The elder Peralta, a 1997 graduate of Morse High School in San Diego, was an infantry rifleman with the 1st Battalion, 3rd Marine Regiment.
On Nov. 15, 2004, the Marines were clearing houses of enemy fighters in Fallujah, Iraq. After breachers kicked in the door to a building, Peralta and his squad walked into a back room and encountered “intense, close-range automatic weapons fire from multiple insurgents,” according to his Navy Cross citation.
As the Marines returned fire, Peralta fell to the ground mortally wounded from a gunshot to the head. The insurgents threw an enemy fragmentation grenade as they fled. When it landed by Peralta, he “reached out and pulled the grenade to this body, absorbing the brunt of the blast,” the citation said.
Peralta, 25, immediately succumbed to his wounds.
The Marine Corps and Navy Department recommended the Medal of Honor based on several eyewitness accounts by fellow Marines, the traditional standard of proof.
However, then-Defense Secretary Robert Gates decided against it after an unprecedented review panel of forensic and medical experts determined that Peralta was probably too gravely wounded to have acted consciously.