[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 152 (2006), Part 9]
[House]
[Page 12705]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                   TRIBUTE TO ALBERTO V. SANCHEZ, JR.

  (Mr. GENE GREEN of Texas asked and was given permission to address 
the House for 1 minute and to revise and extend his remarks.)
  Mr. GENE GREEN of Texas. Madam Speaker, I lost a constituent this 
last week in Iraq. Staff Sergeant Alberto V. Sanchez, Jr., had planned 
to celebrate his fifth wedding anniversary next month while on leave 
from Iraq. ``It takes a piece of my heart,'' his mother, Olga Sanchez, 
said in Houston, through tears. ``Nothing we can say or do will ever 
bring him back.''
  Sanchez, 33, a Milby High School graduate, died Saturday from wounds 
he suffered when an improvised explosive device detonated near his 
vehicle in Balad, about 50 miles north of Baghdad.
  Sanchez was assigned to the Army's 1st Battalion, 68th Armor 
Regiment, 3rd Heavy Brigade Combat Team, 4th Infantry out of Fort 
Carson. Alberto Sanchez chose the Army so he could earn money for 
college tuition, but the military became his career. He chose to be in 
the Army, and his mother, Olga Sanchez, said he always said, ``This is 
just a job. I've got to do what I've got to do.''
  His parents, Alberto, Sr., and Olga Sanchez, moved to Houston from 
Reynosa, Mexico, when their son was an infant. The family is in 
disbelief, Mrs. Sanchez and the other adult children said. ``We never 
felt worried,'' his mother said. ``If he felt worried, he never showed 
it. Like I said, all the pictures we have of him, he always had a big 
smile.''
  Madam Speaker, I ask for a moment of silence to celebrate this 
American hero, Alberto Sanchez, Jr.

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