"Fishing hundreds of bodies - men, women, children - out of the ocean, piling them up and throwing them into mass graves." "He wasn't prepared for what he was doing out there," his father told London's Daily Mail for an article published last month. Routh talked of being forbidden by an officer to give his rations to a starving boy - and of things much worse. They found a country in ruins, with about a quarter million dead - many of them stacked in rotting piles along the muddy roads. In January 2010, Routh was attached to the 22nd Marine Expeditionary Unit as part of Operation Unified Response, sent to the island nation. "How would you feel if I shot a kid?" they said he asked.īut family and friends say Routh was more disturbed by what he saw during a later deployment - in earthquake-ravaged Haiti. You kill them before they can kill you."'Ī few months later, his parents told the magazine, he called home and suggested that something bad had happened while he was out on patrol. "Our response was, of course, 'Eddie, this is a war. "He said, 'Dad, how are you going to feel about me if I have to kill somebody?"' his mother, Jodi Routh, told a writer from Men's Health magazine before a judge imposed a gag order in the case. In a conversation with his parents shortly before deploying, he reportedly expressed concerns about having to use his weapon. By September 2007, he was in the Middle East. Not long after graduation, Routh - also 6-2, but about 50 pounds lighter than Kyle - was off to boot camp in California. "I want to be one of the few and the proud," he told the photographer. Although a photo in the 2006 Midlothian High yearbook shows a buzz-cut Routh chatting with an Army recruiter, he had his heart set on the Marines.
"They did not get along."īut by senior year, Routh knew what he wanted to do with his life. "I know for a fact that his home life wasn't great," says Bernard, who now teaches social studies in Dallas. "He had a chip on his shoulder," says Bernard, who recalls a heart-to-heart with Routh outside the school gym after the teen had had a falling out with his parents. Kc Bernard, a former security guard at Midlothian High, remembers Routh as a decent defensive lineman, but easy to anger. Routh's path would be paved with far less glory.īy most accounts, he was a middling student and a bit of a troublemaker. Three years later, he published his best-selling memoir, "American Sniper." The father of two left the Navy in 2009, following four tours in Iraq. As a sniper with SEAL Team 3, he would rack up, by his own count, more than 300 kills and earn two Silver Stars, the military's third-highest honor for valor. Kyle, Routh led separate but similar livesĪlthough it appears that Kyle and Routh hadn't met before that fatal day in February 2013, they had a lot in common.īoth had attended high school southwest of Dallas in the town of Midlothian, the self-proclaimed "Cement Capital of Texas." Each had played football for the Midlothian Panthers and been involved with the Future Farmers of America, though 14 years apart.Īnd, most importantly, both ended up in the military and went to war.Īfter a brief stint in college and a flirtation with rodeo bronc riding, the 6-foot-2, 230-pound Kyle joined the Navy and qualified for its elite special forces unit. Many expect PTSD from his Iraq tour and a relief mission to earthquake-stricken Haiti to be another narrative thread in that defense.īut with Kyle's personal story the subject of a blockbuster currently packing them in at cinemas near and far, Routh's defenders wonder whether he can get a fair trial.
Routh's attorneys are planning to argue that he was insane. The two men had taken the ex-Marine to a shooting range in an attempt to help him battle post-traumatic stress disorder and other personal demons besetting him.
EDDIE RAY ROUTH POST TRAMATIC STRESS TRIAL
Routh, a 27-year-old Iraq War veteran, stands trial on Wednesday, charged with capital murder in the slayings of Chad Littlefield and former Navy SEAL Chris Kyle, whose memoir "American Sniper" is now an Academy Award-nominated movie. It wasn't long before she got her answer. "I don't know if he's being honest with me." "I'm terrified for my life," she breathlessly told a 911 dispatcher. He asked if she was with him "in hell," then drove off into the fading light.
So when he showed up on his sister's doorstep one afternoon two Februarys ago and claimed to have shot two men, she didn't know what to think.īut when Laura Blevins saw the big, black custom pickup truck in the driveway, not Eddie's Volkswagen Beetle, her stomach tightened. Eddie Ray Routh had been talking crazy for a while.
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