Four Women File Suit Over Tailhook Scandal

A San Diego woman and three others who say they were sexually assaulted at a naval aviators convention have filed multimillion-dollar damage claims against the Navy, their lawyers said Tuesday.

In the first legal action stemming from the Tailhook scandal, the women also filed separate lawsuits against Hilton Hotels and the San Diego-based Tailhook Assn., accusing them of negligence for allowing the attacks to take place.

The four were among more than 25 women, including at least a dozen Navy officers, who told Navy investigators they were groped and fondled by dozens of drunk, cheering aviators Sept. 7, 1991, in a crowded hallway at the Las Vegas Hilton.

Las Vegas lawyer Cal Potter said the four filed federal tort claims with the Navy Department last Wednesday in which each sought more than $2.5 million in damages. They alleged that they were victims of battery, sexual assault and sexual harassment at last year’s convention and suffered emotional distress and mental anguish, Potter said.

The women filed separate civil suits Tuesday in Las Vegas Superior Court accusing Hilton Hotels Corp. and Tailhook, once America’s most prestigious military aviators club, of negligence for allowing the assaults to take place.

A Tailhook spokesman said Tuesday night that he was not aware of the lawsuits and that the association had not received copies.

“I have heard nothing about the lawsuit,” retired Navy Capt. Stephen Millikin said. “I don’t know the details. . . . It would be inappropriate for me to comment.”

But he said the association has denounced the behavior at the convention, calling it “deplorable” and “clearly inappropriate.”

Millikin said the association will support prosecution of those identified by the Defense Department investigation as responsible for criminal acts.

“We’ve made our position quite clear,” he said.

According to court documents, each plaintiff is seeking “in excess of $10,000” from Hilton and Tailhook, the highest amount they are allowed to stipulate under Nevada law. But, once the case goes to court, a jury has the power to award much larger damages.

The four women filing suit in Las Vegas were identified as Suzanne Hallet, 28, of San Diego; Marie Colleen Westin, 32, of Sacramento; Lisa Reagan, 34, of Sacramento, and Judy Mas of Los Angeles, whose age was not known.

Mas said she was “sexually accosted and molested on the third floor . . . by numerous Navy personnel, officers and/or employees, many of whom were members of the Tailhook Assn.”

Mas alleged she was “wrongfully stalked, mobbed and was touched in the area of her buttocks” as she was pushed down a gantlet of aviators.

Mas screamed and begged the men to stop, but they “were intoxicated and failed to respond to plantiff’s pleas to terminate the unconsented touching of her body,” the suit states.

The other plaintiffs told similar stories, but none was able to identify her attackers by name. Mas’ suit refers to them as “John Does 1 through 50.”

“We haven’t been served with documents (from the lawsuits) yet,” Hilton spokesman Marc Grossman said. “Unless and until that happens, there’s really not much we can say.”

“I’d like to make the Navy and the Tailhook Assn. aware this type of conduct is not going to be tolerated,” said Daniel Birnbaum, a lawyer from the San Francisco firm of famed tort lawyer Melvin Belli, which is representing the four women.

The Defense Department is investigating hundreds of Navy and Marine fliers, and the Tailhook scandal has brought the Navy under fire for tolerating sexual harassment in its ranks.

Navy Secretary H. Lawrence Garrett III was forced to resign soon after the Tailhook allegations came to light.