Stolen car found but uniform, medals missing

[thedrifter]

Stolen car found but uniform, medals missing
The Associated Press
Posted : Tuesday Sep 18, 2007 11:40:32 EDT

TYLER, Texas — Dallas police Tuesday recovered a car stolen from a Texas Marine who's just back from Iraq — but his medals are missing.

Cpl. Blake Weller of Whitehouse hopes the thief will return his dress blues and the medals displays on the jacket.

Weller told KLTV television it's hard to know that he didn't get what he really wanted back — his medals.

Weller this year suffered a concussion and took shrapnel to the hand during a mortar attack.

The 20-year-old arrived home on leave this month and bought a car — a white 2005 Mazda.

His newly cleaned uniform and medals were in the vehicle when it was swiped Friday from outside a Tyler mall.

Dallas police ran a computer check on the license plate of a stopped car, which came up as stolen.

The driver is held on a charge of possession of a stolen vehicle.

Ellie

[sgt tony]

Let get this as@ and integrate him with some old VN ways to make him/her talk

[jerryk]

first off steal my wife and keep her, 2nd would not even gone to a mall with them in my car and i do wear them once a year on the marine corp birthday even after 40 yrs

[thedrifter]

Vet due for Purple Heart has new car, medals taken

Vehicle recovered but military items still missing

05:14 AM CDT on Wednesday, September 19, 2007


By ERIC AASEN / The Dallas Morning News
eaasen@dallasnews.com


Blake Weller has his car back. But it's what he doesn't have – what was inside the Marine's Mazda RX-8 – that matters.

His military uniform, a replica of the Purple Heart he'll receive soon, his other medals – pieces of himself, missing.

Cpl. Weller, on leave from the Iraq war, bought his Mazda last week and parked it Friday at Broadway Square Mall in Tyler.

His uniform, freshly tailored, sat in the car.

By the time he came back outside, the car was gone.

The Mazda was found Monday when Dallas police stopped it near Fair Park. The driver, Ershaun Waldon of the Dallas area, was arrested on a car theft charge and placed in the Lew Sterrett Justice Center.

Cpl. Weller, of Whitehouse in East Texas, picked up his car Monday. The military items were still missing Tuesday.

Michelle Weller said her son doesn't deserve this.

"I can't even imagine how another American citizen could have done this," she said. "He's fighting for their freedom, and they've taken his away. It's not fair."

Cpl. Weller, 20, declined an interview request.

Tyler police expect Mr. Waldon to be transferred there today. They plan to talk to him and see if the stolen items can be tracked down. The suspect declined an interview request Tuesday.

Cpl. Weller earned the Purple Heart after a mortar attack in June caused a concussion and hearing loss in his left ear, his mother said. He also suffered shrapnel wounds. He's scheduled to receive the Purple Heart this fall, but he had already mounted a replica on his uniform.

The Weller family wants the uniform and medals back before the end of the month, when Cpl. Weller will return to his base in California. Marine officials say he's stationed at the Marine Corps Air Ground Combat Center in Twentynine Palms. He's scheduled to return to Iraq in May, his mother said.

Being in the military means everything to Cpl. Weller, who has been in the Marines for a couple of years.

"On 9/11, he knew what he wanted to do," Ms. Weller said.

She said her son hasn't expressed what the Purple Heart means to him.

But as a mother, she already knows.

"You stand tall and proud in that uniform," Ms. Weller said, "and if you don't have that, something is missing."

Ellie