Charges Against Marine Who Took Joy Ride in Jet Dropped

All charges against an El Toro Marine corporal who took a $14-million jet fighter on a Fourth of July joy ride have been dropped and he will be discharged from the military today, the Marine Corps announced Thursday.

Howard A. Foote Jr., 21, a Los Alamitos native and record-holding glider pilot before entering the service in 1984, climbed aboard an unarmed A-4M Skyhawk about 2 a.m. on July 4, according to the Marine Corps. He then took off from an unlighted El Toro runway, flew about 50 miles and returned to the Orange County base about 40 minutes later.

Foote’s lawyers had argued in pretrial hearings that the young aviation mechanic had taken the plane after he found that he could never go to Navy flight school because of an injury he had suffered during a high-altitude glider flight.

Foote had been scheduled to stand trial next Wednesday before a general courts-martial on charges of misappropriating the plane, as well as a maintenance truck he drove out to the flight line where the plane was parked. He had faced a maximum of nine years in prison if convicted.

As part of an agreement worked out with the Marine Corps by his lawyers, Foote wrote a letter of apology to the base commander, Gen. D. E. P. Miller.