Wednesday, July 06, 2005
Copyright © Las Vegas Review-Journal

Navy SEAL's burial Saturday

Shane Patton, 22, of Boulder City, died in Afghanistan June 28

Petty Officer 2nd Class Shane Patton will be buried 10 a.m. Saturday at the Southern Nevada Veterans Memorial Cemetery in Boulder City, Navy officials said Tuesday.

Patton, 22, of Boulder City, was one of eight Navy SEALs killed June 28 when an MH-47D Chinook helicopter crashed near Asadabad in Afghanistan's Kumar Province.

He is the first sailor from Nevada to be killed in the nation's wars on terrorism and the 22nd U.S. military personnel with ties to Nevada to die overseas since the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks.

The SEALs were with a special operations team that included eight members who were attempting to rescue other SEALs in Operation Red Wing when the helicopter was shot down by an enemy rocket propelled grenade, according to the Army Special Operations Command in Fort Bragg, N.C.

Eight special operations soldiers from the 160th Special Operations Aviation Regiment also were killed in the Chinook crash.

One member of the four-man SEAL team on the ground was later rescued but two died and one is missing, according to the Department of Defense. Combined with the eight killed in the helicopter, the June 28 rescue attempt was the most tragic single incident in the history of the SEALs, officials said.

Chief Petty Officer Gary Lumpkins of the Naval Reserve in Las Vegas said Patton's body is expected to arrive at McCarran International Airport tonight. He said visitation will be from 3 p.m. to 7 p.m. Friday at Palm Mortuary on Boulder Highway.

Patton's father, James "J.J." Patton, a city marshal at Las Vegas Municipal Court and a former Navy SEAL, has declined to comment.

But the father of another Navy SEAL said Shane Patton spoke highly of his father before he was deployed.

"We loved him like a son and I would like to meet his father because Shane said a lot of neat things about his dad," said Tim Leathers, of San Diego, whose son, Matt, went through training with Shane.

"He and Matt were pretty inseparable. They worked out almost every day. They ate really well and didn't chase the girls or drink booze," Leathers said.

Shane Eric Patton was born Nov. 15, 1982, at Balboa Naval Hospital in San Diego, according to his mother, Valerie Robinson, of Poway, Calif.

"He was a great kid, a lovely wonderful kid who always looked up to his dad. He always wanted to be like his dad," Robinson said in a telephone interview Tuesday.

She said she had not talked to him since 1994 when she divorced his father. The family had lived in Imperial Beach, Calif., until then, when James Patton moved back to his home town, Boulder City, along with Shane's brothers.

Shane Patton graduated from Boulder City High School in 2000. He played on the baseball team as a utility player, according to one of his coaches, Chuck Stuart.

"Shane was a kid who worked real hard," Stuart said Tuesday. "He wasn't blessed with a lot of ability. He had a great attitude and was always smiling. He was kind of quiet but joked around with the other kids. He was fun to be around."

He was assigned to Navy SEAL Delivery Vehicle Team One out of Pearl Harbor, Hawaii. A memorial service is planned for July 11 for the fallen SEALs at Punchbowl National Cemetery in Honolulu, said Cmdr. Jeffrey Bender, a Navy spokesman.