staff Friday in Cuyahoga Falls for a police officer killed in Iraq while serving with the Ohio National Guard.
According to a news release from the city, Sgt. Daniel Crabtree, 31, was assigned to the 2nd Battalion, 19th Special Forces Group of the Ohio National Guard. He died Thursday in Iraq.
Crabtree was with the Falls police department for nine years. He was assigned to the Patrol Division and was a member of the SWAT team and the honor guard. He previously worked with Hartville police.
He is survived by his wife, Kathy, and a 17-month-old daughter, Mallory.
A representative from the National Guard reached in Columbus on Friday said he could not release details of Crabtree's death or his military service.
Local colleagues remember Crabtree as someone who was dedicated to becoming a soldier and a police officer at an early age.
"He entered the National Guard as a junior at Lake High School, earned his degree in criminal justice and became an M.P., but he was always interested in the special forces,'' said John Norman of the Hartville police. "This was his second tour of Iraq, and he's also been to Nicaragua.
"When he was home, on Saturdays, he used to strap a 70-pound bag of rocks to his back, run seven and a half miles to my house, get a drink and run back.
"This was his thing. I used to tell him he had his motivation and mine, too.''
Norman's last e-mail from Crabtree was on May 22.
"He was monitoring the radio and talking about building his new house,'' Norman said. "He was training Iraqi special forces, but he couldn't really talk about that.''
Crabtree's friends in Hartville saw him off before his last tour to the Middle East.
Hartville Police Sgt. Dan Stiles said Crabtree kept in touch often, and he was excited to be going to California for training in urban combat before leaving for Iraq.
"He stopped by right before he was called up,'' Stiles said. "At the time, he seemed excited to go over. He was ready to go.''
News of Crabtree's death came to his friends in Hartville late Thursday night. "I got the phone call at about 10:30 p.m.,'' Stiles said, "but there wasn't a lot of details. The only thing I heard was that there was a Humvee and an improvised explosive device, and that he was gone.''
Crabtree is the fifth service member with ties to Cuyahoga Falls to be killed in Iraq.
"I understand Officer Crabtree's new home is just a month from completion,'' Mayor Don Robart said. "His young family is just heartbroken. We're going to do everything we can to be there for them.''
Funeral arrangements have not been announced.
Police Chief John Conley wore a black ribbon across his badge in honor of Crabtree on Friday. He said an officer has been posted with Crabtree's family since Thursday evening. Family members met with the National Guard on Friday.
Crabtree is one of four Cuyahoga Falls police officers to be called to active military duty. The officers were honored last year in the city's Memorial Day Parade.
"This is a great shock,'' the chief said of Crabtree's death. "It has affected everyone in the city building. Everyone here is grieving.''
A benevolent fund has been established for the Crabtree family. Donations can be made at any FirstMerit branch.
RIP - May God bless your family and friends
Rest in Peace SFC Crabtree...prayers out for your loved ones and Brothers.
Warrior-Mentor
06-10-2006, 08:43
RIP. Having a two week old myself now, seeing he has a 17 month old daughter really hits home.
CoLawman
06-10-2006, 08:56
Rest in Peace. Condolensces to his family and the soldiers and police officers who served with him.
Jack Moroney (RIP)
06-10-2006, 09:10
RIP
CPTAUSRET
06-10-2006, 09:29
Rest In Peace!
Abu Jack
06-10-2006, 09:59
Rest In Peace
No more pain, worrying, hunger, or thirst, welcome Brother to Heaven and your Lord Jesus Christ.
I met him once while on duty. He was a very nice guy from what I could tell. We will be assisting his family in any way possible here, we always do. If anybody is going to the funeral here and needs help, let me know.
RIP brother. I can't truly put into words how I feel right now. I hate this fucking place.
NousDefionsDoc
06-10-2006, 16:32
RIP
Rest in peace SFC Crabtree.
Pat
Radar Rider
06-10-2006, 17:18
Rest In Peace.
RELEASE NUMBER: 060610-01
DATE POSTED: JUNE 10, 2006
PRESS RELEASE: Special Forces Soldier killed in Iraq
U.S. Army Special Operations Command
FORT BRAGG, N.C. (USASOC News Service, June 10, 2006) — An Army Special Forces Soldier died June 8 in Iraq after a roadside bomb exploded next to his vehicle during a combat patrol.
Sgt. 1st Class Daniel B. Crabtree, 31, a Special Forces weapons sergeant, was critically injured in his armored Humvee when an improvised explosive device struck the vehicle near Al Kut, in east-central Iraq. He was evacuated by air after the attack and died en route to a combat support hospital in Baghdad.
An Iraqi interpreter traveling in his vehicle also died following the attack.
Crabtree, originally of Hartville, Ohio, was assigned to the Ohio Army National Guard’s Company B, 2nd Battalion, 19th Special Forces Group (Airborne) in Columbus, Ohio. He was deployed to Iraq in support of Operation Iraqi Freedom and attached to the Combined Joint Special Operations Task Force – Arabian Peninsula.
In civilian life, Crabtree worked as a police officer first in his native Hartville prior to serving with the Cuyahoga Falls Police Department as a member of the Special Weapons and Tactics, or SWAT, unit.
After initially entering military service with the Army Reserve in 1992, Crabtree joined the Army National Guard in 1993 as an administrative specialist. He later retrained as a military policeman and served with the 135th Military Police Company in Brook Park, Ohio. He joined the 19th SFG in March 2002, and in 2003 he was selected to attend the Special Forces Qualification Course at Fort Bragg, N.C.
He earned the coveted green beret when he graduated from the course in May 2004.
Crabtree’s military education also includes the Basic Airborne Course, the Primary Leadership Development Course and the Basic Noncommissioned Officer Course.
His awards and decorations include the Army Achievement Medal, the Army Reserve Component Achievement Medal, the National Defense Service Medal, the Humanitarian Service Medal, the Noncommissioned Officer Professional Development Ribbon, the Army Service Ribbon, the Parachutist Badge, and the Special Forces Tab. He was posthumously awarded the Purple Heart, the Iraq Campaign Medal, the Global War on Terrorism Service Medal and the Combat Infantryman Badge.
Crabtree is survived by his wife, Kathy, and his daughter, Mallory, of the City of Green. He is also survived by his father, Ronald Crabtree and his mother, Judy Ann Crabtree.
-usasoc-
bberkley
06-10-2006, 17:59
RIP
This extraordinary war in which we are engaged falls heavily upon all classes of people, but the most heavily upon the soldier. For it has been said, all that a man hath will he give for his life; and while all contribute of their substance the soldier puts his life at stake, and often yields it up in his country’s cause. The highest merit, then, is due to the soldier.
Abraham Lincoln
mffjm8509
06-10-2006, 18:47
RIP
mp
abnremf, my sincere condolences to you and your Team on your personal loss...you are in my prayers.
gtcrispy
06-10-2006, 20:22
RIP
Ambush Master
06-10-2006, 20:46
Thoughts and Prayers out for ALL of your Brothers, Friends, and Family!!!
Godspeed Brother, we'll meet at the final LZ/DZ/RP!!!
x SF med
06-11-2006, 16:18
RIP SFC Crabtree
Goggles Pizano
06-11-2006, 21:20
Rest in peace
helicom6
06-12-2006, 23:07
God takes care of good men! My prayers go with him and his family! I leave in July for the first time away from my new family, my wife feels this fear everyday. But we have a calling and duty is what is in our hearts.
God speed!
blustr18b
06-16-2006, 01:09
God bless SFC Daniel Crabtree and may he Rest in Peace
my son sent me a link on SFC Daniel Crabtree when he came online for a brief moment today. I asked how he was doing...replyed not good and sent this link.
http://news.soc.mil/releases/06JUN/060610-01.html
keeping our troops in prayer
blustr
Akron Beacon Journal (ABJ)
By Jim Carney
GREEN: The mournful song was Hector the Hero.
It was played by the Cleveland Pipes and Drums member and Brecksville police officer Joseph Grzelak on bagpipes as he slowly walked in front of the flag-draped coffin of fallen Ohio Army National Guard Sgt. 1st Class Daniel B. Crabtree as it was carried Saturday into The Chapel in Green.
Members of the military and nearly 100 uniformed law-enforcement officers, including dozens from Cuyahoga Falls and Hartville, stood at attention and saluted at the church's west entrance as the coffin of the nine-year veteran of the Cuyahoga Falls Police Department passed by.
The song echoed through the massive church as several hundred people stood at the begining of the funeral for the Green resident who died in Irag in a roadside bombing.
The somber mood of the bagpiper's hym carried out to the Green and Lake Township communities, where a fallen son was laid to rest.
The funeral for the 31-year-old Crabtree - who is survived by a wife, Kathy, and a daughter, Mallory - brought out most of the Cuyahoga Falls Police Department.
Volunteers from Stow, Hudson, Copley Township, Tallmadge and Silver Lake helped with afternoon police duties in Cuyahoga Falls so that most of the 95 members of the police department could attend, said Mayor Don Robart.
"Everybody loved him," Robart said of Crabtree.
Two Columbus officers drove in Saturday morning for the service. Sgt. Steve Redding, 34, of London, Ohio, had worked a night shift Friday, did not sleep Saturday morning and was to work another night shift Saturday.
"I'm here to honor a fallen hero," he said. Redding has ties to Crabtree, who was his wife's stepbrother.
Two Michigan State Police Troopers also attended the service.
Trooper B.C. Smith said Rodney Goss, a trooper at the Monroe, Michigan Post, is in Crabtree's unit in Iraq.
Goss had sent an e-mail to the state police post and asked Smith to attend the service on his behalf. So Smith and Trooper T.C. Sproull drove from Michigan to pay their respects.
Crabtree was a Green Beret and a member of a Special Forces unit based in Columbus.
During the funeral, Steve Hodges, a longtime friend of Crabtree, read a letter he wrote to his friend's 17-month-old daughter on the occasion of her father's funeral.
"The proudest moment of his life was when you were born, Mallory," he said.
Outside the church, firetrucks from the Green and Cuyahoga Falls Fire Departments extended their ladders and flew a 36-foot-by-24-foot American Flag for Crabtree and his family.
Along the route from the church to the cemetary in Lake Township, hundreds of people stood, most holding flags of support.
In Green, along Raber Road, Ron Stoudt and his sister Karleen Cope stood under the shade of some trees waiting for the procession.
"I just have to do it," said the 50-year-old Stoudt.
For most of State Route 619 from Mayfair Road to Cleveland Avenue Northwest, small flags were placed on either side of the road about 10 feet apart.
In Lake Township, near Greenlawn Cemetary, 60-year-old Navy veteran Rand Spargo of Lake Township was filled with emotion before the funeral prcession arrived.
"it's a shame we fight wars with cowards," he said. "The person who set of the bomb was a coward. They didn't face him like a man."
The funeral procession included about 75 police vehicles, 35 motorcycles and about 110 other cars, said Lt. Dave Hills of the Summit County Sheriff's Department.
In one of those cars was Jason Blankenship, a close friend of Crabtree, who last week went door to door in Lake Township and Green and persuaded nearly 60 business owners to put signs out in honor of his friend.
"I'll never forget Dan," he said
Kent resident Don Berg, 62, a Vietnam veteran, stood near the entrance to the cemetery and held a sign of thanks to Crabtree. "It's an honor to be here for him," he said.
Lake Township resident Brenda Jones, 62, stood near the Uniontown Chapel of Praise and watched as the hearse carrying the soldier's body passed in front of her.
"It breaks my heart," she said.
Donations can be made to the Daniel Crabtree Family Memorial Trust Fund for his daughter at any First Merit location.
On behalf on Dan's brothers and sisters on the Cuyahoga Falls Police Department, thank you for your prayers for Dan and his family.
Rest in Peace SFC Crabtree. Thank you for standing in the gap. May God Bless you & your family.
NSDQ
RELEASE NUMBER: 060807-01
DATE POSTED: AUGUST 7, 2006
Special Forces Soldier Remembered
By Sgt. Kimberly Snow
DIVIDS Hub
GREEN, Ohio (USASOC News Service August 7, 2006) – In the early evening June 16, a group of about a dozen Soldiers from B Company, 2nd Battalion, 19th Special Forces Group, immaculately clad in full military dress uniform, nestled together in a small basement room of the Schermesser Funeral Home. Above them, hundreds of well-wishers waited their turn to honor the memory of their friend and brother-in-arms, Sgt.1st Class Daniel B. Crabtree, recently killed in combat. Occasionally, one of the men would slip out temporarily to mingle with the guests.
The somber quiet was occasionally punctured by a laugh, which was inevitably followed by a story – like the time their friend broke his leg on his first jump with the elite troops after successfully completing the Army’s Special Forces Qualification Course.
Their friend and comrade had landed badly on the jump. As he lay on the ground with a broken leg, one unit member, Sgt. 1st Class Don (due to the sensitive nature of special operations, first names only will be noted), noticed that something was wrong with his friend and was temporarily distracted.
“I rode my ruck in, trying to see what was wrong with him,” Don said with a laugh. “I landed pretty hard and when I got to him, he was laughing at me. He was still laughing and smiling while grimacing in pain.”
They also remembered the Special Forces weapons sergeant for his patience and kindness.
“You want to know what Dan was like?” Sgt. 1st Class Kevin, a fellow unit member, asked.
Kevin recounted an email – one of many such emails and phone calls he had received in the preceding days – from a young Soldier who had trained with the Special Forces unit, but ultimately didn’t make it to the qualification course. As a trainee, the Soldier had always looked up to the “tabbed” (Special Forces-qualified) Soldiers, particularly Crabtree.
“He always stopped and took the time to talk to me, even though I wasn’t tabbed. He answered my questions no matter how stupid they were,” the young Soldier wrote. “That was Dan. He was what being a Special Forces Soldier is all about.”
Crabtree died June 8, when a roadside bomb exploded next to his vehicle during a combat patrol near Al Kut, in east-central Iraq. “He was on his way to a meeting. He was trying to help a village threatened by the insurgency, trying to help them secure themselves to reduce the threat,” Don said. “He died doing what he liked to do.”
The 31-year-old weapons sergeant had been as determined to make a difference in Iraq as he had always been in meeting his personal goals. One Soldier recalled Crabtree’s training regimen when he was preparing himself for the rigors of the Special Forces Qualification Course. At the time, he was working night shifts.
“He would train when he got off work in the morning, when he was already tired,” he said shaking his head. “He would strap a 70-pound ruck to his back and just start running.”
Crabtree had a passion for weapons that carried over to his civilian job, where he worked as a sniper for the Cuyahoga Falls Police Department Special Weapons and Tactics (SWAT) team. He was also a member of the force’s honor guard.
“He was really good at teaching weapons,” Don said. “He took the time to study all kinds of different weapons systems.”
With a knack for teaching, along with his civilian police training, Crabtree was particularly well-suited for his mission in Iraq, where he developed and implemented a SWAT training program for the Iraqi Police Force in Al Kut. As the lead trainer, he instructed the SWAT volunteers in advanced marksmanship, offensive and defensive driving techniques and urban assault tactics. He had also previously been involved with training other foreign troops.
“They always liked him because he was patient. He always took the time to explain things,” Don said.
Crabtree and his operational detachment also assisted the Al-Kut SWAT team in more than 35 combat missions which netted more than 100 known insurgents.
“The Al-Kut SWAT was one of the most effective Iraqi units. They were feared by the insurgency because they were so effective,” Don said. “And that was due, in large part, to his training.”
Crabtree joined the Army Reserve in 1992 and transferred to the Ohio Army National Guard in 1993 as an administrative specialist. He later retrained as a military policeman and joined the 19th Special Forces Group in March 2002. He earned the coveted green beret after graduating from the Special Forces Qualification Course at Ft. Bragg, N.C., in May 2004.
He was deployed to Iraq in support of Operation Iraqi Freedom and attached to the Combined Joint Special Operations Task Force-Arabian Peninsula.
His awards and decorations include the Army Achievement Medal, Army Reserve Component Achievement Medal, National Defense Service Medal, Iraq Campaign Medal, Global War on Terrorism Service Medal, Humanitarian Service Medal, Noncommissioned Officer Professional Development Ribbon, Army Service Ribbon, Parachutist Badge and Special Forces Tab.
He was posthumously awarded the Bronze Star Medal, Purple Heart, Meritorious Service Medal, and Combat Infantryman Badge. Crabtree’s military education includes the Basic Airborne Course, Primary Leadership Development Course and Basic Noncommissioned Officer Course.
He is survived by his wife, Kathy, and daughter, Mallory, of Green. He is also survived by his father, Ronald Crabtree, and mother, Judy Ann Crabtree.
-usasoc-
Team Sergeant
08-15-2006, 16:45
Their friend and comrade had landed badly on the jump. As he lay on the ground with a broken leg, one unit member, Sgt. 1st Class Don (due to the sensitive nature of special operations, first names only will be noted), noticed that something was wrong with his friend and was temporarily distracted.
“I rode my ruck in, trying to see what was wrong with him,” Don said with a laugh. “I landed pretty hard and when I got to him, he was laughing at me. He was still laughing and smiling while grimacing in pain.”
Only the Airborne could/would understand the above quote.
I may have not known SFC Daniel B. Crabtree, but today he made me laugh.;) RIP SFC Crabtree.
TS
RIP SFC. Feet and knees together...