Woman Says McKinney Apologized

The woman whose complaint triggered the sexual-misconduct investigation of the Army’s top enlisted man testified Tuesday that Sgt. Maj. Gene C. McKinney tearfully apologized two months after she says he made advances toward her.

“ ‘There’s no excuse in the world for what I did. I’m sorry,’ ” retired Army Sgt. Maj. Brenda L. Hoster quoted McKinney as telling her after she blamed her retirement on the advances she says he made in a Honolulu hotel in spring 1996.

“I felt it was a sincere apology,” Hoster told a court-martial that is considering 19 charges against McKinney, 47, the former sergeant major of the Army. It was Hoster’s public complaints about McKinney’s behavior that prompted the service to launch its investigation and remove him from his position.

On Tuesday, Hoster became the third of six military women named in the charges against McKinney to take the stand.

“I didn’t want to make any waves,” Hoster said. “I don’t hate this man. I just don’t approve of his behavior.”

Hoster has said she became disturbed last year after the sergeant major was named to a high-level Army panel to review sexual harassment in the service. The panel was appointed after allegations of widespread misconduct by sergeants at the Aberdeen Proving Ground in Maryland. The military judge presiding over McKinney’s trial ruled that the jury of four officers and four enlisted personnel may be told of a letter Hoster wrote McKinney urging him to resign from the panel.

Defense lawyers have argued that Hoster, 40, went public with her allegations in hopes of winning fame as a media celebrity.

Hoster’s complaint accounts for only one of the charges of harassment and assault facing the sergeant major. McKinney, who faces up to 55 1/2 years in prison, has pleaded not guilty.

Earlier, defense lawyers failed to shake the testimony of Maj. Michelle Amy Gunzelman, the second woman to testify against McKinney. Under cross-examination, Gunzelman, the only officer who has accused McKinney of harassment, insisted that his advances were unwelcome.