Police ID Alaska shooting victim as Ind. soldier

Tuesday, December 02, 2008

ANCHORAGE, Alaska (AP) - Alaska authorities have identified a man fatally wounded during an altercation outside an Anchorage bar as a military police officer from Indiana who recently returned from Iraq.

Police spokeswoman Anita Shell says Evan Lee Minnear, a native of Anderson, Ind., was shot outside the Woodshed Bar early Sunday morning and later died at a hospital.

Shell says 26-year-old Vongdevane Vongthongdy (VONG'-duh-von VONG'-thong-dee) was arrested Sunday and charged with second-degree murder.

The 24-year-old Minnear was a military police officer stationed at Fort Richardson in Anchorage.

Shell says Minnear was a member of the 425 Military Police Co. assigned to the Brigade Special Troops Battalion.

Minnear returned from a 15-month deployment to Iraq last February.

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