Who's Shooting Who?

With her son's story lacking the final, whodunit chapter, Peggy Buryj would like to see a full-scale probe like the one being done in the Tillman case by the Army Criminal Investigative Division, under orders from the IG. There's reasonable cause, she says.

"I think it may have been someone from the 66."

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At least, that's what she was told, she says, by one of the officers in Jesse's 66th MP Company.

A lieutenant, he "came to our house last February [2006]," Buryj says."He had heard me on a radio show talking about Jesse. He called and asked if he could come by and talk to me. He was very afraid and at first wouldn't tell me his name.After a while, I figured out who he was." She won't publicly identify the officer.

"He told me who had confessed to killing Jesse. [The officer] was not there when Jess was killed, but he was there when the confession was made and the reports were falsified."

Buryj says she relayed the information to the IG's office, but was told the officer who had spoken with her had since left the service and the Army lacked jurisdiction. The IG's office won't comment today.

"They totally discredited him by saying he was demoted while in Iraq and had an ax to grind with commanders of the 66th," Buryj says. "That may be true, but people I've talked to in the 66th say it isn't."

Time is working against her now, as it is for the Tillmans. Three of the four likely shooters in Tillman's case are out of the service, free from military punishment.

"I think they're waiting for the same thing in Jess' case," says Buryj, suggesting the Army can just drop the case altogether if the alleged shooter of her son leaves the service.

A civil lawsuit would be expensive and perhaps futile—the military services are shielded from most tort claims for injury and death under a 60-year-old law known as the Feres doctrine, which, for the "good of the service," immunizes the military from what could be a barrage of claims.

Besides, says Buryj, if key evidence is missing, other than asking for a criminal probe, "There's just no place I know to go from here. Is it good enough? No. But what can I do about it? I guess you just live with your frustration."

She pauses.

"He was funny; that's the one thing I miss most. He was the funniest person I ever met. We were always on the same wavelength." She visits him weekly, sometimes driving past the football fans downtown.

randerson@seattleweekly.com