Is Retirement Option for General in Sodomy Case?

Under military law, Brig. Gen. Jeffrey A. Sinclair may be able to ask the secretary of the Army for permission to retire rather than face possible court-martial for forcible sodomy.

Fort Bragg officials declined to discuss whether retirement is a possibility for Sinclair or if he has made such a request.

“It is premature to discuss this,” Ben Abel, a Fort Bragg spokesman, said.

A military justice fact sheet furnished by Fort Bragg indicates that the Army’s top civilian leader, Army Secretary John McHugh, has “approval authority” for a resignation request from an officer.

If petitioned by Sinclair, McHugh would have to take into account comments by his boss, Defense Secretary Leon Panetta.

“It’s an outrage that we aren’t prosecuting our people involved here,” Panetta said in a Sept. 27 interview on sexual assaults in the military. NBC News reported that only 240 cases were prosecuted out of more than 3,000 reported last year.

Victor Hansen, a retired Army lieutenant colonel who served as a military lawyer, doesn’t believe that Sinclair will get the option of retirement.

source

2012-10-16 14:20:23

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