Army Sgt. 1st Class Troy L. Miranda

Died May 20, 2004 Serving During Operation Iraqi Freedom

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44, of DeQueen, Ark.; assigned to C Company, 1st Battalion, 153rd Infantry Regiment, 39th Brigade Combat Team, Army National Guard, attached to the 1st Cavalry Division; killed May 20 when a grenade was thrown near his foot patrol in Baghdad.

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Arkansas soldier killed in Iraq grenade attack

Associated Press

LITTLE ROCK — A ninth member of the Arkansas-based 39th Infantry Brigade has been killed in action since its arrival in Iraq this spring, the soldier’s mother told The Associated Press on Thursday.

Staff Sgt. Troy “Leon” Miranda, 44, of Little Rock, was the 12th Arkansan to die in combat in Iraq since the March 2003 start of the war.

“He always tried to do the right thing,” said his mother, Bobby Miranda, of Wickes. “He always did his job whether he wanted to do it or not.”

Bobby Miranda said another son, 37-year-old Phillip, called her husband and her, Carlos, from Baghdad on Wednesday afternoon with the news

“(Leon) was on foot patrol in Baghdad when they were attacked,” she said. The brothers had planned to go to a movie when Leon got off duty.

A military statement described a grenade attack that killed a soldier and wounded three in central Baghdad.

The Miranda brothers were assigned to Charlie Company, 1st Battalion, 153rd Infantry Regiment. The unit had been assigned directly to the 1st Calvary Division, which had been on duty in Baghdad.

Bobby Miranda said her sons were doing different jobs in Iraq. She said her son Phillip called Wednesday because he didn’t want her to hear the news from a stranger.

Phillip will accompany his brother’s body home. The family expects the body to arrive May 28. Leon Miranda will be buried with full military honors in Oak Grove Cemetery in Polk County.

According to his family, Miranda was promoted to Sgt. 1st Class posthumously and awarded the Bronze Star and Purple Heart. He was a commander of his unit and specialized in explosives, combat warfare, germ warfare and chemical warfare. He was deployed Oct. 13 with an advance party because of his special training.

Miranda, who was based out of De Queen, was the second-oldest of six siblings, his mother said. Funeral arrangements have not been made yet.

Leon Miranda had been a member of the Army National Guard for almost 20 years, his mother said. He worked for its Counter Drug program, and for about 10 years had been assigned to work in the Arkansas State Police Criminal Investigation Division Office of Investigative Support in Little Rock, state police spokesman Bill Sadler said.

Bobby Miranda said Gov. Mike Huckabee called Thursday.

“He ... called the sergeant’s family and expressed his sympathy and the sympathy of the state of Arkansas for their brave and noble sacrifice,” said Jim Harris, the governor’s spokesman.

Soldiers from the 39th, based at Little Rock, left Fort Polk, La., for Iraq in March and early April. Four members of the brigade were killed in a rocket attack April 24 and four others have died since April 7, including a Connecticut soldier attached to the unit.

A total of 790 U.S. service members have died since the beginning of military operations in Iraq last year. Of those, 576 died as a result of hostile action and 214 died of non-hostile causes.

At the start of May, Arkansas National Guard spokeswoman Capt. Kristine Munn said the 39th, known as the Arkansas Brigade, had had the largest number of losses of any guard unit serving in Operation Iraqi Freedom. At the time, seven members of the 39th had died.

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Slain sergeant knew he wanted military career, cousin recalls

WICKES, Ark. — Mike Wilson recalls that, even when he was a child, it was obvious what Troy Leon Miranda wanted to be when he grew up.

“He wanted to be a soldier,” Wilson said at his cousin’s memorial service Saturday in the Wickes High School auditorium. “From the pictures you see of Leon in his uniform, there was no question that he was meant to be a soldier.”

Miranda, 44, signed up with the Army Reserve in 1984.

On May 20, by then a staff sergeant with the 39th Infantry Brigade, he was killed as he and other soldiers patrolled on foot in Baghdad. Three others were injured in the grenade attack. He was the ninth soldier from Arkansas killed in the line of duty in Iraq.

Leon McCleskey, who served with Miranda in the Arkansas National Guard, recalled the words on a plaque dedicated to Miranda on Friday.

“The plaque read, ‘Brother, Son, Friend, Hero,”’ McCleskey said. “Leon was a brother to some, and a friend to many; he was a hero because of his willingness to do his duty.”

Hundreds of friends, relatives and well-wishers attended the memorial service.

As Maj. Gen. Don Morrow, adjutant general of the Arkansas Guard, prepared to give the Miranda family their son’s Bronze Star, Purple Heart and Arkansas Distinguished Service Medal, half of the audience rose to its feet.

They were members of the Army, Air Force, state police, the Wickes chapter of the VFW and the Hot Springs Chapter 1 of the Vietnam Veterans Organization. They all stood at attention as Morrow read the citation for each award.

“He was an outstanding young man and soldier,” Morrow said. “One can pay him no higher tribute than call him a soldier. He did not want to give his life for freedom, but he knew the price of freedom sometimes calls for it and was willing to pay it.”

Wilson said his cousin’s death is not what should be remembered.

“It was his life that we should remember,” he said. “Each of us seeks in his or her own way how to find in each day that which we need to do to accomplish God’s plan. The freedom to praise God was a freedom Leon lived and died for.”

Miranda was buried at the Oak Grove Cemetery three miles west of Wickes.

— Associated Press