General to Testify in Ski Accident Trial

A military judge said Monday he will order at least one top Marine general to testify about pressure applied to investigators looking into a Italian ski gondola accident involving a pilot from Orange County.

The judge, Lt. Col. Robert Nunley, said he would call Maj. Gen. Michael DeLong, former deputy commander of Marine forces in the Atlantic, to testify next week during a motions hearing for two aviators charged in the accident.

Twenty people were killed when the EA-6B Prowler cut the gondola’s cable Feb. 4.

Capt. Richard Ashby, 32, of Mission Viejo and Capt. Joseph Schweitzer, 31, of Westbury, N.Y., are on trial at Camp Lejeune, N.C., and face 20 counts each of involuntary manslaughter and 20 counts of negligent homicide.

Nunley also said he was considering calling Lt. Gen. Peter Pace, the officer who actually charged the aviators, to testify as well.

Defense attorneys say the charges should be dismissed because Pace may have unduly influenced DeLong during an investigation into the accident.

Pace sent DeLong to Italy to head the investigation board, which concluded that the aircraft crew was at fault because the plane was flying too low and too fast.

“I would think there are some questions General Pace needs to answer . . . about intemperate remarks . . . like, ‘I’m going to burn Ashby,’ ” he said.

The judge also said the commandant of the Marine Corps, Gen. Charles Krulak, may be asked to answer written questions.

Nunley said there was no doubt that there was political pressure in the decision to charge the air crew.

The announcement came at the end of a long day when defense attorneys had been pleading for more money to hire experts to testify. The motions hearing is set to resume today.

Attorneys for the aviators told Nunley on Monday they needed a virtual reality flight simulator to re-create the tragic flight and more expert witnesses for their case.

“We need this to get a fair trial,” defense lawyer Dave Beck said.

Prosecutors said the simulator and experts the defense wants to testify at the Marines’ courts-martial in February would cost more than $300,000.

During discussion of the flight simulator motion, defense witness William Edwards of Chesterfield, Mo., said Ashby and Schweitzer, who was the jet’s navigator, could fly their route in the simulator.

“If we put Capt. Ashby and Capt. Schweitzer in there, we can see how fast they react, . . . that they reacted in a manner I would expect to a hazard right in their face,” Edwards said. “It would also show speed doesn’t matter here.”

Prosecutors argued the government already has produced a computer simulation of the flight path that the defense can use.

The investigation showed the jet was traveling at more than 500 mph when it hit cables strung at 370 feet, well below an altitude restriction of 1,000 feet.