Without Guilt?

  • All Bill Clinton could do was apologize, "The U.S.," he declared, "is responsible for this terrible tragedy." But his guest was implacable. "We shall say we are satisfied when whoever is responsible for what happened is found guilty and punished," said Italian Prime Minister Massimo D'Alema. The day before, a military jury in Camp Lejeune, N.C., had acquitted Captain Richard Ashby, a U.S. Marine pilot whose EA-6B warplane severed a ski gondola in the Italian Alps on Feb. 3, 1998, sending 20 Europeans to their death.

    While military prosecutors alleged that Ashby had been "flat-hatting"--flying recklessly--his lawyers revealed widespread training deficiencies. Prosecutors couldn't prove Ashby had been told of speed and altitude restrictions for the flight. There was also a sense among some leathernecks that Ashby was targeted for punishment that should have been more evenly shared. All that was apparently sufficient for at least three of the eight Marine jurors to vote not guilty (military juries require only two-thirds to convict) after seven hours of deliberation. Ashby still faces charges of destroying a videotape of the flight, and his navigator, Captain Joseph Schweitzer, faces a charge of involuntary manslaughter and obstruction of justice.

    After the verdict was announced, a prosecutor turned to the relatives of those killed. "I'm sorry," he said. "I buried my husband a year ago," Rita Wunderlich replied. "Today it was his second funeral."