Photo By Sgt. Reba Benally | Spc. Leo Becera coaches a servicemember during a kickboxing class at the J.G. Denich...... read more read more
Subscribe
GUANTANAMO BAY, Cuba - As service members in the United States military, there’s a standard that we must uphold. It takes discipline and bravery in order to conduct our jobs every day. But it takes selfless acts and motivation to stand out and be constantly recognized.
Spc. Leo Becerra, a medic with the 670th Military Police Company from the California National Guard has been recognized many times throughout Guantanamo Bay and his home station for his efforts in uniform and off duty.
“I really don’t feel like I do enough. I feel like there’s always more that I can do. I’ve really pushed myself to get out there and expose myself to unfamiliar areas in my life to things I’m not comfortable doing normally,” Becerra said.
Becerra teaches combat medic courses for the Army and his students routinely walk away from the classes applauding his professionalism.
“His knowledge and real world experience in combat lifesaving was beyond impressive, and it was obvious that he is extremely passionate about the skills he passed onto us,” said Sgt. Paul Ball, with the 102nd MP Company. “Having deployed to a combat zone in the past, I personally would feel comfortable and secure having him on any mission as our squad’s combat medic.”
Becerra also volunteers, he teaches Latin dance classes, scuba dives, practices ju-jitsu, kick boxing, cooks Mexican cuisine, and teaches honor guard drills.
“I try to focus on changing the morale aspect of things. If it has to do with morale that is what I’m driven to,” Becerra said. “There’s too much to do here to ever say that you’re bored.”
Sgt. Timothy Brown, the medical evacuation non-commissioned officer in charge of the Joint Troop Clinic has worked with Becerra for the past four years.
“Working with Spc. Becerra has been an adventure, the life of the party. Over the past two years I’ve seen him grow a lot. He was recognized by our brigade commander in recognition of everything he’s done on this island, from teaching his dance class and being so involved in the community,” Brown said. “In a way I feel like it’s almost inspirational for other people to see how involved he is.”
Looking back on his proudest moment Brown said “I was watching TV one morning, drinking my coffee and a story comes on about this lady who was stabbed. This guy came out and saved her out of nowhere and I look up and there’s my soldier on TV in his Army PT shorts with his medic bag on his shoulder.
He heard this woman screaming outside, two o’clock in the morning. [He] grabs his medic bag, runs outside and actually saved the woman’s life. Even the doctors said there was a good chance that she wouldn’t have made it without that immediate intervention that he provided. That was one of those real proud papa moments.”
The article ran in multiple news papers, T.V. stations and GX magazine.
Becerra explained how he gains his strength to continue to work hard and boost morale in GTMO.
“There have been a couple of times where I’ve wanted to stop teaching a class because I feel unmotivated but then I have a new found energy and motivation from the people and how grateful they are. Especially from seeing people dance and seeing people learn from CLS class that I taught they come back to me and say, ‘oh I used this one day,’ and that feels amazing,” Becerra said. “Seeing change in other people’s lives makes everything worth it.”
| Date Taken: | 05.15.2015 |
| Date Posted: | 06.16.2015 14:50 |
| Story ID: | 166828 |
| Location: | GUANTANAMO BAY, CU |
| Web Views: | 70 |
| Downloads: | 0 |
This work, JTF Trooper helps build a brighter community, by SGT Reba Benally, identified by DVIDS, must comply with the restrictions shown on https://www.dvidshub.net/about/copyright.
No keywords found.
