Judge Orders Navy to Reinstate Openly Gay Sailor

In the first successful challenge to the armed forces’ prohibition on homosexuals serving in the military, a federal judge in Los Angeles on Friday ordered the Navy to reinstate a sailor discharged after he announced on national television that he is gay.

U.S. District Judge Terry Hatter, setting aside arguments that homosexuality is incompatible with military service, issued a preliminary injunction against the Navy’s discharge of 30-year-old Petty Officer 1st Class Volker Keith Meinhold.

The federal judge’s order comes as President-elect Bill Clinton, in Little Rock, Ark., planning his transition to the White House, ponders options for lifting a policy that has barred gay men and lesbians from serving in the military since 1981.

“This is the first time the U.S. armed forces have been forced to reinstate an openly gay person discharged under the current regulation,” said Christopher L. Rudd, Meinhold’s attorney. “It’s very exciting news for us. We believe this is an indication this irrational and groundless policy is crumbling, and this is a first step in its dismantling.”

The Navy said it has no intention of sending Meinhold back to his job as an anti-submarine warfare specialist until the government decides whether to appeal the judge’s order. But the Justice Department’s next move in the case remained unclear late Friday after Hatter’s order was issued.

“The government is currently evaluating possible responses to the judge’s orders,” said a Navy spokesman. “Meinhold’s current status remains unchanged pending evaluation of possible responses to judge finding,” he added.

Meinhold filed suit Oct. 6 challenging the Navy’s policy excluding gays from the service and demanding reinstatement with back pay. Meinhold was discharged from the Navy Aug. 12 after he told ABC’s “World News Tonight” that he is a homosexual and charged the Navy with conducting a “witch hunt” for gays and lesbians.

When he filed the suit, Meinhold said that the Navy had found him an exemplary sailor for 12 years and had discharged him solely on the basis of his stated sexual preference.

Meinhold was a specialist in anti-submarine warfare at Moffet Field Naval Air Station in Mountain View, Calif.

Hatter issued his preliminary injunction after Justice Department attorneys filed a brief in opposition to Meinhold’s reinstatement that exceeded the length permitted by local court rules.

The federal judge cited only that technicality, and not the arguments against homosexuals’ service, in issuing his preliminary injunction. But Rudd and other knowledgeable attorneys said that although the judge’s order was issued on such narrow grounds, the ruling has a broader significance.

“We won on a technicality,” Rudd conceded. “But the entry of a preliminary injunction presumes that the final finding will be in the complainant’s favor. You don’t get a preliminary injunction unless you can argue persuasively that you’ll finally prevail on the merits of the case, and that without the injunction, the complainant will be done irreparable harm.”

Mary Newcombe, a Los Angeles attorney with the Lambda Legal Defense and Education Fund, added that Hatter’s order appears to be in line with a more general trend in which courts are agreeing to put off consideration of such discharges in the expectation that President-elect Clinton will soon raise the ban. The military services, however, are continuing to discharge homosexuals.

“All of this litigation--including this case--is going to be resolved by Clinton signing an executive order rescinding the ban” on homosexuals’ military service, said Newcombe. “With Clinton’s having made his position very clear, we feel it’s punitive of the government to force people out, given that the policy is expected to change. One could read Judge Hatter’s order as a recognition that Petty Officer Meinhold is going to be given the opportunity to rejoin the military and there should be no impediment to his doing so now.”

In one other instance, a slightly different case was overturned on appeal. In the mid-1980s, the Army denied Sgt. Miriam Ben-Shalom, a lesbian Army reservist, the opportunity to re-enlist in the service, and a 1989 court order directed the Army to permit her re-enlistment. Later that year, Ben-Shalom lost the opportunity to re-enlist when another court overturned the earlier finding. Meinhold’s case is different in that he was actually discharged from the Navy in August and has been ordered reinstated.

Rudd called Hatter’s order “courageous” and added: “It sends an important signal that employees will be judged on their abilities and not on the basis of prejudice.”

Rudd said, “We expect first thing Monday morning, Mr. Meinhold will seek to regain his position in the Navy and the Navy will comply with the court’s order. We’re prepared to take steps to address that if they don’t.”