My latest column is about Lance Corporal Andres Raya of the U.S. Marines. If the name rings a distant bell, it’s because Raya was all over the TV news last week in surveillance videos and still pictures of his ambush on police officers at a Ceres, Calif., liquor store.

Before we go any further, let me use this space to reprint the minute-by-minute chronology of Raya’s cop-killing plot (courtesy of the Modesto Bee):

Sunday, around 8 p.m. � Using an assault rifle, Raya fires a shot into the pavement in the parking lot outside George’s Liquors, 2125 Caswell Ave. He goes inside and tells the clerk, “Somebody just fired at me, call the police.” Police said they received the call at 8:05 p.m. and arrived at the liquor store at 8:07. A surveillance video shows police arriving about 8:16, which means the camera’s timer may have been as much as nine minutes fast.

8:15:37 � Surveillance video shows Raya pacing outside the liquor store door, at a corner of the building.

8:15:47 � The first Ceres police unit pulls up, behind an opposite corner of the building. Two officers emerge: Sam Ryno and an unidentified trainee.

8:15:49 � The officers walk to the building.

8:16:14 � A second police car, with one officer inside, pulls up.

8:16:19 � Ryno and the trainee peer around the corner.

8:16:20-8:16:23 � Raya sees them and steps back, reaches under his poncho and levels his rifle.

8:16:24 � Raya fires, and Ryno goes down. Raya keeps shooting as he advances on the corner. A third officer, who arrived in the second car, returns fire as Ryno crawls back to his car.

8:16:33-8:16:41 � Raya runs back to the other corner.

8:17:20 � He keeps the rifle out and throws part of the poncho over his shoulder.

8:17:34 � He notices something to his left, apparently Sgt. Howard Stevenson driving up. Raya crouches behind a sedan in the parking lot.

8:17:37 � He fires through one of the car’s side windows and hits Stevenson outside his car. Raya continues firing, and Stevenson returns fire.

8:17:42 � Raya runs toward the downed officer. Police say he shot him twice in the back of the head.

8:18 � Officers from around the region respond to the “officer down” call, and cordon off the neighborhood as they search for the gunman.

About 10 p.m. � Police evacuate residents from several homes around a house where officers believe Raya may be holed up. Police shoot out streetlights to obscure the suspect’s vision.

11:08 � Four officers see Raya climb over a fence, entering an alley between Glenwood and Myrtlewood drives. He fires on them, and they return fire, striking him. He drops his rifle, but remains standing. He reaches under his poncho and officers fire again, killing him.

Raya was not a desperate, crazed gunman driven to “suicide by cop” in an attempt to avoid being sent back to Iraq. He had never seen combat, never fired his gun overseas, and was scheduled to be deployed to Okinawa, not the Middle East. He was, according to police, a gang-banger high on cocaine who had a history of trouble with the law and questionable loyalties to this country. Cops found a videotape with Raya and Latino gang members smoking marijuana and throwing gang signs after breaking into a school gym, stealing computer equipment, tearing up an American flag, and spelling out “F— BUSH” with the pieces–which were left on the gym floor.

The Left’s martyrdom of Raya has been quick and unrelenting. Counterpunch writer Jack Random exploits the incident to call for military recruiters to be banned from high schools. Indymedia posted a complaint from a reader angry that the California legislature lowered its flags in memory of the slain cop. And check out this appalling piece in La Voz de Aztlan, which demonizes Raya’s white neighbors as “rednecks” and blames our military for Raya’s murderous shooting spree:

One can only speculate what horrors Andres Raya experienced in Fallujah. The slaughter by US occupation forces of Iraqi civilians in Fallujah has been compared to the slaughter in Guernica by Nazi forces in 1937. Many US Marines with a conscious have found it very difficult to reconcile the Iraqi civilian murders in their minds and have committed suicide. US Marine Andres Raya decided to take some cops with him. Most probably he was harassed by them while growing up Mexican in this small northern California town.

As I conclude in the column, the question isn’t what got into Raya when he entered the military. The question is why and how Raya — who police say had a propensity for violence well before he joined the Marines — got into our military in the first place. Raya’s citizenship status is murky. As I’ve noted before, the Pentagon’s lax policies allow illegal aliens and those using fake ID to enter the armed forces with ease. A number of military folks have also told me that there is a significant problem with gang members getting into service.

Somebody’s asleep at the wheel.

Update: The Socialist Worker Online continues the Myth of the Anti-War Marine here.

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