PORTLAND, Ore. (AP) - A U.S. Marine from Salem has been killed in fighting in Iraq, the Defense Department said Thursday.
     
Lance Cpl. Derek W. Jones, 21, died when a roadside bomb exploded Sunday while he was in the Al Anbar province in Iraq. He was a rifleman and team leader assigned to the 2nd Battalion, 3rd Marine Regiment, 3rd Marine Division, III Marine Expeditionary Force, Kaneohe Bay, Hawaii.

Two other Marines - Lance Cpl. Jeremy S. Sandvick Monroe, 20, of Chinook, Mont.; and Capt. Robert M. Secher, 33, of Germantown, Tenn. - died in Sunday's blast.
     
A 2003 graduate of Sprague High School, Jones joined the Marines in 2004. He served in Afghanistan from May 2005 to January and went to Iraq in September, the Marines said.
     
His widow, Pamela, 20, posted a lengthy message to her husband on a MySpace.com Web page, saying in part "you are my everything and always will be." Their daughter is nearly 2.
     
He and Pamela eloped to Hawaii and were married last year. They returned to Salem in February 2006 for a large reception, his mother, Laurie Hadden, told The Oregonian newspaper.
    
"Everyone was so happy to see him," she recalled. "He was dressed all in his dress blues. I remember thinking how much he'd grown into a man."
     
His brother, Chad, is a senior linebacker on the Sprague football team, and the players planned to honor Jones by wearing U.S. flag stickers on their helmets for Thursday night's game against rival McNary High School.
     
Based on a listing kept by Gov. Ted Kulongoski's office, Jones was the 73rd person from Oregon, or with strong ties to the state, to die in fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan.


     
(Copyright 2006 by The Associated Press.  All Rights Reserved.)