Officer Defends Osprey Orders

An officer at the center of an investigation into allegations that he asked Marines to falsify maintenance records of the MV-22 tilt-rotor aircraft said he had not compromised the Corps’ safety. The inquiry was the latest chapter in a saga that saw 23 Marines die in two MV-22 crashes last year and the grounding of the aircraft, known as the Osprey, which takes off like a helicopter and flies like an airplane. Lt. Col. O. Fred Leberman, a 20-year Marine Corps veteran, was relieved of his duty as commander of Tilt-Rotor Training Squadron-204 in New River, N.C., and a team headed by the Corps’ inspector general started the inquiry based on an anonymous letter and tape.