Army Captain, phony soldier

TSO sends this article from the Virginia-Pilot about a recently-created Captain who figured his 21 years of serv ice wasn’t good enough;

Fort Monroe’s commanding officer Col. Anthony Reyes has dismissed all charges against Capt. Jose J. Huertas, who agreed to retire as a staff sergeant, base spokesman Mike Hodson said Tuesday.

A veteran of 21 years in the military, Huertas did not have enough time in grade to retire as an officer, said Greg McCormack, Huertas’ attorney.

Huertas was charged in December with unauthorized wearing of multiple medals, including the 3rd Infantry Division combat patch and two Kuwait Liberation Medals. Huertas had served in the 1991 Persian Gulf War.

Pretty damned sad. It seems that he earned many of the medals he was wearing, but he didn’t have any time in combat.

Huertas was also charged with fraud for filing a false claim for lodging expenses, being absent without leave for five days, and repeatedly being late to work. The charge of conduct unbecoming an officer stemmed from emergency leave Huertas requested to visit a sick brother in Kentucky. He was granted the leave but did not actually go on the trip.

[Huerta’s bonehead lawyer, Greg] McCormack contended that Huertas was the target of an overzealous boss intent on driving him out of the Army.

Yeah, Huertas applied for emergency leave to visit a sick brother and never left his home. here’s a hint; if your boss is out to get you, don’t give him cause to put the screws to you. Ya know there are thousands of people who are in the service and haven’t gone to the war – they’re not pinning on stuff they didn’t earn. If Huertas wanted to wear that stuff, he could have volunteered to do the tough stuff those awards require instead of doing the criminal thing.

Back in January, the Virginia-Pilot wrote that he was innocent.

The case against an Army captain accused of wearing more than a dozen unauthorized medals hit a snag this week when the soldier’s lawyer produced military records showing he is entitled to wear most of the decorations – and two of his superiors conceded they had never checked those forms, known as DD-214s.

“I cannot believe the Army would accuse an officer of wearing ribbons and awards he was not entitled to wear without checking his DD-214s,” Greg McCormack, the lawyer representing Jose J. Huertas, said during closing arguments in a preliminary hearing.

Well, that was pretty stupid of the Army, too. But truth prevailed.

I hate me some phonies.

Category: Phony soldiers