Army Spc. Randy W. Pickering

Died December 9, 2007 Serving During Operation Iraqi Freedom

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31, of Bovey, Minn.; assigned to the Regimental Support Squadron, 2nd Stryker Cavalry Regiment, Vilseck, Germany; died Dec. 9 in Baghdad of injuries sustained in a non-combat-related incident.

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Soldier from Bovey, Minn., killed in Iraq

By Steve Karnowski

The Associated Press

MINNEAPOLIS — A soldier who lived for two years outside the northern Minnesota town of Bovey before he joined the Army and went to Iraq loved video games and comic books, his brother said.

Army Spc. Randy W. Pickering, 31, died Dec. 9 in Baghdad of “injuries sustained in a non-combat related incident,” the Defense Department said in a news release. It said his death was under investigation.

“It’s very unexpected,” his brother, Chris Pickering, of Mason, Mich., said. “It’s very shocking to anybody who knew him. That isn’t something he would do.”

Randy Pickering’s family plans to hold funeral services Dec. 18 at St. James Catholic Church in Mason, the Lansing State Journal and WILX-TV reported.

He grew up in Pleasant Hill, Mo., in the Kansas City area and later lived with his grandparents for several years in Liberty, Mo., his relatives said. Randy didn’t graduate from high school but earned his equivalency certificate and had a college degree in computer programming, Chris said.

He lived in Missouri until his mid 20s, when he moved to the Bovey area on Minnesota’s Iron Range with his father, Bruce Pickering, and other family members, Chris Pickering said.

“He lived way out in the boonies,” he said.

His brother listed Bovey as his hometown with the Army when he joined about 3 1/2 years ago because he wanted to leave Missouri behind, Chris Pickering said. Their family situation there was difficult.

“He really didn’t like Missouri much,” his brother said.

But he did like comics. His brother said he had been drawing a comic book for the past six to 12 years.

“He did his computer thing. He loved video games. Video games and comics were his life,” he said.

Randy Pickering called himself “randymonki” on the Internet sites YouTube and MySpace and recently posted a video on YouTube of him horsing around with his buddies, his relatives said.

On MySpace, he described himself as “A young loner on a crusade to champion the cause of the innocent, the helpless, the powerless, in a world of criminals who operate above the law.”

He also loved margaritas, his brother said. His MySpace page shows him drinking one, as does one of his videos on YouTube.

Randy Pickering joined the Army around the same time his father moved to Michigan, but never lived there himself, his brother said. He’s also survived by a half sister, Amy Koser, of Springfield, Mo.