Air Force Senior Airman Jonathan A.V. Yelner, 24, Lafayette; killed by a bomb in Afghanistan
Jake Yelner thought he'd pulled a fast one on his mother.
He enrolled at Diablo Valley College near his hometown of Lafayette, in the East Bay -- but he never showed up for classes. His mom finally busted him, dragging him to campus to prove that he wasn't a student.
"He never went to school at all, that little brat," Yolanda Vega recalled. "I gave him two choices: go back to school or join the military. And if you do join, I said, I'd love it if you joined the Air Force."
Yelner joined the Air Force on Oct. 7, 2003, and more than once raised his hand to serve on dangerous missions.
A weapons crew load member, he volunteered to provide escort duty to contractors in Iraq and volunteered to be sent to Afghanistan this year for a program to help residents build roads and buildings and set up water supplies.
On April 29, Senior Airman Jonathan A.V. “Jake” Yelner, 24, was killed when his vehicle struck a roadside bomb near Bagram, Afghanistan, north of Kabul. He was assigned to the 28th Aircraft Maintenance Squadron at Ellsworth Air Force Base, S.D.
"He loved wearing the uniform. He loved serving his country," his mother said. "I'm sure as a 24-year-old he had no idea he was going to die. He went to help the people of Afghanistan, to help build their homes. He'd say 'Mom, I'm making a difference.' "
Yelner, who was Jewish and Puerto Rican, attended Catholic schools throughout his childhood and graduated in 2002 from De La Salle High School in Walnut Creek. He also embraced his Jewish heritage and completed the bar mitzvah coming-of-age ceremony at the Western Wall in Jerusalem, his mother said.
He was active in the campus ministry and the theater company's set crew in high school.
On his MySpace page, the self-proclaimed "Puerto Rican heartthrob" wrote that he was "living each day like my last. Cause it might be." The website displays a photograph of Yelner dressed in his Air Force jacket leaning against a display in a music store.
His pride and joy was the Ford Mustang he had recently purchased. He described his interests as "role-playing online and on paper." He enjoyed rock music, lacrosse and golf, and he had begun studying martial arts. "I am a simple guy with simple interests and a complicated brain," he wrote.
Yelner also wrote on MySpace that he wasn't "one of those guys that says 'Darn I wish I did that.' " He also admitted that he was blunt: "I say what is on my mind and the truth no matter what."
