Kin of kidnapped GIs come together: Pitch in to build care packages for troops
By O’Ryan Johnson
Sunday, July 22, 2007

Two families holding out hope of a homecoming met in Lawrence yesterday, where they packed boxes with clean socks, movies, magazines, snacks and anything else a ground-pounder from the 10th Mountain Division might need.
    Iraqi insurgents kidnapped Spc. Alex Jimenez of Lawrence and Pvt. Byron Fouty of Michigan, along with a third soldier from the 10th Mountain Division, in April.
    Fouty’s stepfather and Jimenez’s parents met Friday night for the first time, brought together by a soldier support group from Methuen that organized yesterday’s care-package drive for the missing soldiers.

    “We hugged and it was hard to let go,” said Fouty’s stepfather, Gordy Dibler, 48, of Oxford, Mich.
    Dibler said when he saw Jimenez’s father, Andy Jimenez, the bond was immediate and strong. Not only were both their children American soldiers fighting overseas and assigned to the same elite unit, but both were snatched by an insurgent group and the subject of seemingly endless media coverage.
    Jim Wareing - whose Methuen group New England Caring for Our Military Inc. has been recognized by President Bush - organized the drive to allow the families and friends of Fouty and Jimenez to build and send care packages to soldiers in the 10th Mountain Division.
    More than a dozen volunteers arrived to assemble hundreds of packages, including Anne Chay, 55, of Andover. Chay teaches algebra at Lawrence High School, and her son Spc. John Stras, 20, is fighting in Iraq. By coincidence, Stras’ unit was close by when Jimenez and Fouty were captured, and the 2005 Andover High School graduate was sent to the field for five days on a mission to find them.
    “He knew one of the soldiers was from Lawrence,” she said. “When he called he said, ‘You tell those people in Lawrence we’re doing everything we can.’ ”
    Also volunteering at the event was retired Marine Staff Sgt. and Iraq war veteran Daniel Cotnoir, who was acquitted last year of assault and battery charges after he fired into a rowdy crowd that tossed a bottle through his home’s window.
    “You cannot believe the morale that they get from something like this,” he said of receiving a package overseas. “You open it up and everybody shares it. Everyone in the unit gets something out of one of these boxes.”
    The Jimenez family said they are happy to help the men searching for Alex, praying that maybe the gift of something happy and unexpected will come their way as well.
    “Hope,” said Jimenez’s mom, Marie Duran of New York. “I hope.”

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