A former Fort Carson soldier who has lived in Fountain with his family for the past 9-1/2 years and who deployed to Afghanistan last year from Fort Riley, Kan., died Wednesday from injuries suffered in a Sept. 8 ambush, according to his wife.
Sgt. Kenneth W. Westbrook, 41, was shot in the right shoulder and right cheek when he and others were attacked in Kunar province, Charlene Westbrook said Thursday. He was transferred to a hospital in Germany and had been at Walter Reed Army Medical Center in Washington, D.C., since Sept. 11, she said.
Westbrook had been in Afghanistan since November 2008, where he trained Afghan border police, and was due to return next month, Charlene Westbrook said. He had planned to retire from the Army, where he had spent 22 years, soon after his return to Fountain, south of Colorado Springs, his wife said.
“This was going to be his last mission,” she said.
The couple, originally from New Mexico, would have marked their 22nd wedding anniversary Oct. 20., said Charlene, who last saw her husband when he was home in May. They have three sons: Zachary, 20; Joshua, 18; and Joseph, 14.
Read the rest of this story at .
