The war in Iraq has claimed another Tucson soldier, 33-year old Army Sergeant Victor Cota, who died on May 14 from injuries suffered in an earlier explosion when his vehicle encountered a roadside bomb. Sergeant Cota grew up in Tucson and attended Tucson High School.

His friends called him “Chico,” and the tragedy brought some of them back together to remember their friend. Aaron Valencia says, “(A friend) called me yesterday and said hey, I’ve got some bad news – Chico was killed. I asked my wife, I contemplated, and I was like, it’s not true. Victor’s not dead.”

Valencia knew Cota since their days at Tucson High. He says one of Cota’s proudest military moments came during the capture of Saddam Hussein. “He was really proud to come back and brag about that, that his platoon was one of the ones that was there,” says Valencia.

Cota first enlisted in the Army in 1993, but friends say he was so proud of his service that he signed up for a second tour of duty in 2000. “He didn’t have to go back but he did, and he did because he believed in the cause,” says Cota’s friend, Octavio Parra. “I feel sad because I never had a chance to tell him how I felt about him. I cannot describe what I’m feeling right now. I lost a friend. I lost a brother.”

Cota is survived by a wife and two children from a previous marriage. He would have turned 34 on May 23.