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Friends and family said Pvt. Neil Turner, 22, was killed this week. His parents, Leland Turner and Charlotte Cox-Turner, left Tacoma early Thursday morning for Dover Air Force Base in Delaware, where his remains were being sent.
The Army has not released details about how Turner died. His father on Facebook Thursday wrote, “My son, Neil, was killed during a training exercise yesterday in Afghanistan. When I get all the findings, I will post them.”
Information on Turner’s Facebook page shows he was assigned to Fort Bliss, Texas. The public-affairs office at Fort Bliss did not return a call for comment.
Leland Turner’s announcement rippled through a community of East Side Tacoma families who watched Neil Turner grow up. He was the oldest of four brothers. Neighbors remembered him as mindful of siblings Maxwell, Jordan and Tucker.
“He gave his brothers space because they were boys, but he was the one who would corral them,” remembered Tami Scheidt, who lives next door to the Turner family.
“It’s been really hard for all of us,” she said. “He’s gone through some transitions in life, and he hit his late teens and he just grew up. He starts making good choices, and then this happens.”
Scheidt’s mother, Lynnette Rogers Scheidt, organized a candlelight vigil for Turner’s friends to grieve together on a chilly winter night. About 50 of them gathered, quietly sharing memories and crying together. Lynnette Scheidt also lives in Turner’s neighborhood, near the vacant Gault Middle School.
Turner “moved here when he was in eighth grade, and he said, ‘I don’t want to be here, I don’t want to be here,’” Lynnette Scheidt told Turner’s friends at the vigil. “Then he met you, and he was like, ‘I’m home.’”
Turner graduated from high school in 2008. Friends said he enjoyed hip-hop and talked constantly about mixed martial arts. At one point, Tami Scheidt said, the Turner boys kept instruments and played music in their garage.
Allison Russum, 21, dated Turner and laughed about the catalog of song lyrics that seemed to spill out of his mind.
Russum said she often fumbled a song’s lyrics while singing in a car, and Turner “had this way of making fun of me every time because he literally knew the words to every song.”
“That was the kind of person he was, turning mistakes into great memories,” she said.
Matt Zimmerman, 23, said Turner talked about joining the Army while they attended Lincoln together. Turner enlisted a little more than a year ago and deployed early this fall. They saw each other for breakfast in December when Turner was home for leave.
“It seemed to me that he loved it. All the pictures I’ve seen of him deployed, he was smiling,” Zimmerman said.
Zimmerman remembered Turner as a popular student and a reliable friend.
“He was always that guy you could count on,” Zimmerman said.
Younger teens in the neighborhood looked up to Turner, too.
“Neil definitely left an imprint on my heart,” said Lincoln High School senior Ransom Hatch. “He’s one person who can’t be forgotten.”
Hatch said his older brother spent many hours fixing cars with Turner. He remembered seeing Turner frequently riding a bicycle around the neighborhood.
“He was always down to try a new adventure.”
Hatch also spent time with Turner during the soldier’s mid-deployment leave.
“He was still the same old Neil,” Hatch said.
In recent months, Turner’s Facebook page was full of jokes, a little bragging about infantry life and sweet comments to his friends and family in Tacoma.
“Till next time all of the Fam in the Tac,” he wrote Dec. 9. “I’ll love you all and miss you as always.”
On Dec. 13, he wrote: “Had guard for the last four hours and it was a clear night. I got to see my first meteor shower, too, so if you need any wishes fulfilled just hit me up.”
Adam Ashton: 253-597-8646
adam.ashton@thenewstribune.com
blog.thenewstribune.com/military
