Just thought I would shed some interesting info for general consumption:
Published on SavannahNow.com (http://savannahnow.com)
Army deserter gets 3 years in prison
By Savannah Morning News
Created 2007-05-22 23:30
Adam Crisp | Wednesday, May 23, 2007 at 12:30 am | (see enhanced version) [1]
[2]
Merlyn Seeley (Photo: Carl Elmore [3])
Seeley pleads at court-martial for reduced sentence.
FORT STEWART [4] - A U.S. Army [5] specialist accused of being absent without leave eight years ago was found guilty Tuesday of two counts of desertion terminated by apprehension after a two-day court-martial.
Spc. Merlyn Seeley [6] was dishonorably discharged, reduced to E-1 rank, told to forfeit future pay and benefits and was sentenced to 1,202 days in a military prison - roughly three years and three months.
Prior to sentencing, Seeley [7] made an emotional plea to the court to impose a sentence that would not take him away from his family. His wife, seated a few feet behind him, wept as Seeley [8] spoke, and their young daughter laid her hand across her back.
It took the panel of four enlisted personnel and three officers about 90 minutes to reach the verdict.
At trial, the government said Seeley [9] signed up for a four-year enlistment in Dec. 1997. He would have been discharged from the Army in Dec. 2001, but instead he left in September 1999, prosecutors said.
Seeley [10] maintained throughout the trial that he had proper authorization to leave the Army because of an early-out program.
“Our lives have been destroyed,” Seeley [11] said of being forced to return to Fort Stewart [12] in December after eight years in civilian life. “I was given orders.”
Prosecutors said there was no evidence Seeley [13] ever had such authorization, and they presented three witnesses who said Seeley [14] admitted after being arrested that he knew the Army was looking for him and that he knew he had not completed the proper out-processing procedure.
“The military creates a document trail because we have continuous personnel changes,” said Capt. Angela Swilley [15], the lead prosecutor. “People move, memories fade, but ink doesn’t.”
Swilley and her co-counsel, Capt. Edward Berg [16], said Seeley [17] didn’t have the Army’s standard DD-214 discharge papers. Although the armed forces typically make seven copies of the separation form when a soldier gets authorization, Seeley [18] could not produce any copy - either from his records or from Department of Defense [19] files.
Seeley [20], who was residing in Tuscon, Ariz. [21], when federal authorities tracked him down, said he is an ordained Buddhist priest and that a prison term would pull him away from his ministerial duties and his family.
“If I am taken away from my family, I’m not sure how they are going to be able to do it,” Seeley [22] said. “What’s a family to do?”
The government’s prosecutors showed no mercy. Capt. Berg [23] asked the panel to sentence Seeley [24] to five years in a military prison, give him a dishonorable discharge and demote him to an E-1, the lowest non-commissioned pay grade. The maximum penalty Seeley [25] faced was six years in jail.
“The consequences lie squarely on the shoulders of the accused,” Berg said. “The Army expects obedience of orders. … Send a message to soldiers and future enlistees to deter them from going AWOL.”
Berg said Seeley [26]'s statement just before sentencing proved that he did not take responsibility for his desertion.
In his defense, Seeley [27] defense attorney sought to prove he was offered an early-out as part of a post-Cold War military downsizing. No witnesses could confirm if such a program existed at Fort Stewart [28] during the late 1990s.
Seeley [29]'s government-appointed defense attorney, Capt. Alex Gallego [30], said the government is responsible because it lost the specialist’s out-processing paperwork.
“All we ask for is justice,” said Gallego, speaking before sentencing. “Is it justice when the government has been negligent? The government is not blameless.”
Now that the sentence is imposed, a convening authority, selected by Col. Todd Buchs, Stewart-Hunter garrison commander, can decide if it should be reduced.
Seeley [31] has 30 days to present mitigating factors that might persuade the authority that he deserves a lighter sentence.
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