VICTIM  OF  HIT  &  RUN  ACCIDENT

Michael Andrew Tooley was born in Suffolk, Virginia, on August 7, 1987.  Unfortunately, during the early morning hours of July 16, 2016, he was struck and killed by a hit and run motorist in Sneads Ferry, North Carolina.  Tooley was then a 28-year-old sergeant who had been in the Marine Corps for eleven years.  At the time he was undergoing instruction at a combat engineer course at Camp Lejeune, was only a week short of graduation and was planning to return to his regular assignment as a drill instructor at Marine Corps Recruit Depot, San Diego.  The Marine Corps reported that during his service he had deployed four times, twice to Iraq and twice to Afghanistan.  Investigation immediately following the incident by North Carolina State Highway Patrol investigators disclosed that passersby discovered Tooley who was pronounced dead at the scene.  It was revealed that a tractor-trailer was parked in front of the establishment where the accident occurred, but it blocked the incident from appearing on surveillance cameras.  No witnesses or vehicle description was developed.  In 2019, North Carolina authorities reopened the cold case but continued to be unsuccessful in determining the identity of the individual responsible for Tooley’s death.  SGT Tooley is buried in Albert G. Horton Jr. Memorial Veterans Cemetery in Suffolk, Virginia, where his grave marker carries the inscription:  SGT  -  US MARINE CORPS  -  PERSIAN GULF  -  AFGHANISTAN  -  IRAQ.  He is survived by his wife and parents.

Submitted by CDR Roy A. Mosteller, USNR (Ret)