A Texas soldier who disappeared for 11 days this year — and was found one day after the announcement of his wife’s death — is not a person of interest in the case, military officials said.
In a news release, the Army’s Criminal Investigation Division cleared Spc. Craig Chamberlain, 23, in the May death of Cam Chamberlain and said her cause and manner of death will be released after an autopsy is completed.
The statement, which was released Friday, added that because the investigation is active, no additional details will be released.
Cam Chamberlain.Courtesy Jessica D’Lynn PylesIn a text message Monday, Craig Chamberlain’s mother disputed the date of death the Army released for Cam Chamberlain — May 25 — and said the Criminal Investigation Division previously told her family it was May 23.
An Army spokeswoman later clarified that May 23 was correct. Fort Cavazos officials announced the death on May 25.
“I am glad that the truth is coming out and I know that there will be more truth to follow,” Virginia Chamberlain said in the text. “We do not know why it has taken so long for this to come to light.”
She called on the Killeen Police Department to release the details surrounding her daughter-in-law’s death so “Cam’s loved ones and friends can have closure.”
The police department previously referred questions to the lead agency investigating her death, the Criminal Investigation Division.
NBC News reported Thursday that close friends of Cam Chamberlain’s have remained frustrated in the weeks after her death because authorities have released few details about it.
“I can’t even mourn her death the way family should, because it’s as if she never existed at all now,” said a friend, Shandy Eubank.
Efforts to reach Cam Chamberlain’s family have been unsuccessful. Friends of hers have said she was estranged from relatives.
Spc. Craig Chamberlain.U.S. ArmyCraig Chamberlain, of Fort Cavazos’ 704th Explosive Ordnance Disposal Company, went missing May 15 in what the Army described as a “willful” disappearance. The base has said he was found May 26.
Army officials have declined to provide more details about his status or the disappearance, which was the subject of internal inquiry. A spokeswoman for the base said the Army does not comment on administrative actions.
Craig Chamberlain’s mother previously said a civilian search party found him in the Killeen area — near where Fort Cavazos is located — in “rough shape.” She declined to provide additional details, citing his privacy, but she described his path forward as a “hard journey” with “a lot of healing.”
Craig and Cam Chamberlain were married in October 2020.
He was assigned to a new post in South Korea in December, Army officials have said, but for “unknown reasons” he never traveled to the country.
In a Facebook message to a friend after Craig Chamberlain went missing, Cam Chamberlain said her husband had lied to her about the assignment, and in an interview with the Killeen Daily Herald she said military officials told her that he stopped reporting to work in March — though she said he never told her about it.
In the days before her death, Cam Chamberlain told friends that her marriage had become “toxic” and that she was divorcing her husband.
Eubank said her friend had struggled with her husband and his family partly because of her gender identity. Cam Chamberlain publicly identified as a transgender woman.
Virginia Chamberlain has rejected that claim, calling it “very, very inaccurate.”
Tim Stelloh
Tim Stelloh is a breaking news reporter for NBC News Digital. » …
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