TOKA'S FRIENDS 
Service dogs for military veterans

A  hero of the Gulf War, Leigh Ann Hester was the first female soldier to be awarded the Silver Star for valor since WWII. As a sergeant with the National Guard’s Kentucky-based 617th Military Police Company deployed in 2005 to Iraq, she was scanning and clearing a route for a supply convoy near Baghdad when her squad was ambushed by enemy fire.  She directed her team away from the enemy’s intense fire and into a flanking position that exposed multiple irrigation ditches and an orchard that the enemies were using to stage the attack.  Sgt. Hester displayed incredible bravery as she had walked directly into the line of fire to kill at least three enemy combatants at close range, resulting in numerous convoy members lives saved. With thirty-three insurgents killed or wounded and one captured, every member of her unit survived.