The highly-decorated US special forces soldier who took his own life in a Cybertruck explosion in Las Vegas on New Year’s Day had confided to a former girlfriend that he faced significant pain and exhaustion that she says were key symptoms of traumatic brain injury.
The dead man, US Green Beret Matthew Livelsberger, 37, was a five-time recipient of the Bronze Star, including one with a V device denoting valour under fire.
He had an exemplary military record that spanned the globe and had welcomed a new baby, born last year. But he struggled with the mental and physical toll of his service, which required him to kill and caused him to witness the deaths of fellow soldiers.
The soldier is believed to have taken his own life in the blast (AP Photo/Ty ONeil)
Livelsberger mostly bore that burden in private but recently sought treatment for depression from the army, according to a US official.
He also found a confidant in a former nurse, who he began dating in 2018.
Alicia Arritt, 39, and Livelsberger met through a dating app while both were in Colorado Springs.
Ms Arritt had served at Landstul Regional Medical Centre in Germany, the largest US military medical facility in Europe, where many of the worst combat injuries from Iraq and Afghanistan were initially treated before being flown to America.
There, she saw and treated traumatic brain injuries (TBIs), which troops suffered as a result of incoming fire and roadside bombs. Serious but sometimes hard to diagnose, such injuries can have lingering effects that might take years to surface.
Ms Arritt said: “I saw a lot of bad injuries. But the personality changes can happen later.”
The incident took place outside Trump International Hotel (Bizuayehu Tesfaye/Las Vegas Review-Journal via AP)
In texts and images he shared with Ms Arritt, Livelsberger revealed some of what he was facing.
“Just some concussions,” he said in a text about a deployment to Helmand Province in Afghanistan. He also sent her a photo of a graphic tattoo on his arm of two skulls pierced by bullets, to mark the lives he took in Afghanistan.
He talked about exhaustion and pain, not being able to sleep and reliving the violence of his deployment.
“My life has been a personal hell for the last year,” he told Ms Arritt during their early days of dating, according to text messages she provided to the AP.
“It’s refreshing to have such a nice person come along.”
Las Vegas law enforcement officers released excerpts of messages Livelsberger left behind showing the manner in which he killed himself was intentional – meant both as a “wake-up call” but also to “cleanse the demons” he was facing as a result of losing fellow soldiers and taking lives.
The special forces soldier is said to have taken his own life (Alcides Antunes via AP)
Livelsberger’s death in front of the Trump Hotel using a truck produced by Elon Musk’s Tesla company has raised questions as to whether the incident was an act of political violence.
Officials said Livelsberger apparently harboured no ill-will toward President-elect Donald Trump, and Ms Arritt said both she and Livelsberger were Tesla fans.
“I had a Tesla too that I rescued from a junkyard in 2019, and we used to work on it together, bond over it,” Ms Arritt said.
The pair stopped talking regularly after they broke up in 2021, and she had not heard from him in more than two years before he texted out of the blue on December 28, and again on December 31.
The upbeat messages included a video of him driving the Cybertruck and another one of its dancing headlights; the vehicle can sync up its lighting and music.
But she also said Livelsberger felt things “very deeply and I could see him using symbolism” of both the truck and the hotel.
The dead man is said to have borne no ill-will towards the US President-elect (Bizuayehu Tesfaye/Las Vegas Review-Journal via AP)
“He wasn’t impulsive,” Ms Arritt said. “I don’t see him doing this impulsively, so my suspicion would be that he was probably thinking it out.”
Ms Arritt served on active duty from 2003 to 2007 and then was in the army reserve from until 2011. With Livelsberger, she saw symptoms of TBI as early as 2018.
“He would go through periods of withdrawal, and he struggled with depression and memory loss,” Ms Arritt said.
“I don’t know what drove him to do this, but I think the military didn’t get him help when he needed it.”
Livelsberger was also sweet and kind, she recalled: “He had a really deep well of inner strength and character, and he just had a lot of integrity.”
Pentagon deputy press secretary Sabrina Singh told reporters it has turned over all Livelsberger’s medical records to local law enforcement, and encouraged troops facing mental health challenges to seek care through one of the military’s support networks.
When Livelsberger struggled during the time they were dating, Ms Arritt encouraged him to get help. But he would not seek it out, saying it could cost him his ability to deploy if he was found medically unfit.
“There was a lot of stigma in his unit – they were, you know, big, strong, special forces guys there, there was no weakness allowed, and ‘mental health is weakness’ is what they saw,” she said.
Livelsberger seeking treatment for depression was first reported by CNN.