Top Sergeant’s Lawyer Hammers Accuser

Attorneys for the Army’s top enlisted man Thursday began building their rebuttal to charges by a woman who has accused him of sexual misconduct, portraying her as a disappointed job seeker trying to sell a deeply flawed tale.

In an Army pretrial hearing, lawyers for Sgt. Major of the Army Gene C. McKinney attempted to establish that Sgt. Christine Roy’s allegations were aimed at exacting revenge for McKinney’s failure to deliver a staff job that he had once promised her.

And they tried to lay the groundwork for an assertion that Roy was not in McKinney’s house last Oct. 30, when she claims he had sex with her against her will.

The hearing, which began Wednesday at Ft. McNair, is designed to establish whether there is cause to send McKinney--suspended from his post since February--to a court-martial. On allegations from four women, he faces 18 preliminary counts, including indecent assault, adultery, maltreatment of a subordinate and obstruction of justice.

McKinney denies all the charges.

Roy told the hearing that McKinney had cultivated her friendship after they met in May 1996, but that it had gone awry when he assaulted her on an overstuffed couch at his official quarters while his wife was away.

McKinney’s lawyers pressed Roy on Thursday to acknowledge that she had wanted a job as his aide as a way out of jobs with little responsibility.

Roy, 25, did not dispute that, and she conceded she was angry when McKinney, citing her new--and unwanted--pregnancy, decided not to give her the job.

“I was very disappointed. This was the opportunity of a lifetime that I was missing out on because I was pregnant,” she said. “This was discrimination. It was unfair.”

McKinney’s lead attorney, Charles W. Gittins, also indicated he will argue that Roy was actually not in McKinney’s quarters on Oct. 30, as she has specifically alleged.

“She wasn’t in his house on the 30th, period,” Gittins said during a break in the proceeding.

Meanwhile, Roy angrily denounced the Army for scaling back one charge against McKinney because of his powerful position.

Roy, who has repeatedly denounced her Army superiors, said the lead government attorney told her they didn’t want to bring the most serious charge because they feared a “loophole” that could make it difficult to convict.

This showed that the case was political, she said.

Army officials wouldn’t comment, but attorneys for McKinney and former Sgt. Maj. Brenda L. Hoster, McKinney’s original accuser, speculated that Roy’s comments referred to the Army’s decision not to charge McKinney with raping Roy.

Roy has said that she did not want the sexual encounter, which she says occurred while she was about eight months pregnant. But she has also acknowledged that she did not resist.

The hearing also disclosed that two of McKinney’s accusers believe their safety has been jeopardized by their complaints.

Army attorneys, trying to ward off defense requests for more documents, disclosed that they have extended witness protection to one accuser, whose allegations are still under study.

And Roy said she sought to move herself and her family temporarily to Ft. Hood, Texas, after she got harassing phone calls at her home in the Washington area.

“It wasn’t safe for my family and me to be here,” she said.

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Meanwhile, a congressional subcommittee on Thursday urged psychological testing for drill sergeant candidates and changes in military training to help rid the military of sexual misconduct.

The personnel subcommittee of the House National Security Committee also recommended that the services find a way to reassign without penalty those found unsuitable as drill sergeants and to set up an independent review board to monitor basic training.

Times staff writer Heather Knight contributed to this story.