Simi Native Killed in Iraq

A 23-year-old Simi Valley High School graduate was among five Marines killed Saturday in Iraq during an ambush by hundreds of insurgents outside their base near the Syrian border, his family said Monday.

Cpl. Chris Gibson’s unit was escorting a convoy when it was attacked by insurgents near Qaim, according to relatives. Gibson’s best friend in the Marines also was killed in the ambush.

“The grief is deep and it’s overwhelming at times,” said Gibson’s mother, Terri Bowen, of Henderson, Nev. “But I know he believed in what he was doing, and he gave it all for his country. I praise the Lord for that.”

Gibson was married and had two children, his mother said. He grew up in Simi Valley, where he attended Grace Brethren Church, and had many friends both in the church and community, she said.

A 1999 graduate of Simi Valley High, Gibson married his high school sweetheart, Jessica Brady, in 2000, the day after he completed boot camp at Camp Pendleton, Bowen said.

He had never expressed interest in joining the military, but signed on immediately after graduating from high school, Terri Bowen said. “We were as shocked as you can imagine when he told us,” she said. “As all young kids do, he was asking, ‘What am I going to do with my life?’ ”

Jessica Brady Gibson was with her parents and other family members Monday at the Marine Corps base in Twentynine Palms, Calif., where she and Gibson lived with their children, Ivy, 3, and Luke, 1.

Her father said she was too distraught to talk about her husband.

Terri Bowen said that her son, who liked to make model cars as a child, grew up to be a strong, kindhearted man.

“He was a typical Marine,” she said. “Very physical, of course, but very proud. He had a sense of confidence in the work he was doing. He had a loving and tender side, too. His children were so important to him.”

Gibson last saw his family over the Christmas holidays after completing a seven-month tour of duty in Iraq. His son, Luke, was born while he was overseas.

Gibson’s grandfather, Larry Bowen, said Gibson called his wife at the hospital in Simi Valley using a cellphone he borrowed from a newspaper reporter who was accompanying the unit.

He started his second seven-month tour in Iraq in January.

Gibson is the third man from Ventura County and the second from Simi Valley to die in Iraq since January. Army Spc. Chris Hill, 26, a graduate of Moorpark High School, was killed last month when his vehicle apparently ran over a land mine outside Baghdad. In January, Army Spc. Michael Anthony DiRaimondo, 22, an Army medic from Simi Valley, was among nine U.S. soldiers killed when their Blackhawk helicopter was shot down near Fallouja.

In March of 2003, Marine Sgt. Michael Bitz, 31, who grew up in Port Hueneme, was killed in fighting near Nasiriya.