Marine Cpl. Dean P. Pratt

Died August 2, 2004 Serving During Operation Iraqi Freedom

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22, of Stevensville, Mont.; assigned to 2nd Battalion, 1st Marine Regiment, 1st Marine Division, I Marine Expeditionary Force, Camp Pendleton, Calif.; killed Aug. 2 by enemy action in Anbar province, Iraq.

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Montana Marine killed in Iraq

Associated Press

MISSOULA, Montana — A Marine from Stevensville died in an explosion in Iraq five weeks before he was due to be discharged.

Cpl. Dean Pratt, whose job was to inspect cars for bombs, died outside Fallujah, his mother, Geri Morris, confirmed Thursday. She said she was not given any details about Monday’s explosion.

Pratt, 22, a 2000 graduate of Stevensville High School, enlisted in the Marine Corps on Sept. 11, 2000 and would have been discharged this Sept. 11.

“He was a good kid,” said his mother, who now lives in North Pole, Alaska. “He was a good Marine.”

His father, Danny Pratt, lives in Chico, Calif. Pratt also is survived by his older brother, D.J. Pratt, who lives in Stevensville.

Pratt was born in Missoula on Aug. 7, 1981 and his family moved to Stevensville in 1984.

Memorial services are planned for next week in Stevensville.

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Friends, family say farewell to Stevensville Marine

STEVENSVILLE, Montana — Montana’s latest soldier to die in Iraq was remembered Thursday as a fun-loving boy who found enough time in his short life to become a thoughtful, brave man.

“He was a good boy grown into a man,” Deborah Stokes told a crowd of about 500 at the American Legion Hall funeral of Cpl. Dean Pratt. “He was my son’s best friend. He was a Marine.”

Pratt, 22, died in an Aug. 2 explosion five days before what would have been his birthday and five weeks before his scheduled discharge. It was the second Iraq deployment for the soldier who enlisted on Sept. 11, 2000.

Stokes, whose son Jason is also a Marine corporal, told of lying awake years ago and waiting for the boys to come sneaking home, gliding into driveways with headlights off and thinking they were fooling their mothers. Mourners were also told of how Pratt seemed to be on a first-name basis with the area’s Montana Highway Patrol officers.

“To be honest, they caused their share of trouble,” Stokes said.

But Stokes said the Marine Corps gave the youths direction and purpose.

“I am so proud of the men they grew up to be,” she said.

Pratt’s divorced parents, Geri Morris and Dan Pratt, sat next to each other with their current spouses on either side. Pratt’s only brother, J.D., also sat in the front row, a few feet away from the flag-draped coffin. Pratt’s body was cremated after the service.

“I don’t know how to condense Dean to a sheet of paper,” Morris wrote in a note read aloud. “He always had a smile on his face, even when he was in trouble ... He is responsible for 80 percent of our gray hair ... He is safe now.”

Jim Carlson, the minister who read the note, said Pratt “majored in the positive side of life” and had a fondness for camping, fishing, soccer and baseball.

“He had a sense of humor that made him wonder if the Marine Corps was ready for him,” Carlson said. “He had an aversion to tying his shoes, and the Marines dealt with that.”

Pratt was the third Montana service member to die in Iraq as of Monday, according to a list maintained by the Associated Press. In December, Army 1st Lt. Edward Saltz of Bigfork died in an explosion and Army Pfc. Owen Witt of Sand Springs died in a May vehicle accident.

— Associated Press