“Heroine n. 1. A woman noted for courageous acts. 2. A woman noted for special achievements in her field.” — Webster’s II New College Dictionary.
On Saturday, April 16, America lost one of its brightest stars. You may not have known her name or been touched by what she did, but she worked on your behalf all the same. She deserves to be mourned; she deserves to be remembered. Her name was Marla Ruzicka, and she was only 28 years old. Since the age of fifteen, she had been involved in activist work, helping humanitarian causes from China to Honduras. She died in Iraq still trying to save the world, racing along one of the most dangerous streets without a single piece of armor. The doctors found her at the scene, burns covering
90 percent of her body. Her last two words: “I’m alive.”
For some people, it’s not enough to make fiery speeches or buy bumper stickers or wave placards on the highway shouting “Honk if you hate war!” She didn’t even content herself with writing snooty columns in some college newspaper. Instead, when she learned that the Pentagon wasn’t counting civilian casualties in Afghanistan, she left her cozy home in California to count them herself. She had worked on behalf of dead and injured civilians of war since
December 2001.
“In war, innocent civilians should not be hurt. It happens. Now, we have to see what you do to help the families that were hurt,” Ruzicka told NPR in a 2002 interview.
Ruzicka’s irrepressible good nature led her to form a non-profit organization called the “Campaign for Innocent Victims In Conflict.” As part of the process of counting civilian casualties, she went door to door and hospital to hospital, speaking directly to the injured and the families of people deemed “collateral damage.” Lacking the money for an office, Ruzicka often slept on the couches of journalists or other humanitarian workers in Kabul and Baghdad.
Despite a lack of funding, Ruzicka managed to contact and catalog over 2000 families who had lost one of their own to the war in Afghanistan. She also confirmed the deaths of
800 civilians killed by American air strikes. In Iraq, Ruzicka had just begun her work. Before her death, she successfully lobbied in Congress to give families of people killed in Afghanistan and Iraq almost
$13 million in compensation. She hoped the money could be spent on hospitalization and reconstruction. Even after doing so much more than her share, Ruzicka kept on counting, not only the people Americans killed, but the people who were caught in Iraqi insurgents’ crossfire as well. Beyond politics, she wanted to make sure each and every orphaned child had a name in her files. A few days later and she would have been back in the United States, fundraising and out of danger.
Marla Ruzicka was killed in the line of duty. She wasn’t even a target. She was on her way to visit yet another injured child when suicide bombers caught her vehicle. It was only by chance that she was driving next to a convoy full of contractors. She was just another person to be sacrificed for the greater goal. The guerilla armies must be celebrating, as they have killed yet another well-intentioned person with white skin. As perhaps is fitting, she died side by side with her longtime Iraqi partner, Faiz Ali Salim. Marla Ruzicka touched so many and worked so hard. To me, she represents everything good and pure that is soiled by violence and repression.
I can think of no greater
eulogy than her own words: “Yes, a number is important … but not as important as realizing each number is a human life.”
She had a special kind of courage that I can never match. Goodbye, Marla Ruzicka. We have truly lost an angel to God’s sweet embrace.

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