PHILADELPHIA (Tribune News Service) — He went to war with a Marines regiment known as the Cannon Cockers, an artillery unit that rained explosive shells on the enemy in Iraq.
He didn’t stay long — less than three months in 2008. But Bradley Stone claimed he had been fully disabled by post-traumatic stress disorder and was taking medication as part of his mental health treatment.
It’s clear he struggled with alcohol. And on the license for his second marriage, he listed his occupation as “disabled veteran.”
In a patch of woods not far from his Pennsburg, Pa., home on Tuesday afternoon, police found Stone dead of self-inflicted cutting wounds — a gruesome end to a manhunt that began after he killed his ex-wife and five of her relatives in Montgomery County on Monday.
On Tuesday, service-veteran friends of Stone struggled to make sense of the killings. None condoned them. At the same time, they said, Stone was a man who suffered.
“He saw war,” said Seth Howard, 27, a Marines veteran who served in Iraq. “How are you supposed to be healthy after that?”
Howard stood at Vets for Vets, a nonprofit center located almost across the street from Stone’s house in Pennsburg. He said the two often talked about their combat experiences.
Stone, friends said, was a Marine through and through, a family man who happily lent a hand to shovel snow and a former sergeant who struggled with stress disorder and with physical injuries from carrying heavy backpacks in Iraq.
Vietnam veteran Clyde Hoch, 68, said he and Stone weren’t close, but he considered the younger man “a pretty decent guy.”
“You can’t condemn someone until you understand what they went through,” he said.
Jake Leone, who bought and renovated the former post office that became Vets for Vets, said Stone willingly lent his construction tools for the work.
“The cool thing about him,” Leone said, “was the level of pride he took in the service of his country.”
Stone, 35, enlisted in the Marines as a reservist in 2002, left the service in 2008, and remained on ready-reserve status until a final separation in 2011, according to the Marines. His records give no sign that he was wounded or in any way injured during his service, the Marines said.
Montgomery County District Attorney Risa Vetri Ferman said she did not believe Stone was diagnosed with PTSD. The slayings, Ferman said, had “no valid explanation.”
In the Marines, Stone had been assigned to the 3rd Battalion, 14th Marine Regiment, known informally as the 3/14, a Philadelphia-based reserve artillery battalion.
His job was as an artillery meteorological man, meaning he helped direct fire by observing and computing weather data.
When Stone went to war, however, it was not with the 3/14 but with the 11th Marine Regiment, an artillery unit based at Camp Pendleton, Calif. Officials at both regiments said they could provide no information on the gunman.
Stone served in Iraq from April 17 to July 2, 2008.
Members of his artillery unit were assigned to different parts of Anbar province, according to Sgt. Bobbie Curtis, a Marines spokesman who also served in Iraq. Most Marines typically spent six months to a year in Iraq.
“The 11th Regiment was not there as an individual unit doing a job,” Curtis said. “They could have been doing everything from artillery to convoy security or manning checkpoints.”
Parts of the unit definitely experienced combat, he said. He had no information on unit casualties during Stone’s time in Iraq.
After he returned, Stone had sought work for a time as a contractor, but it’s not clear how busy he was or how long that lasted, according to one Montgomery County business owner who worked with him but asked not to be identified.
And his personal life started to unravel. In 2009, Stone and his wife, Nicole, began divorce proceedings. The divorce finalized in 2008, but a custody battle over their two girls was ongoing.
Records also show Stone owned at least two handguns — a Heckler & Koch .40-caliber and a Beretta 9mm.
In November 2013, Stone stood before a Montgomery County judge after being arrested for the third time on charges of drunken driving in about a decade.
At 12:30 a.m. April 28, 2013, Stone had been driving a silver Ford Fusion on Gravel Pike in Lower Frederick Township when he missed a curve, thumped over a curb and drove onto a lawn, according to an affidavit.
When state troopers arrived, Stone’s soon-to-be spouse and the car’s owner, Jennifer Ovdiyenko, told them she had been driving. She later admitted covering up for Stone because he had previous drunken driving arrests.
All three arrests occurred in Montgomery County — the third, captured in a court transcript, opening a window onto Stone’s troubles. Along with taking medications and having PTSD, Stone described himself as broke and unable to work.
Instead of coming down hard on the divorced father of two young girls, Judge William Furber Jr. allowed Stone to enter a veteran’s treatment program that ensured he wouldn’t go to jail or pay a large fine.
The judge emphasized Stone’s military service and stressed that he and others were there to help the veteran. Under the terms of veterans treatment court, Stone would have to make regular court appearances and follow a specific treatment plan.
“I’m proud to admit you,” Furber told Stone, according to the transcript.
He sentenced the vet to 23 months of “intermediate punishment” — sparing him from prison — with the first 90 days served under house arrest. Stone also received three years of probation and a $1,500 fine.
Stone told the judge he had been treated at the Veterans Administration for combat-related injuries since 2008.
As the hearing neared its end, Furber thanked Stone for his military service and said to others in the room, “Let’s give this man a hand.”
Staff writers Chris Palmer and Michaelle Bond contributed to this story.
©2014 The Philadelphia Inquirer. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.
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