LEWISTON — A 49-year-old Lewiston man has died of an apparent heart attack while working for a civilian contractor in Iraq.

Michael Behr was on his way home for a visit when someone on a bus discovered him, said his mother, Florence.

Behr had been working as a private contractor in a metal fabrication facility. He was employed by KBR, a former subsidiary of Halliburton.

Florence Behr said two men from KBR told her about her son’s death on Monday.

He died sometime over the weekend, she said.

“It’s being treated as a military, non-combatant death,” Florence Behr said.

His body will be shipped home sometime in the next few days and will undergo an autopsy to determine how he died.

Until that’s done, funeral arrangements and services will wait, she said.

Behr, a longtime biker, had spent four years in the U.S. Air Force as a young man, but he had moved around a lot.

“He was a good guy,” his mother said. “He was into the biker life.”

He was recently working in Oregon before he moved back to Lewiston last year with his wife, Cindy Morneau-Behr.

He was treated for high blood pressure and passed a physical before leaving for Iraq in November, his mother said.

“He was supposed to be on medication,” Florence Behr said. He was a constant smoker and heart troubles run in the family.

“He said he was better, but he was probably telling me what I wanted to hear,” she said.

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