29
April. “The FBI is kind of crazy,” she says.
“It’s unreal every single day.” (Both James
and his wife declined interviews for this
story, citing ongoing court proceedings.)
He has pleaded not guilty.
The man in these posts comes across
as a devoted dad and husband with a wry
sense of humor, who likes fishing, grill-
ing and secretly watching The Golden
Girls. He occasionally jumps into Insta-
gram videos advertising Audrey’s real es-
tate business. The oldest of six siblings,
James grew up in San Jose, Calif., playing
football and the guitar. As he approached
the end of high school four years after the
9/11 terrorist attacks, he decided to follow
in his uncle’s footsteps and enlist in the
Army, motivated by the idea of serving his
country while also setting up a stable life
for himself. Before he deployed to Iraq in
March 2007, at the height of the U.S. mili-
tary surge, he got a tattoo on his right fore-
arm: death before dishonor.
On June 7, the 19-year-old Army pri-
vate was in the turret of his armored truck
outside Baghdad. His eight-man unit had
spent hour after eye-glazing hour staring
at the arid terrain, hunting for signs of
buried roadside bombs. Suddenly the
road erupted into a fireball. “A dump
truck full of 2,000 lb. of homemade ex-
plosives blew the bridge in half that my
squad was on,” Sergeant David Aleman,
the unit’s squad leader, tells TIME.
The blast killed three and wounded
several others, including Aleman. It
rocked James’ head and neck, shattering
his jaw as the column of a nearby building
collapsed on him. Smoke and blood filled
James’ nostrils. Scrambling in the chaos,
someone in the unit managed to radio
for medical support. “It is a miracle,”
Aleman says, “that some of us survived.”
For James, the months that followed
were a blur of surgeries and physical-
therapy sessions, first in Europe and then
in Fort Bragg, N.C., before he settled in
Florida. His body slowly healed, but he
was forced to take medical retirement
from the Army, and struggled to adapt to
postmilitary life. He suffered from PTSD,
anxiety and depression as his personal re-
lationships came under strain, according
to legal filings. In 2011, James was charged
with prowling when he was found hand-
ing out flyers for a moving company in a
gated parking lot in Jacksonville. He faced
a felony charge of impersonating a law-
enforcement officer after police said he
falsely claimed he was a member of the
military police. The charges were ulti-
mately dropped.
Things finally started falling into place
on the night in 2014 when he took Audrey
on a first date to a comedy club. She later
posted on Facebook that she laughed so
loud, she embarrassed him. The two had
met years earlier, when Audrey was still
married to another soldier and James’ jaw
was still wired shut. She would later joke
to friends that she liked it better that way.
They married in 2016.
All the while, James’ prior military
service remained an important part of
his life. He became involved with local
^
At least 10% of the people arrested in
connection with the siege at the Capitol
were current or former military members
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