Matt's mystery: Two years and counting
P.J. HUFFSTUTTER; Los Angeles Times
BATAVIA, Ohio - There are yellow ribbons tied around mailboxes and telephone poles, and staked across rolling hills. They curl around trees and the handrails of a Clermont County office building. They flutter from the mirrors or antennas of school buses.
The ribbons are as bright as they were two years ago, when townspeople started putting them up after Carolyn Maupin's son was captured in Iraq. There are so many that as Carolyn drove across town on her way to Cincinnati on a recent Friday, it looked as if she were breezing past fields of plastic daffodils.
She arrived at the Yellow Ribbon Support Center and warmly greeted the volunteers. Carolyn walked past walls plastered with photographs of Army Sgt. Keith Matthew 'Matt" Maupin, slipped into a back office and sat down by the phone.
When the Army officer called, as he does every Friday at 6 p.m., one of the first things Carolyn asked was: Are you any closer to finding my son?
The reply was simple, painful and routine: No.
Since the U.S. invaded Iraq three years ago, Matt is the only kidnapped soldier whose fate remains unknown.
On April 9, 2004, while on a security detail protecting a civilian convoy west of Baghdad, Matt's unit was attacked. As bullets flew, he was abducted.
Within days, the kidnappers released grainy video of the weary-looking 20-year-old, wearing camouflage and surrounded by five masked men. About three months later, another video was released of a man being shot in the back of the head and falling into a grave. The narrator claimed it was Keith Matthew Maupin.
But the video never showed the soldier's face. Matt's body was never recovered. There has been no proof of his death - not then, and not now, two years later - so the military considers him alive.
"I wake up and think, 'Is this the day that Matt will call and tell me he's coming home? Is this the day that the Army will call and tell me he's dead?'" said Carolyn, 58, a transportation secretary and dispatcher at the West Clermont School District. 'I go to bed wondering, 'How did Matt spend his day today? Did he eat? Can he sleep?'"
She and Matt's father, Keith, have pondered these questions for 734 days.
Officially, Matt Maupin is classified as 'captured." The Army doesn't consider him a prisoner of war, because Matt was not abducted by an opposing army and there was no standing government in Iraq at the time.
Only one other U.S. soldier in recent history has been classified as captured: Navy Capt. Michael 'Scott" Speicher disappeared when his plane was shot down over Iraq in 1991 during the Persian Gulf War. Neither he nor the ejection seat has been found.
When news of Matt's capture broke, the country flooded the family with thousands of cards, e-mails and calls of condolences. Camera crews swarmed the streets of Batavia (pop. 1,600) and nearby villages, about 20 miles southeast of downtown Cincinnati. For weeks, reporters peppered residents with questions about the 6-foot-2, 220-pound former high school football player.
As time passed, headlines and public attention faded, leaving Matt's family and the community isolated in their sorrow.
'It's so strange. Sad, and strange," said Shari Lawrence, deputy public affairs officer for the U.S. Army Human Resources Command. 'Nothing has changed there in all this time."
To a degree, not much has changed in the military's eyes, either. The Army has promoted Matt twice. His paycheck is regularly deposited into his bank account, which remains untouched.
In the last two years, officials from the Clermont County Convention and Visitors Bureau estimated that they've handed out about 30,000 yards of ribbon. When the sun fades the bright yellow, the ribbons are quickly replaced.
The marquee in front of Aztec Plumbing pleads, 'PRAY FOR MATT." Snappy Tomato Pizza advertises its specials below bold letters that ask diners to 'PRAY FOR MATT MAUPIN AND FAMILY."
Matt's younger brother, Micah, 21, was already in the Marine Corps. He's a corporal, now based at Miramar Air Station in Florida. This past winter, he broke his neck in a motorcycle crash.
While recovering, he told his parents that he asked the Marines to send him to Iraq. He wanted to find Matt.
Micah was scheduled to leave for Iraq this summer. He still wants to go. His parents have begged him not to. The military will review the request when he's better.
Carolyn and Keith threw their energies into founding the Yellow Ribbon Support Center to aid military families and troops serving overseas. The center opened in August 2004 and has sent to Iraq more than 5,000 care packages filled with movies, snacks and small luxuries.
Each outgoing package includes an image of Matt's face - either in a snapshot, or on a poster, T-shirt or magnets.
Keith, whose grief led him to shut down his construction company last summer, relies on friends and his savings to pay the rent. He spends most days at the center, surrounded by posters of his son.
'It's the only place where I feel at peace," Keith said, who hasn't shaved in two years. The bushy gray beard is now 10 inches long.
When President Bush attended the Cincinnati Reds' opening day on Monday, he visited with the couple and told them the military had not given up the search. Then, Keith recalled, the president suggested he visit a barber.
Keith said he tugged on the beard and replied, 'I'll cut this when you bring Matt home."
© 2006 Tacoma News, Inc. A subsidiary of The McClatchy Company
Tacoma, Washington