A Question of Honor

No one disputes that Navy Lt. Derrick J. Smith was on the verge of a bright military career.

He was an honor student and athlete at the Naval Academy, Class of 1992. He had been promoted regularly and given glowing evaluations by his superiors. He was assigned jobs of unusual responsibility for a junior officer.

He was dreaming of transferring to the Marine Corps or becoming a Navy SEAL.

But all of that is gone now. Smith stands convicted of adultery, of having loved not wisely but too well.

All Smith wants these days is to avoid the shame and stigma of receiving a discharge stamped “other than honorable.”

“I would like the secretary of the Navy to focus not just on my misconduct but to look at my entire service career,” Smith said.

Smith, 26, has run afoul of those uniquely military laws that empower the top brass to fire, disgrace or imprison a serviceman or servicewoman for off-duty sexual behavior that, in the civilian world, would be none of the boss’ business.

Smith’s career is in ruins because of his love affair with a fun-loving woman he met at a nightspot favored by the college set and military personnel in the Pacific Beach area of San Diego.

Just who pursued whom is a matter of disagreement, but on this much the two former lovers agree: They spent several happy months together, spending a weekend in Ensenada, Mexico; traveling to see his parents in Maryland; and even talking of spending a lifetime together.

Smith told investigators that the woman, 28, told him she was permanently separated from her husband, with whom she has a small child (she also has two children from a previous marriage).

If so, that proved to be a lie: The woman was married to a Marine sergeant who was on overseas deployment. His uniforms were still in the closet and pictures of him were around the apartment.

When her husband returned from Okinawa--soon after Smith had left on a similar deployment--he found Smith’s love letters and negatives of risque pictures of his scantily clad wife reclining on the roof of Smith’s car. He angrily confronted his wife and she confessed to the affair.

“The pictures were taken at my house and his car was in my garage,” the sergeant, now a drill instructor at the Marine Corps Recruiting Depot in San Diego, told Navy investigators. “I asked her what she did with the pictures. She told me she sent the pictures to him at his address on the ship.”

The father of the betrayed husband--also a retired serviceman--demanded that the military launch an investigation into his daughter-in-law’s conduct.

The upshot was that Smith was ordered to return prematurely from his deployment and soon faced charges of having “an improper personal and romantic relationship” with the wife of a Marine enlisted man on deployment, having sex with a married woman not his wife, and of having married the woman in Tijuana the day before he went to sea.

Smith says the Tijuana marriage ceremony--suggested by a cabdriver when the couple was in Tijuana for a day of frivolity--was never meant to be a real marriage but rather just a lark and a token of the depths of their love.

In any event, the marriage charge and the other two charges are felonies under the Uniform Code of Military Justice and, taken as a whole, could carry a sentence of three years confinement.

To avoid a possible prison sentence, Smith, upon the advice of his military lawyer, pleaded guilty to the charges and offered to resign.

The decision on what kind of discharge Smith would be given--honorable, general, less than honorable--was left to Secretary of the Navy John Dalton, who will consider a recommendation made by the chain of command. Dalton’s decision could come this week.

By pleading guilty, Smith hoped to increase his chances of getting an honorable discharge or at least a general discharge. The latter was the kind of discharge given in the highly publicized case of Air Force Lt. Kelly Flynn, who was caught in an adulterous affair with the husband of an Air Force enlisted woman.

While waiting for Dalton’s decision, Smith and his lawyer, Marine Maj. John M. Schum, sought support from the senator from Smith’s home state, Barbara A. Mikulski (D-Md.). Mikulski wrote the Navy on behalf of Smith but the response was swift, unequivocal and disheartening.

“Although Lt. Smith has expressed remorse, his actions have brought discredit upon himself and the Naval Service,” an official in the Navy’s congressional liaison office wrote Mikulski in late August. “The seriousness of his offenses cannot be set aside. The recommendation being forwarded to the secretary of the Navy is that Lt. Smith be separated with an [other than honorable] characterization of service.”

Until Dalton’s decision is made, Smith has the option of withdrawing his plea and opting for a court-martial. That would give him a chance to prove that the woman is lying when she says he always knew she was married.

To be sure, Smith has evidence in his favor. The woman’s letters to him talk joyously of the life they will have once he returns from sea duty--not the sentiments presumably of a woman who had an adulterous fling while her husband was away.

Also, the woman’s brother, a Marine sergeant, was living in the apartment when Smith and the woman were sleeping together. He has conceded to investigators that he never told Smith his sister was still married.

On the other hand, the uniforms in the closet and the pictures of the sergeant and his wife might prove hard to explain away (Smith says he never saw them). And there is the argument that as an officer, Smith should have exercised better judgment and, in effect, demanded proof that the woman and her husband were permanently split.

“He never asked to see the divorce decree,” Schum said.

One unique twist to Smith’s case, as compared to other adultery cases recently in the military, is that it fell to officers from one branch of the service to pass judgment on an officer from another branch.

Because he is assigned as a naval gunfire officer for a Marine infantry battalion at Camp Pendleton, Smith’s direct superiors are Marines. Thus Marines were asked to decide what should happen to a Navy lieutenant accused of misconduct with a wife of a Marine.

The recommendation that Smith be given an other than honorable discharge--which could hamper his chances for civilian employment--came from Marine Commandant Gen. Charles Krulak. Krulak has a reputation as a uncompromising hard-liner on violations of what the Marine Corps calls “core values” of integrity and honor.

At a hearing, Col. J.F. Weber, commanding officer of the 11th Marine Regiment at Camp Pendleton, said that Smith “was an extremely talented young man with recognized abilities who had served his country admirably. However, he had exercised extremely bad judgment and, as an officer in the armed services, he was responsible and accountable for his actions.”

Military officials say that adultery is a crime in the military because it can undermine discipline and morale among the troops, particularly because personnel are often required to spend months away from their spouses. The crime is considered particularly egregious for officers because they are expected to show leadership and fealty to military law.

“Lt. Smith’s behavior was not consistent with our core values,” said a Marine Corps spokesman.

Smith feels he deserves at least a general discharge. He notes that unlike Flynn, he never lied to superior officers or ignored orders to break off the relationship.

And he is at a loss to explain why his former lover has told military investigators that the loving things she wrote to him were only “games” and she never intended to leave her husband.

“I figured she was a straight shooter,” Smith said. “I thought with all her expressions of affection that she would never hurt me in any way.”