Colorado & Denver News

BOULDER, Colo. (AP) ― Authorities who spent five days searching for a Marine reported missing after a hiking accident have arrested the man's friend and said Thursday they believe the disappearance was staged so the Marine could avoid returning to duty.

Steve Powers, 20, of Boulder was arrested late Wednesday for investigation of a misdemeanor charge of false reporting, Sheriff's Cmdr. Phil West said.

Authorities are still trying to find the Marine, Lance Cpl. Lance Hering, 21, who returned from Iraq in July and was due back at Camp Pendleton, Calif., this month. West said the new development had been reported to the Marine Corps and to Hering's parents.

He said state authorities were comparing DNA from human blood found at the scene where Hering was reported to have fallen while rock climbing to samples from Hering and Powers. Investigators have some leads into Hering's whereabouts but West declined to elaborate.

"Essentially (Powers) was trying to keep (Hering) from having to return to service as a Marine," West said. "That's Powers' version. Powers has lied to us repeatedly, so we take what he says with a grain of salt."

A call to Hering's parents in Boulder and messages left with officials at the Pentagon were not immediately returned. There was no telephone listing for Powers.

Camp Pendleton spokesman, 1st Lt. Esteban Vickers, said Hering was with the 3rd Battalion, 5th Marines, 1st Marine Division that returned from Iraq early last month. His unit engaged in combat, though Vickers wasn't sure if Hering did.

Hering's unit would not have returned to Iraq until at least 2008, Vickers said.

"We just want to make sure the Marine is OK," Vickers said. "The rest of the stuff can come out later."

Nobody answered a knock on the front door of the Hering home, in a quiet south Boulder neighborhood, where two electric candles were burning in the windows.

Hering's brother, Air Force Lt. Brendan Hering, was on leave in Colorado from Barksdale Air Force Base, La., said a man who answered a call at Brendan Hering's unit.

Brendan Hering has said it was an "insult" to suggest that his brother staged his own disappearance to avoid military duty. Hering's parents, who helped in the search, have said they believed his head injury may have caused him to lose his memory and become disoriented, possibly walking out of the park or asking for a ride.

"He doesn't run from his problems," Brendan Hering told the Daily Camera in Boulder for a story Wednesday. "He doesn't have any problems with the military."

Powers had reported that Hering fell while the two were hiking and injured his head, losing consciousness in the rugged Eldorado Canyon State Park west of Boulder. Powers said he went for help the next morning, but when he returned, Hering had vanished.

Brendan Hering told the Daily Camera that about 10 years ago, Lance Hering hit his head and temporarily lost his vision and speech. A few days later, he suffered some short-term memory loss. He said his brother could be suffering a similar injury.

The sheriff's department and search and rescue teams called off their search after five days, saying they were confident Hering had left the area. At the time, West said that a nationwide missing-person bulletin would be distributed for Hering.

In a statement, West said the sheriff's department planned to seek restitution for the thousands of dollars spent on the search, including flights by a Denver police helicopter. He also said Lance Hering could be charged with false reporting.

Marine officials have told sheriff's agency that Hering was classified as unauthorized absent because he left before official approval of his request for leave, West said.

The Pentagon has said simple desertion has been decreasing in the military in recent years -- about 2,500 troops last year didn't show up for work, down from almost 5,000 in 2001.

But groups that run the GI Rights Hotline, which helps servicemembers interested in getting out of their required service, have reported receiving more than 36,000 calls in 2005, and about 19,000 in the first six months of this year, up from fewer than 1,000 in 2001, two years before the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq.

"Certainly, the numbers of people who are opposed to the war are going up," said Steve Morse, GI Rights coordinator for the Central Committee for Conscientious Objectors. "Many people are going (absent without leave), more and more, some who are back from the war with post-traumatic stress disorder and many facing going back again say they are not going to go."

There have been several high-profile cases of people who refused to return to Iraq in recent years.

Marine Cpl. Wassef Ali Hassoun, an Arabic translator, faces two desertion charges after Navy investigators concluded he fled Camp Fallujah in Iraq in June 2004 and then failed to arrive at his base in Camp Lejeune, N.C., in January 2005. Hassoun is still missing.

Last week, Army Spc. Mark Wilkerson surrendered to authorities at Fort Hood, Texas, after being declared absent without leave a year and a half ago before his second deployment to Iraq. He said he wanted to turn himself in rather than "live in constant fear" of being arrested.

Wilkerson said his request for conscientious objector status was denied a month before his unit was to return to Iraq, and he decided not to return from two weeks of approved leave after learning his appeal would not be considered until he returned from another deployment.

Toronto attorney Jeffry House, who represents Army paratrooper Jeremy Hinzman, who is seeking political asylum in Canada, has said about 20 Americans have fled the military and applied for refugee status in Canada. House also has estimated 200 others were hiding in Canada awaiting the outcome of Hinzman's case.

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