Navy Officer and Marine Mechanic : She Marries a Corporal--Now Faces Court-Martial

Their courtship began in a Jacksonville, Fla., bar a little over a year ago, one of those nights, they recall, when two people caught each other’s eye and wound up “dancing the night away.”

It was a night when Kathleen Mazure was wearing her dancing dress, not her Navy lieutenant’s bars, and the last thing on her mind was what Scott Price did for a living. It wasn’t until after she had taken Price home with her, in fact, that she found out he was a Marine Corps lance corporal.

Now Mazure, a Navy dentist who married Price last fall, faces a court-martial on charges of fraternizing with a junior enlisted man--charges that she threatened the “good order and discipline” of the military by engaging in a sexual relationship with the 24-year-old aviation mechanic who became her husband.

Though the armed forces have historically prohibited liaisons between officers and enlisted persons, the case is believed to be the first in the country in which a member of the armed forces has faced a court-martial for fraternizing with a member of another branch of the military--and where no professional working relationship was at stake.

If convicted, Mazure faces up to two years in prison, a dishonorable discharge and the potential loss of her dentist’s license. Her husband has already been forced to leave the Marine Corps.

“I was utterly shocked,” said Mazure, who is stationed at the Marine Corps Air Ground Combat Center in Twentynine Palms. “I never thought that this (relationship) could be a problem. I had what I considered a spotless record, and there was no way I would ever do anything that would jeopardize my continuing in the service.”

Mazure said she fears the case may discourage women, who only in recent years have moved in large numbers into the armed services’ top ranks. “I don’t think an officer should be ashamed of loving her husband.”

The Marine Corps, which is prosecuting the case against the Navy officer because the fraternization occurred at a Marine facility, has declined to comment on specifics of the case, except to cite the military’s historic prohibition against “fraternization,” or the kind of familiarity between officers and juniors that the military says can lead to morale problems during peacetime and outright disruption of command during war.

“Fraternization is a violation of Article 134 of the Uniform Code of Military Justice and is considered a serious offense. Because of the threat posed to good order and discipline within the armed forces, the Criminal Investigation Division of the U.S. Marine Corps investigated the alleged offenses,” Sgt. Gigial Cureton said in a prepared statement.

Precise Threat

Questions about precisely how Mazure and Scott have threatened military order when they have never worked together and have never had a role in evaluating one another’s work performance “go to the heart of this case, and it would be inappropriate to comment prior to the trial,” Cureton said.

Mazure, 29, grew up in a military family and had “always dreamed” of becoming a Navy officer like her father. Though the Navy did not offer dental scholarships, Mazure decided to apply during her first year of dental school anyway because it offered the best on-the-job training, the best equipment and a chance to travel.

She was commissioned in May, 1986, and started work two months later in Jacksonville, Fla. Price, a ground support aviation mechanic, was in Jacksonville for training, and they dated there for only a short time before he returned to Twentynine Palms.

Mazure said it was really her career, not Price, that sent her to Southern California several months later. The Marine Corps, which contracts with the Navy for dental services, had opened a limited number of spots for women officers, and Mazure found that her only chance to work with the Marines was to be stationed at Twentynine Palms.

She reported in October, and soon began dating Price again. They would usually get together at her apartment, after work or on weekends.

Trouble began when a next-door neighbor, who happened to be a deputy provost marshal at the base, told authorities that he had seen Price spending a lot of time at Mazure’s home.

Price and Mazure were married shortly after the investigation began, but Mazure wound up being charged with fraternization stemming from two incidents of sexual relations before their marriage.

The hearing officer at her Article 32 proceeding--the military’s equivalent of a preliminary hearing--recommended that the matter be handled administratively, either with counseling, a transfer, or discharge, noting her “excellent” service record, the fact that Mazure did not know Price was an enlisted man until their second date, and the clear evidence that Price “was not a victim.”

“He was clearly a voluntary, active participant in the fraternization, and was not taken advantage of. It is my opinion that he was the dominant member of the relationship,” Capt. Samuel D. McVey found.

Mazure’s supervisor, Lt. Edgar W. Turner III, testified about her successful service record.

“I would not like to lose her,” he testified. “As far as her clinical abilities and that sort, she does an excellent job. She manages her patients well, she is a real asset and her shoes would be tough to fill.”

Recommendation Overruled

But Maj. Gen. Gene Deegan, base commander, overruled the hearing officer and ordered Mazure to face court-martial on May 24.

The American Civil Liberties Union, which is representing Mazure, said the case is unusual not only because it involves members of different service branches but because it has none of the other aggravating factors that are usually associated with fraternization cases that go to court-martial, such as adultery, drug abuse or sexual harassment.

“Even when you talk about sex, in the other cases that I’ve read, they’re out carousing in the enlisted men’s club or they have wild parties at which there are other people, so the argument that the courts could make is that this would lower the esteem of the officer in the eyes of their subordinates,” said ACLU attorney Mark Rosenbaum.

“The issue is what they don’t say on the recruitment posters: Does the government have the right to look into people’s private lives, where it has absolutely no bearing on military security, and do people have the right to normal, healthy relations, sexual or otherwise?” Rosenbaum said.

“We maintain that the military has just reached too far in the fraternization area, and this case is clearly the furthest they’ve reached.”

ACLU officials have also raised questions about the way the military handled the matter. The investigator who interviewed Price, Rosenbaum said, admitted that he asked him whether he and Mazure had engaged in oral sex, anal sex, cunnilingus or “the missionary position.”

“He (the investigator) said that this was all part of his official investigation,” Rosenbaum said. “I think a few of the so-called good men down there are peeping Toms and voyeurs.”

Spokesmen for all four branches of the military said Thursday that while other cross-branch fraternization cases have been investigated, they know of no others that have been recommended for court-martial.

Pentagon spokesmen said they had no immediate figures on the prevalence of fraternization. But a 1985 study by the Department of Defense obtained by the ACLU showed that 10% of all marriages within the armed forces are between officers and enlisted personnel.

Price, who declined to be interviewed, was honorably discharged on Tuesday under conditions that will not allow him to re-enlist. He was given the choice of either leaving the corps or transferring to North Carolina and serving aboard ship for six to nine months a year, Mazure said.

“We were newly married, and to me that’s not a choice,” she said.

“It’s real tough,” she added. “We have each other, and things between us are really good, but it’s just a total disruption of our lives. I keep wondering if I was a man if something like this would happen to me.”