David Campbell of Chandler has been to hell and back.
The 45-year-old Army veteran served in the first Iraq War in 1991 as one of the first soldiers in Baghdad to push back Saddam Hussein's Republican Guard. Later in the conflict, he was caught in a bunker with his partner and nearly didn’t make it out.
But Campbell, who comes from a military family, recovered — and even returned to the battlefield before coming home to the states, where he nearly lost his life, again in a car accident.
After multiple surgeries, Campbell had left leg amputated and now gets around with the use of prosthetics and with help of Caleb, his service dog.
But along with the physical ailments from both on and off the battlefield, the mental scars of war have stayed with him.
Now, he wants to help others cope with the horrors of post-traumatic stress disorder by working with the Mesa Police Department to identify those who are also going through tough times.
