Family recalls free-spirited son killed by bomb in Iraq
By Sara Burnett, Rocky Mountain News (Contact)
Saturday, September 13, 2008

Photos By Chris Schneider / The Rocky


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Stepfather Dan Benavidez, comforts Michelle Benavidez, the mother of Staff Sgt. Kennith Mayne, as the honor guard loads Mayne's casket into a hearse Friday at the Rocky Mountain Metropolitan Airport in Broomfield. Mayne, 29, was killed Sept. 4 in Iraq when his Humvee was hit by a roadside bomb.

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Honor guards stand in front of Mayne's casket at Rocky Mountain Metropolitan Airport in Broomfield. His body was flown to Colorado from Dover Air Force Base.

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Mayne's uncle, Herb Owen, 36, places his hand on the hearse. Owen recalled growing up with Mayne. "We'd throw each other around . . . like boys do," he said.

"He came out of the womb with a talent for knowing exactly what he could and couldn't get away with."

From the eulogy of Staff Sgt. Kennith Mayne

It was July, and Staff Sgt. Kennith Mayne was on his mid-tour break from Iraq.

He and his mom sat on the back porch of the family's Arvada home, a rare quiet moment in a house usually bursting at the seams with friends and family.

Mayne talked about Iraq: the kids he gave soccer balls to, the soldiers he served with, the Iraqi people he was helping.

Then he looked at his mom and said he wasn't afraid to die there.

He had been baptized a Christian during his first tour, and he knew he'd go to heaven, Mayne said.

"He told me, 'You know Mom, I'm OK with dying to save my soldiers. I'm OK with it. There's a lot of good people in Iraq. I'm OK with dying for them,' " Michelle Benavidez recalled this week as she sat on the same back porch.

"I think somehow he kind of knew."

Mayne died Sept. 4 when his Humvee was hit by a roadside bomb outside Baghdad. He was 29.

Among his last wishes were these: Everyone wears Hawaiian shirts to his memorial service. No one wears black. And someone plays Jimmy Buffet, preferably Cheeseburger in Paradise.

"That's his one last laugh at all of us," his cousin Josh Mayne, 27, said.

'The Rat Pack'

Mayne came from a family in which cousins are more like siblings and friends are more like cousins - and there always were a lot of both.

When he was 2, the family decided to leave California for Cedaredge in western Colorado. So the whole crew - Michelle and her three siblings, all their families and a St. Bernard - piled into a van and a Ford Pinto.

Sometimes the families lived together, with a brood of kids sharing a room with bunk beds. They were so close, people called the kids "the Rat Pack."

"If you found one of us, the rest of us were bound to be right there," said Josh Mayne, 27.

Ken Mayne was the one with the big smile, the goofball personality and the twinkle in the eye that could get him out of any kind of trouble, which was good, because although the kids liked to hunt and fish and camp, they loved to fight.

"We'd throw each other around and beat the hell out of each other, like boys do," said Mayne's uncle, Herb Owen.

It didn't end as they grew older. When he came home from the Army, Mayne would pick fights in the kitchen with his younger brother, Danny. The size disadvantage prompted the 17-year-old to take up mixed martial arts.

"He was tall and lanky when he went in (the Army), but he turned out to be a big dude, which sucked for me," Mayne's brother said. "I had to figure out how to defend myself, I guess."

'A hoodlum' transformed

By the time Mayne got to high school he was, as his mom put it, "a hoodlum."

He kept getting picked up by the cops. Benavidez caught him with drugs. He threatened to drop out of high school in Arvada, where the family had moved.

When he was about to turn 18, Benavidez told him he'd get a cake for his birthday, and then the party would be over.

I love you, but you have to get out of the house, she said. You have to do something.

He chose the Army - a decision that thrilled Benavidez.

"I was so proud of him," she recalled.

Mayne originally was assigned to the 101st Airborne but switched to the 4th Infantry because after its deployment it would be sent to Fort Carson - closer to home.

The Army turned out to be just what Mayne needed. He grew bigger, stronger, more mature and responsible. He was respectful, a leader.

"He'd come home, and we'd sit back, awe- struck," Josh Mayne said. "(The Army) gave him a reason. It gave him something he could look back on. All the people in life who said, 'You're a screw-up' - he could look back and say, 'Look what I did.' "

He believed in his mission, and he loved his soldiers.

When he learned one of them wasn't getting any mail from home, he asked his mother to send the soldier packages. He'd also ask for toys and candy to give to the kids.

Through the transformation, though, the goofball spirit remained.

On his first tour to Iraq in 2003, there were some "big nasty kids" who would throw rocks at the Americans, Mayne told his family. When the soldiers sat down to eat, those same kids would come up and ask for food.

Mayne would say sure, then hand over his packet of hot sauce and watch the kids' eyes water from the heat.

On a recent trip home, Mayne showed the family a photo of his combat team. In it, there were about 60 people, all dressed in camouflage and hiding in various poses.

He asked if anyone could spot him. Josh Mayne immediately cracked a smile and pointed.

"He was the only one waving to the camera," he said with a laugh.

"There were some things you couldn't change about him."

Family welcomes son home

Benavidez talked on the phone with her son or e-mailed him every three or four days while he was in Iraq. Any more than that, and he knew she'd be freaking out.

They spoke for the last time last Thursday.

He joked with her that everyone in his unit was receiving packages from her - but he still hadn't gotten his beef jerky.

Two hours later, he was killed.

On Friday, a plane carrying his body flew from Dover Air Force Base to Rocky Mountain Metropolitan Airport in Broomfield, where - no surprise to anyone - more than 30 family and friends were waiting.

Mayne's sisters and brother, mother and stepfather, cousins and friends held one another as the coffin was lowered from the plane and slowly placed into the hearse.

Benavidez and Mayne's stepfather, Dan, walked up close.

Then Benavidez turned, hugged her husband and began to sob, a mother's cry audible across the tarmac.


burnetts@RockyMountainNews.com or 303-954-5343


PUBLIC SERVICES

* Services for Staff Sgt. Kennith Mayne are at 1 p.m. today at Fort Logan National Cemetery, Shelter A.

* The family requests donations be given to these military support organizations: americanmilitaryfamily.org and soldiersangels.org