Marines provide first aid, stall assault suspect near Okinawa beach

CAMP HANSEN, Okinawa — Three Marines headed to a Naha beach for a pickup soccer match instead intervened in an alleged assault, treated an injured Japanese man and stalled the suspect until police arrived.

Lance Cpls. Braeden Martinez and Zachary Leewe and Pfc. Marvin Bousy, bulk-fuel specialists with Hansen’s 9th Engineer Support Battalion, received Navy and Marine Corps Achievement Medals for their actions July 5 at Wakasa Seaside Park near Naminoue Beach.

The Marines said they did not expect recognition.

“Internally, we know we all did the right thing,” Leewe, of Aldie, Va., told Stars and Stripes on Friday in the warehouse where the three work.

“If someone’s in need, just help them,” he said. “Don’t be one of those people who just stand there and watch. Don’t be a follower; be a leader.”

The Marines said they drove to the beach in two vehicles with three friends visiting Okinawa from a California university. The friends, who have since returned to the United States, declined through the Marines to be identified.

As the group prepared to join a soccer game, they noticed two men in the nearby park. One, who was larger, lifted the other from the ground and dropped him, Leewe said.

“We thought they were just messing around because it didn’t look serious at first,” said Martinez, of Lancaster, Pa.

Then the larger man began stomping on the other man’s head, Leewe said.

The alleged attacker back away as the Marines ran toward them, and an older bystander grabbed him, Martinez said. The injured man lay on his back with blood covering his head and chest and his eyes swollen shut.

“I take off his shirt and I see there’s cuts — several lacerations on his forehead,” he said.

Bousy, of Philadelphia, called police while Leewe and Martinez used water to clean the man’s wounds. Martinez fashioned a bandage from the injured man’s T-shirt, and the group moved him toward a nearby shopping center.

Martinez credited Marine Corps combat casualty-care training with helping him respond.

From left, Lance Cpl. Braeden Martinez, Pfc. Marvin Bousy and Lance Cpl. Zachary Leewe, of 9th Engineer Support Battalion, pose in front of their battalion's logo at a warehouse on Camp Hansen, Okinawa, Japan, July 31, 2026. (Ryan M. Breeden/Stars and Stripes)

Without it, “I wouldn’t know what to do, like cleaning off a wound and then bandaging,” he said.

Leewe and the three visiting friends remained with the injured man while Martinez and Bousy followed the suspect, Leewe said. The man threatened them, but the Marines stalled him until several police vehicles and an ambulance arrived moments later, he said.

Police arrested Fumiya Saito, 35, at 7:39 p.m. on suspicion of assaulting and injuring a 23-year-old man from Itoman, an Okinawa Prefectural Police spokesman said by phone Friday.

Some Japanese government officials may speak to the media only on condition of anonymity.

The injured man was taken away by ambulance, said Leewe, who provided a statement at Naha Police Station on July 9.

Col. Robert Gerbracht, commander of Combat Logistics Regiment 37, said the three Marines “lived up to the hype” when he met them at the award ceremony.

Gerbracht said their actions reflected the Okinawan expression “ichariba chode,” which roughly means that once people meet, they become family.

“I would say these Marines acted in that spirit,” he said.