Ft. Carson Widow Learns Of Death Through Facebook

An investigation is underway after a Fort Carson widow learned of her husband’s death through a Facebook message.

Staff Sargent Christopher Brown was killed in Afghanistan earlier this month when he stepped on an explosive. His wife said before she could be properly notified by the military, a woman in her husband’s platoon gave her the heart breaking news.

“What I was told was via Facebook,” Ariell Taylor-Brown told Ohio station NBC4i. “It was from a girl in his platoon. She wrote me and told me to call her immediately, it was an emergency, and I didn’t know what she wanted. She told me over the phone in front of my kids. I completely had a meltdown.”

Taylor-Brown said it happened a few hours before military members came to her door in Mobile, Alabama to notify her.

Soldiers are usually warned not to release information about military deaths until the family has been notified. Those that break the rules can be court-martialed.

A Fort Carson spokesperson told KRDO Newschannel 13 that procedures were obviously violated, and an investigation is underway into why this happened.

Taylor-Brown, who’s pregnant with her third child, is left devastated by the loss of her husband and confused by his fellow soldier’s mistake.

“She wasn’t supposed to, but I guess she took it in her own power to do it,” said Taylor-Brown.