Colonel John Howard charged
The Air Force Times reports that Colonel John Howard, commander of the 375th Air Mobility Wing at Scott Air Force Base, has been charged with two specifications of cruelty and maltreatment, two specifications of sexual assault, one specification of conduct unbecoming an officer, and one specification of fraternization in violation of the Uniform Code of Military Justice.
Between July and September 2016 at or near Royal Air Force Mildenhall in the United Kingdom, Howard is accused of maltreatment of the senior airman, whose name is redacted, by rubbing his groin against the senior airman and making inappropriate comments on at least two occasions, according to the charge sheet.
In April 2017, Howard is accused of sexually assaulting the senior airman at or near Bangor, Maine.
Howard was relieved last December because his commander had lost confidence in his leadership.
Thanks to Bobo for the link.
Category: Air Force
If those charges turn out to be true and he is convicted, I hope they give him a nice long sentence at the USDB in Leavenworth along with Dismissal.
Reality is demotion to 05 and retirement.
After the Sinclair case it was pretty obvious that military does not treat sexual assault, obstruction of justice and fraternization as real crimes.
Yeah, his wearing buzzards on his shoulders, different spanks for different ranks. Let an Enlisted or NCO do that and they’ll get fried extra, extra crispy!
I wouldn’t use the Sinclair case as a standard for judging other similar cases. From everything I’ve seen, three were some significant problems with his accuser’s conduct, as well as chain-of-custody issues relating to certain physical evidence (accuser’s cell phone). I’m guessing that played a huge part in Sinclair getting a plea deal that let him off easy – the prosecutors may have feared he’d be acquitted of virtually everything at trial.
Agree with you Hondo, just because one case turned out a certain way doesn’t mean that every case of that type will turn out the same way. People are still getting convicted of sexual assault pretty regularly. Each case stands or falls on its own merits.
Very few sex cases with an 06 or above as the offender ever seem to make it through the system with an imprisonment outcome.
True, but possibly irrelevant due to the small population concerned.
The number of serving O6s and above among the 3 services is rather small (limited by Federal law, as I recall). Given a small population to begin with, it stands to reason that you’d have a correspondingly smaller number of such criminal cases. And some fraction are going to “get off light” regardless of rank.
If you want to argue “disparate punishments”, as a minimum you need rate statistics for convictions and sentences, properly categorized and broken down by rank. Otherwise, you’re going off published accounts of military sex cases you read about in the press. I’ll give long odds that those published accounts are heavily skewed towards cases involving senior personnel – because those are “more newsworthy” than Joe Tentpeg being tried for the same offenses.
Not saying you’re wrong, and I personally believe any field grade or GO/FO who’s found guilty of a serious UCMJ offense deserves dismissal. Given the inability of courts-martial to reduce officers in rank (it’s dismiss or retain in grade), it may well be that courts-martial are reluctant to dismiss senior officers (and I’ve seen accounts where the same appears true of senior NCOs as well).
But without the numbers to back up the claim, we simply don’t know what’s “ground truth” here.
It is a fairly simple equation: officers get off much more lightly than troops. I cannot recall the last time I heard of an officer actually getting jail time for various crimes they committed. They just get retired, or perhaps busted one grade then retired. Same often goes for very senior enlisted.
You might want to take a look at this: ‘Marine colonel sentenced to nearly 5 years in prison for child sex abuse’ https://www.marinecorpstimes.com/news/your-marine-corps/2017/09/11/marine-colonel-sentenced-to-nearly-5-years-in-prison-for-child-sex-abuse/ ‘A Marine colonel from Camp Lejeune will spend nearly five years in prison after being found guilty of sexually abusing a child. Col. Daniel H. Wilson was sentenced on Sunday to 66 months’ confinement; the 240 days he has spent in the brig since January will count toward his sentence, said Lt. Col. Michael Armistead, a spokesman for II Marine Expeditionary Force. “As you can probably imagine, the Wilson family is very disappointed and the impact is devastating,” said Phillip Stackhouse, Wilson’s civilian attorney. Wilson, 56, will be transferred from the brig at Camp Lejeune to a long-term naval confinement facility, Armistead said on Monday. Marine Corps officials will determine whether Wilson will serve his sentence at the Naval Consolidated Brig, Chesapeake, in Virginia; Naval Consolidated Brig, Miramar, in California; or Naval Consolidated Brig, Charleston, in South Carolina. The former II MEF operations officer, Wilson was also sentenced to be dismissed from the Marine Corps after a military jury found him guilty of sexually abusing a child under 12 years old several times in June and July 2016 at Camp Lejeune. Wilson was also found guilty of conduct unbecoming of an officer and being absent without leave. After only 10 days into a rotation to Darwin, Australia, Wilson was fired as a liaison officer for unacceptable behavior, including making sexual comments to another colonel’s wife and sending crude Facebook messages to a female officer, Military.com reported. Wilson has been in custody since January when investigators uncovered allegations that he sexually assaulted a woman. On Saturday, Wilson was found not guilty of sexual assault and assault consummated by battery for alleged incidents at Camp Lejeune and in South Carolina, but he was found guilty of being absent without leave when the incidents in South Carolina allegedly took place. “Col. Wilson never disputed his boorish and sophomoric behavior in Australia or that he went to South Carolina between Christmas and New Years 2017 – only that his conduct did… Read more »
I’ve seen 6 years (reduced to 4 on appeal due to a judicial error), plus a DD, for a lower-enlisted for child molesting…but of course “child sex abuse,” like “sexual assault,” can cover a broad range of actions. Military tribunals do seem to give some consideration for the effects of the DD–Bergdahl was one of the only non-sex DD’s I’ve ever seen.
P.S. – Officers can’t get “busted one grade” by a court-martial; they can be dismissed (equivalent of a DD) and their retirement might be affected (paid for “the last rank at which they served honorably”) but reduction in rank is not an allowable sentence for officers.
I have seen very senior enlisted busted a grade and allowed to retire…but not for anything involving child sex.
Pedo sexual assault cases are in a different category in my mind. When I was at Leaveworth back pre 9/11 I was told that the majority of former officers in the facility were baby rapers. Don’t know if it was true or not but that was the word on the street.
Seen quite a few court martial results where 0-6s ended up losing everything. 0-6 is a pretty senior rank, but they ain’t general or flag rank. As George Carlin liked to say “you ain’t in the club”.
so, I guess it may be a bit too forward to ask in today’s society, but is he charged with this against an airman, or an airperson? NTTAWWT, but he does look a tad….delicate.
anyhow, wonder what else is going on if they’re throwing all of that on a full bird? had to be way more to the story.
He does look a little light in the loafers.
Like he wanted to fly off into some Airman’s “Wild Brown Yonder”?
Who does he think he is – Bill Clinton?
Fat fingered the report link, sorry bout that!
Heehee! You could have warned people, 2banana!
Who?
Hannover Fiste!
“Hanging’s too good for him! Burning’s too good for him! He should be chopped up into little bitty pieces and buried alive!”
Also known as “a day ending in ‘y’ in the Infantry”.
It’s only skin bro…
too true. geez, can you imagine what they’d do to the average infantry squad or platoon these days?
im guessing this has more to do with the disparity between ranks than the actual actions. bored joes screwing around with each other is just unit bonding and horseplay, having a junior EM and a senior field grade is totally different.
Had a SSG that was a prior RECON Marine, humping your leg was just his way of saying hello.
After 14 years as an infantryman, I’ve probably seen more dick than a career hooker
Off we go into the wild blue yonder.
The definition of the phrase “wild blue yonder” does seem to have changed over the last few years.
So, the incidents happened in September of 2016 and April of 2017, and the AF charged him in June of 2018? They really move on serious accusations, don’t they?
Maybe, maybe not. Can’t say without knowing when the incident was first reported to proper authorities.
Well, maybe these idjits will grow up some day and realize that there are consequences for being stupid.
History, and human nature, say nope, Ex.
So, he was confused about “leading from the front”…
Weirdo.
Is it just me or does this guy look, well, effeminate?
Very effeminate.
Man, when did Woody from Toy Story join the USAF?
Howard is accused of playing rubby-dubby and boinky-boinky with the same person, first in the UK (July-Sept 2016) and then in April at or near Royal Air Force Mildenhall in Maine in April 2017. He is married with two kids.
Take two and call me in the morning.
Howard is accused of playing rubby-dubby and boinky-boinky with the same person, first in the UK (July-Sept 2016) at or near Royal Air Force Mildenhall and then in April 2017 in Maine. He is married with two kids. His wife is a retired AF colonel–and a woman.
So when do they deep fry his nuts? before or after the prison time?