David Hernler contacts his family after being presumed dead for 28 years. Â He sort of came back from the dead after so many people assumed he was dead years ago. Â He had escaped his air force based in 1984 and began a new life under a new name in Sweden. Â Hit the jump to read why he decided to escape his base and start a new life without anyone knowing.
Steph Bassanini
28 years after deserting the U.S. Air Force, a serviceman believed dead has stunned his family by contacting them from where has been living, as a fugitive, in Sweden.
Now aged 47, David Hemler vanished in 1984 while serving at a base in Germany, fleeing the country without a trace.
The conservative-raised airman hitchhiked through Denmark to Sweden after getting involved with a pacifist church – and a girl.
He felt in awe of the ‘fantasy world’ of Germany, its people ‘very involved in peace movements’ and became disillusioned with the policies of former President Ronald Reagan.
Together they have borne three children and he works for a Swedish government agency, local newspaper Dagens Nyheter reported. He is registered in Sweden as a citizen of an unknown country who was born in Zurich, keeping his true identity a secret from his new family.
Hemler became one of the U.S. Air Force’s eight most wanted fugitives and had expected at any time to be arrested by military police with both Interpol and Europol looking for him.
A grainy picture of his 21-year-old self was posted on the website of the U.S. Air Force Office of Special Investigation, as well as an age-enhanced photo guessing at his 47-year-old looks.
The site details how the Pennsylvania-born serviceman deserted on February 10, 1984 from the 6913th Electronic Security Squadron in Augsburg, Germany.
Now Hemler’s true appearance has been revealed after he agreed to a video interview with the DN. He said he turned to the media so as to ‘tell my story without pressure and in my own words’.
Hemler told how he had missed his parents after he deserted but went on to have a child and had not wanted to be separated from her. He decided to come forward after his third daughter turned two and could go to day care, so his wife would be better able to cope if he was arrested.
The dad-of-three first contacted his U.S. family four weeks ago, speaking to his brother Thomas who was in Massachusetts at the time on a business trip.
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