San Diego
A man who was jailed for 38 days last year after Navy officials said he enlisted in 1976 but never reported for duty has filed a $5-million claim against the government.
Guiles Gadsby’s lawyer, Karl Seuthe of Studio City, said he filed the claim with the Navy and the Los Angeles U.S. attorney’s office Wednesday.
He said Navy officials have six months to respond. If they deny the claim or take no action, Seuthe said, he will file suit in federal court on Gadsby’s behalf.
Lt. Cmdr. Steve Honda, a Navy spokesman in Los Angeles, said Thursday that he could not comment on the case.
“I don’t have any knowledge of that case other than what I’ve read in the newspapers,” he said.
Gadsby, an Army veteran of the Vietnam War, was jailed for 38 days last year after naval officials said documents showed he enlisted in the Navy in Denver in 1976 and then never reported for duty in San Diego.
Gadsby maintained that he was attending college in Southern California when he supposedly enlisted and that he never signed any papers to join the Navy.
Seuthe said Navy officials granted Gadsby an honorable discharge last October and gave him a check for $303 in severance pay after handwriting analysis experts said the signature on the enlistment form was not Gadsby’s.
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