Marine Pilot Acquitted in Skiers’ Deaths

Marine Corps Capt. Richard Ashby was acquitted Thursday of all criminal charges in the deaths of 20 skiers in the Italian Alps, a verdict that brought members of his Orange County family leaping to their feet and relatives of the dead to tears.

Ashby, 31, an eight-year veteran who yearned to fly while growing up near El Toro Marine Corps Air Station, stood at rigid attention when the verdict of not guilty “on all charges” was read.

The pilot from Mission Viejo, Calif., did not react, did not so much as flinch--even as his mother and sister jumped up behind him and screamed with delight.

Later, still looking as though the verdict had not yet sunk in, a white-faced Ashby said: “This has been a tragedy for all involved. My heart and my thoughts and prayers go out to the families of the victims of this tragedy.”

Evidence presented in the four-week trial suggested that Ashby was flying too low and too fast during the routine training mission on Feb. 3, 1998, when his jet clipped two cable car wires in the snow-covered Cavalese Valley. Twenty skiers fell 370 feet to their deaths.

The eight jurors--three of them pilots, all of them captains or higher-ranking officers--refused to discuss publicly how they arrived at their decision. But, suggesting that they were split, they had asked the judge earlier Thursday morning how they should proceed when one side wanted the other to reconsider its findings.

Beyond that there was no indication of the jury’s internal dynamics. But because six votes were required to convict, as few as three votes for acquittal would have produced a verdict of not guilty.

Many of the victims’ relatives were stunned by the acquittal, which came after just seven hours of deliberations in the court-martial, despite earlier demands from the Italian government that Ashby and his crew be tried in Italian courts.

Some relatives of the dead--Italians, Belgians, Germans, Poles, Austrians and Dutch--had come here to follow the proceedings and, they hoped, to find some consolation for their losses. But the acquittal of Ashby means that no member of the Marine Corps has been held criminally responsible for one of the U.S. military’s worst accidents overseas involving civilians.

Two of the flight’s four crew members were granted immunity in return for their testimony in the court-martial. The co-pilot is awaiting court-martial on the same charges as Ashby.

Several relatives of the dead hugged and cried as the verdict was read. A Marine escort reached out an arm to steady them as they left the tiny military courtroom.

Later, they expressed disgust that Ashby’s mother, Carol Anderson, and his sister, Cary Lee Horsager, shouted with such glee. They also complained that neither Ashby nor his family have apologized to them personally.

“I buried my husband a year ago. Today it was his second funeral,” said Rita Wunderlich, who spoke at a press conference called by German relatives of victims.

“If Mr. Ashby really feels sorry, why didn’t he tell us?” she asked. “Right now he is a free and innocent man and could have come to us. He could have looked into our eyes. But I don’t know if he can do that.”

Emmi Aurich, who lost her son and his wife, also spoke. “I came here with the wish to find justice here in America. I really trusted the American justice system. I don’t know if you can imagine how disappointed I am.”

Italian Premier Baffled by Verdict

Speaking in Boston, Italian Premier Massimo D’Alema said he was “really baffled by this ruling. With that kind of a massacre, with so many casualties, I think it is a duty to ensure that justice is done.”

D’Alema, who today will attend a previously scheduled meeting with President Clinton, said that Italy will “explore all the legal ways” to hold those responsible accountable.

In Italy, several government officials decried the Ashby verdict. “The decision of the martial court to absolve the pilot responsible for the Cermis disaster is more a provocation than a verdict,” said Paolo Guerrini, undersecretary of Defense.

In Mission Viejo, Ashby’s grandfather, Bill Currier, 83, said that the ordeal had been “terrible.”

“It’s been quite a strain. It’s my personal opinion that the government and the Marines have tried to pass the buck. I think they were trying to find a scapegoat,” Currier said.

White House Press Secretary Joe Lockhart said that the administration will “continue to work closely with the Italian government to ensure that all claims resulting from the tragedy are handled expeditiously.”

Ashby faced a maximum of about 206 years in prison had he been convicted on all charges--20 counts of involuntary manslaughter, one count each of negligence in destroying the Italian cable car system and damaging his $60-million EA-6B Prowler jet, and a final count of dereliction of duty.

He still faces a second court-martial on a single charge of obstruction of justice for allegedly hiding and then helping destroy a videotape recording that his co-pilot had made during the flight.

Also still scheduled to be tried on the same charges as Ashby is his co-pilot, Capt. Joseph P. Schweitzer, 31, of Westbury, N.Y.

2 Other Crewmen Given Immunity

The plane’s two other crew members--Capt. William L. Raney II, 27, of Englewood, Colo., and Capt. Chandler P. Seagraves, 29, of Nineveh, Ind.--were given immunity from prosecution in return for their cooperation with Marine Corps authorities.

Both Raney and Seagraves were called as government witnesses in the court-martial, but their testimony seemed to help their colleague. They praised Ashby as an outstanding pilot and insisted that the crew was not aware of the cable car system before it was struck.

It is unknown what effect the Ashby acquittal might have on the Schweitzer trial, expected to start later this month.

Ashby declined to say anything beyond his expression of sympathy to the victims, well aware that he could spend as much as a year inside a military prison if he is convicted on the obstruction charge.

When asked about the second trial, his civilian attorney, Frank Spinner, said: “We still don’t know how that’s going be resolved.”

More broadly, Spinner urged the Marine Corps to systematically review how it trains pilots and also to review its internal judicial process.

“It’s time, now that the truth has come out in the courtroom, for the Marine Corps to look back at how this trial came about,” he said. “And it’s time for Congress to look at the Marine Corps and perhaps look at what went wrong. How is it that the Marine Corps could claim Capt. Ashby committed involuntary manslaughter and a jury acquit him of those same charges and even lesser charges?”

Spinner commended the “courage and true integrity” of the jury, and he encouraged the government to drop the charges against Schweitzer.

John A. Eaves Jr., a Jackson, Miss., attorney who is representing some of the German and Polish families, said they are angry because they have received no financial restitution while the U.S. government has paid $20 million to the gondola company. One woman who lost three loved ones was offered just $50,000, he said.

Eaves also said that with the Ashby acquittal, the victims’ families now will file claims in Italy with the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, for which Ashby and his crew were deployed. He said that process could take eight to 10 years.

“We just ask that we be treated fairly, like an American would be treated,” Eaves said. “If this had happened in Vail, Colo., these claims would have been resolved a long time ago.”

Sindy Renkewitz, a German who was offered the $50,000 in restitution for the loss of her father, her sister and her sister’s fiance, said the verdict convinced her that the Marine Corps was simply protecting its own.

“There is a saying in Germany that one crow doesn’t pick out the eye of the other one,” she said. “That means that people of the same group flock together.”

Aboard the aircraft carrier Constellation, training off San Diego, Navy Cmdr. Terry Kraft, commander of a Prowler squadron, said that Prowler aviators “had been watching the case intently” and were split on what caused the accident and who should be held responsible.

“There are views on all sides of the case,” Kraft said. “This has been a tragedy for everyone and it’s affected the entire [Prowler] community. A verdict one way or another was not going to change that.”

Kraft’s squadron is based at Whidbey Island, Wash., where Ashby trained.

Kraft said the tragedy reaffirms his stand to punish any aviator under his command who engages in “flat-hatting,” that is flying low and fast. “I have no tolerance for flat-hatting,” Kraft said.

Plane Exceeded 517-mph Limit

Evidence showed that Ashby flew at 65% below a restricted level of 1,000 feet when his jet hit the gondola wires. The plane was traveling at 621 mph, much faster than the 517-mph limit.

The prosecutors also tried to prove that Ashby was flying recklessly over the scenic mountains.

They argued that because this was his last jaunt in a radar-jamming Prowler and because he had just been promoted to fly the more prestigious F-18 fighter jets, Ashby used the training mission to take his Prowler on a final thrill ride.

The defense, however, scoffed at the suggestion that Ashby would risk his promotion by flying that way.

Spinner produced evidence suggesting that some of the plane’s instruments, specifically the radar altimeter, malfunctioned and never gave Ashby a true altitude reading during the flight.

The defense also brought in flight maps that did not include notations for the ski resort and gondola system, which was popular among sports enthusiasts from Northern Europe.

Times staff writers Allison Cohen in Mission Viejo and Tony Perry aboard the aircraft carrier Constellation off San Diego and researcher Maria de Cristofaro in Rome contributed to this story.

Video from Capt. Richard Ashby’s post-verdict press conference is on The Times’ Web site at: https://www.latimes.com/ashby

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Anatomy of a Tragedy

The accident occurred after Capt. Richard Ashby swooped into the Italian Alps’ Cavalese Valley, since dubbed “Mishap Valley” by the Marines. The 31-year-old pilot was consulting a map when his right wing clipped a gondola cable, sending 20 skiers to their deaths. According to testimony, Ashby first spotted the cable six to eight seconds before hitting it. Flight maps did not show cable cars in the valley.

The four-member crew of the Marine EA-6B Prowler jet was practicing low-level altitude maneuvers between the canyons along the northern Italian mountains.

Air Force standards at the time of the accident restricted altitude to no lower than 2,000 feet. The jet deviated from the center line of the route by at least a mile and a half at times during the flight.

The jet was traveling at 621 mph when it struck the ski gondola cable. Jet-speed restriction was at 517 mph.

20 skiers killed when gondola plunges to ground.

Primary Function: Electronic countermeasures

Contractor: Grumman Aerospace Corp.

Length: 59 ft. 10 inches

Wingspan: 53 ft.

Speed: 575 mph

Range: 1,150 miles

Crew: Four