USS Fitzgerald collision in C7F

[Uncle Fester]

I still think that if you’re going to shoot somebody “for the encouragement of the others,” you should at least make your point public and explicit. They’re taking the OOD, TAO, and SWC to a GCM over this; they should make the findings public. Otherwise those just looks like a public execution because someone has to be guilty.

Just going off what’s in the news, seems like the whole watch team dicked the dog in a big way, but a GCM says that it rose to the level of criminal negligence. There have been lots of collisions with loss of life over the years...guys got reprimanded or fired, but not prosecuted. So what’s different here?

 

[nittany03]

I still think that if you’re going to shoot somebody “for the encouragement of the others,” you should at least make your point public and explicit.

The irony of your quoting Voltaire is that he was referring to shooting Admirals, not junior grade Lieutenants.

 

[Flash]

So she kills seven Sailors and loses 2.5 months of pay...wow.

I'm very wary of punishment for mishaps, it is rare in aviation even when there is loss of life and someone is found at fault. To lay the bulk of the blame at her feet is a bit too much in my opinion, she wasn't the only one on the bridge and plenty of folks further up the chain share some as well.

I watched a LT (an LT?) lose $2K for six months and spend a month on restriction for way less than that...granted he fought it the whole way and never accepted blame, but damn...he was given the boot at 18+years as well...
http://www.navy.mil/submit/display.asp?story_id=90670

Not knowing the details other than the link you posted, his appears to be a deliberate crime while hers was a mistake the Navy decided was a crime. Big difference to me.

 

[nittany03]

I've never had a need to know... How does it work that you're NJP is finalized and then you also have a Court Marshall? Hoping @nittany can boil this down in something shorter than a page.

Hardy har har. Talking completely out my ass, I’d assume she either got NJPed on a separate charge and specification, or the military judge subtracted the NJP from the sentence. Dunno if it being “non-judicial” means the Double Jeopardy Clause of the Fifth Amendment doesn’t apply.

Edit: upon further Googling during the bus ride home, it looks like NJP isn’t a bar to prosecuting someone via CM. So sayeth Part V of the MCM. But conversely, you can’t NJP someone for a case that’s been tried in a CM or Federal court. You CAN NJP someone for allegations tried in state court, apparently. But it takes service secretary approval, which means “look in the JAGMAN first,” and I’m way too lazy to do that right now.

 

[picklesuit]

Will be very interesting how the CO/XO fare in the end...

 

[picklesuit]

To be clear, I’m not arguing she should have gotten more or less punishment, it’s just surprising that was all she got.

I do believe a solid mea culpa can go a long way toward reducing a potential sentence...

 

[Gatordev]

Sweet. AW tasking!!!!

No, no, no. You're misunderstanding. It's not tasking, it's a request...specifically for not a wall of text.

and @nittany03 you'll need lots of pictures for @Gatordev

Too true.

Hardy har har...it looks like NJP isn’t a bar to prosecuting someone via CM.

Interesting. I guess since you can get hit twice between local and UCMJ, I guess it makes sense you can get hit twice between NJP and CM (but not really).

Edit: upon further Googling during the bus ride home,

I'm slightly overwhelmed with various smart-ass comments. Maybe I need to take an Uber ride to go pick up my Prius after shopping for groceries at my local co-op.

 

[jmcquate]

This incident has been out of the news cycle for a while, and the last thing the Navy wants is to put a JO (or any one else) on CM to change that. Her career's over, and hopefully things will change change because of the incident. The scalp of a JO does no good in the big picture.

 

[Pags]

Does anyone know of aviators being taken to CM for mishaps that have resulted in the death of others?

 

[nittany03]

I'm slightly overwhelmed with various smart-ass comments. Maybe I need to take an Uber ride to go pick up my Prius after shopping for groceries at my local co-op.

#SeattleProblems

But hey, when your company gives you a free unlimited transit pass, and then charges you almost $300/mo to drive through Seattle traffic hell and park in their garage, you do what any good capitalist would do, and take the better deal!

Though it would be nice if there were less people smoking weed right before they got on board . . . damn, that shit stinks. ?

 

[Jim123]

Does anyone know of aviators being taken to CM for mishaps that have resulted in the death of others?

The Aviano EA-6B crew back in 1998, but somehow they dodged any real accountability for the people they killed.

 

[Flash]

Does anyone know of aviators being taken to CM for mishaps that have resulted in the death of others?

The Prowler crew in Italy as was mentioned, the other that comes to mind is the copilot and sole survivor of a USCG MH-60 mishap who was initially charged with negligent homicide but it was later dismissed. Two combat-related incidents that I can recall were the prosecution of one of the E-3 controllers in the shutdown of the H-60's in northern Iraq in 1994, he was acquitted, and the NJP of two F-16 pilots in a friendly fire incident that killed 4 Canadians in 2002.

The Aviano EA-6B crew back in 1998, but somehow they dodged any real accountability for the people they killed.

One of the backseat ECMO's gave a pretty frank and thorough briefing to VT-86 when he was an instructor there, there were a lot of mitigating circumstances that weren't the fault of the crew. I have mixed feelings about where the blame lies for that particular incident, a lot rests on the crew but a lot is also shared by others. The two front-seaters were eventually convicted and dismissed from the USMC.

Two interesting notes from his brief; they were cut loose/hung out to dry by the Marines and handed over to the Italians with zero support shortly after the mishap and there was never a mishap investigation.

 

[Jim123]

... there was never a mishap investigation.

The safety school's explanation for this is that the Navy didn't want the SIR to end up getting released (released to Italian authorities but released nonetheless).

 

[BigRed389]

I still think that if you’re going to shoot somebody “for the encouragement of the others,” you should at least make your point public and explicit. They’re taking the OOD, TAO, and SWC to a GCM over this; they should make the findings public. Otherwise those just looks like a public execution because someone has to be guilty.

Just going off what’s in the news, seems like the whole watch team dicked the dog in a big way, but a GCM says that it rose to the level of criminal negligence. There have been lots of collisions with loss of life over the years...guys got reprimanded or fired, but not prosecuted. So what’s different here?

?

Over the last 20 or so years, I can't think of any collisions in the surface community that included loss of life.

Hell, Porter took a hit very similar to what Fitzgerald did, but with no loss of life, topped out at NJP for the CO IIRC.

 

[Flash]

The safety school's explanation for this is that the Navy didn't want the SIR to end up getting released (released to Italian authorities but released nonetheless).

What we were told was that an investigator/s was dispatched to do his/their work and the the General in command of the Marines (MAW CG?) demanded he inform him everything he found out in the course of his investigation, the investigator/s refused and left without starting his work.