Police found a Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson soldier dead in an apparent suicide Wednesday morning in Anchorage, according to a JBER spokesman.
Sgt. Brent Steven Barnett-Lamothe, 25, died of an apparent self-inflicted gunshot wound while sitting in his car outside his home on Matthew Paul Way in East Anchorage, said Army spokesman Chuck Canterbury.
Barnette-Lamothe is from Highland, Calif., and joined the Army in July 2005. He had been stationed in Anchorage since May 2011 and recently returned from a 10-month deployment to Afghanistan, Canterbury said.
"He got back in September," Canterbury said. The Army spokesman said he did not know how many JBER soldiers have committed suicide in the past year.
Anchorage police discovered Barnett-Lamothe dead at the scene and have since closed the investigation, said Lt. David Parker, a department spokesman. "Every indication is that it was a suicide," he said.
Barnette-Lamothe described himself on Facebook as a signal support teams specialist -- a job that generally involves maintaining battlefield communication networks. He was a member of the 1st Squadron, 40th Cavalry Regiment, 4th Airborne Brigade Combat Team, 25th Infantry Division at JBER.
The soldier's family has been notified of his death.
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By KYLE HOPKINS