All photos courtesy of the family of Spc. Rao.

PORTLAND, Ore. - The family of a man who grew up in the Portland area and attended West Linn High School said Monday that he was killed in Afghanistan on Saturday.

Family members said U.S. Army Specialist Elijah John-Miles Rao, 26, was killed by a roadside bomb on December 5. He is the 20th person from the Oregon and Southwest Washington area to be killed in Afghanistan since the start of the war.

Rao, pronounced "Ray-o," leaves behind a wife and an 18-month-old daughter. His parents live in Vancouver, Washington.

According to information released by Specialist Elijah John-Miles Rao's family, he was on his second tour of duty in the region and was due to come home on leave in January and was scheduled to finish his deployment to Afghanistan in May.

Rao served an extended tour in Iraq before being sent to Afghanistan.

According to the press release, Rao was in a vehicle that was part of a convoy that stopped at the site of an earlier roadside explosion.

When Specialist Rao stepped from his vehicle to assist, another buried explosive reportedly detonated nearby, killing him. The press release did not specify if there were any other casualties.

“The minute he was born, there was a soft gentle, loving, kind spirit that never left him,” said Rao’s mother Sharon Hauerken on Monday. “It was to his core. ... It grew and matured with him, but it was always with him.”

She said the events of 9/11 prompted her son to join the military.

“He thought they were just horrible and that someone needed to go over there and help those people,” she said. “He was there for the right reasons, the right honorable reasons. Everything that was America – the right reasons. … It was without question.”

Hauerken said her son carried a Bible everywhere he went, and he will be awarded the Purple Heart.

Specialist Rao's body is expected to be returned today, Monday, to Dover Air Force Base. It will then be returned to Portland for burial with full military honors at Willamette National Cemetery.

The exact date for the burial in Portland has not been released. Rao was based out of Fort Carson.