Paul T. Nakamura

Died: June 19, 2003

Rank: Specialist

Unit: 437th Medical Company (Ambulance), 3rd Medical Command

Branch: U.S. Army

Specialist Paul T. Nakamura, an Army Reserve Soldier assigned to the 437th Medical Company (Ambulance), 3rd Medical Command based in Colorado Springs, Colorado, was killed in action on June 19, 2003, on a highway in al-Iskandariyah, Iraq, 20 miles south of Baghdad. Supporting Operation Iraqi Freedom, Nakamura was part of a crew transporting an injured Soldier in the back of the ambulance when the vehicle was hit by a rocket-propelled grenade that killed him and injured two other crewmen. On July 2, 2003, family, friends, military personnel, and extended family members from Okinawa, Japan, attended his funeral at Rose Hills Memorial Park, in Whittier, California. He was the first Japanese-American to be killed in the Iraq War.