Two Navy Officers Reassigned in Investigation of Sign at Party

A senior West Coast aviator and the commander of an F-14 squadron at Miramar Naval Air Station have been temporarily reassigned pending a probe into a sign unfurled two weeks ago at a fighter pilot party at the base Officers’ Club, the Navy said late Wednesday.

Capt. Richard Braden, the No. 2 man at the Navy wing that oversees fighter aircraft in the Pacific Fleet, and Cmdr. Dave Tyler, commanding officer of Fighter Squadron 51, were reassigned Wednesday, sources said.

The Navy said a female patron at the club saw an “offensive” sign during the “Tomcat Follies” party June 18, an annual event during which various Miramar-based F-14 squadrons put on often-satirical skits.

The Fighter Squadron 51 skit included a sign that referred to Rep. Patricia Schroeder (D-Colo.) and made a “sexual” reference, sources said. “It wasn’t the f-word,” a source said, declining to elaborate. Braden was the senior officer in attendance, sources said.

Word of the probe was disclosed a few hours after the U.S. Senate Armed Services Committee on Wednesday approved 1,126 Navy and Marine Corps promotions that had been held up by an investigation into the Tailhook sex scandal.

At the September, 1991, meeting of the Tailhook Assn., a Bonita-based Navy booster group, at least 26 women said they were groped and fondled while being pushed down a gantlet of drunken aviators in a Las Vegas hotel hallway. Half the women were Navy officers.

Meanwhile, a second new incident also came to light Wednesday, involving a small number of Army personnel who allegedly videotaped several enlisted men and an enlisted woman having sex.