Hero's welcome in Rocky Point for soldier out of prison

Well-wishers lined the streets and waved tiny American flags. Firefighters arched the roadways with huge American flags. Police officers cleared the way.

It was a hero's welcome Friday for Justin Boyle, a former soldier released Thursday from an Oklahoma military prison after serving 13 months for a death he says he was not responsible for.

"This is unbelievable to see so many people here," Boyle said, moments after arriving at a reception in his honor at a packed Veterans of Foreign Wars hall in his Rocky Point hometown. "People I don't even know have done so much to keep my spirits up."

Boyle, 29, was sentenced last October to 2 years in prison for using a fatal choke hold on fellow soldier Pfc. Luke Brown following a night of drinking near Fort Bragg, N.C. Boyle, who left prison a year early after being granted clemency, has always maintained that he and several other soldiers were trying to subdue Brown because the 250-pound former athlete was drunk, violent and suicidal.

His 2009 conviction by a Fort Bragg court martial resulted in a bad-conduct discharge for Boyle, whose work doing Army intelligence during multiple combat tours of duty in Iraq and Afghanistan had earned him glowing personnel appraisals. It also earned him the loyalty of many of his soldier colleagues, some of whom came up from Fort Bragg to help welcome Boyle home.

"It's still surreal at this point," said the former Army sergeant during a telephone interview shortly after his release Thursday from the garrison at Fort Sill, Okla. "I can tell you the first thing you think about after getting out is Luke and his family, and how his family must feel about this. I miss him."

Boyle was granted clemency by Fort Sill's commanding general, Maj. Gen. David D. Halverson. A fort spokesman, who called Boyle "a model inmate," said the clemency decision was based in part on the wishes of the victim's family, which during Boyle's trial had called for his acquittal.

Boyle's case has become a cause celebre among some area patriotic groups, who helped organize Friday's motorcycle escort, then feted Boyle at the VFW reception.

Frank Bania, a member of the Patriot Guard Riders who helped organize the escort, said some people had asked him whether honoring Boyle is appropriate given his conviction in Brown's death. Bania said Boyle's effort to subdue Brown, who had fought with friends who were trying to get him to return to Fort Bragg from a local bar, was consistent with an Army tradition of protecting fellow soldiers at risk of harming themselves.

"I know from being in the Army myself that you bring everyone back and don't leave a fellow soldier in harm's way," Bania said. "He needs to know people are here for him."

Jessica Boyle, one of Justin Boyle's triplet siblings, gushed with relief.

"I'm proud of him," she said. "It was his actions and integrity that won him clemency."