Marines wrangle over testimony

Two Marine captains testified Wednesday that they were relieved of duty after they resisted pressure from a senior officer to produce a report that would justify filing charges against two experienced drill instructors for abusing recruits.

Capt. Taylor Buff and Capt. Jason Mansel testified that Lt. Col. Robert Scott, commander of a training battalion, seemed to have made up his mind even before evidence was collected against the drill instructors.

The testimony came at a pre-trial hearing for Sgt. Brian Wendel, who is charged with assaulting troops, drinking on duty and failing to supervise an inexperienced drill instructor.

Each testified that Scott suggested that sometimes in the Marine Corps, an officer needs to be unfair to an innocent Marine in order to “save others.”

“Sometimes you have the uncomfortable duty of shooting a good Marine between the running lights to save others,” Buff quoted Scott as telling him.

After Buff was relieved as the investigating officer into allegations of recruit abuse in platoon 2167, his replacement, selected by Scott, produced a report that led to criminal charges against three drill instructors and demotions and reassignments for at least 10 officers and enlisted personnel.

Scott, testifying after Buff and Mansel, denied the “running lights” quote and said he was disappointed in the two captains for not conducting a more thorough investigation. Buff, he said, “lacked the moral courage to follow all the allegations to their logical conclusions.”

Sgt. Jerrod Glass, the drill instructor Wendel was supervising, last week was convicted of eight counts linked to abuse of recruits. The same military jury sentenced him to six months in the brig and a bad-conduct discharge. He could have been sentenced to 9 1/2 years.

Wendel faces a maximum one year in the brig if convicted. Sgt. Robert Hankins, the senior drill instructor for the platoon, faces similar charges.

Wendel’s attorneys asked the judge, Maj. Brian Kasprzyk, to dismiss the charges on the grounds of “illegal command influence.” Under Marine Corps regulations, as the battalion commander, Scott had the authority to refer Wendel and Hankins to a special court-martial but only after an impartial investigation.

Kasprzyk delayed a decision on the defense motion.

The cases against Glass, Wendel and Hankins are the largest set of recruit-abuse allegations at the depot in decades, involving dozens of recruits allegedly being hit, kicked and degraded.

By relieving Mansel and Buff of their duties, Scott put their careers in jeopardy. Scott also gave Buff an unsatisfactory job evaluation which led to a tense confrontation between the two, both testified.

Buff said he recommended that Glass be sent to court-martial but that Hankins and Wendel be reprimanded and allowed to remain as drill instructors.

Buff and Mansel testified that at a meeting where Buff presented his report, Scott did not look at the evidence and only glanced at the recommendations before declaring it unsatisfactory.

Scott testified that he declared the report substandard not because it wasn’t tough enough, but because it did not include a clear timeline of the allegations.

“It would look like we were covering up if we accepted” the report, Scott said.

tony.perry@latimes.com