The below article is a re-write from change.org. Read it here, or read it there… https://chng.it/RCX6pVz65P. Beatrice has made it possible for people to donate to the cause of reform. There are many great charities out there. The two we donate to is this one, and to Veterans America who does fabulous work on behalf of America’s Veterans worldwide.
We thought it was of high value because the issue of change to the military judicial system is of extreme interest to us here at MilitaryCorruption.com. For over twenty years we have been reporting about outrageous instances of military corruption. It just keeps happening over and over again, because that’s the way the military likes it.
They like it when they can crucify someone they don’t like… and let the admirals and generals scoot out the back door into retirement to avoid accountability for their own misconduct. This article from Beatrice Anderson says it all….
My name is Beatrice Anderson and I need about 10 minutes of your time. My son, Major Clarence Anderson III (upper left), was falsely accused and convicted of sexual assault by a United States Air Force military court and he is not alone.
I want a strong, just, and fair military, but I need your help to make sure we have one. There is an old saying I’ve learned over the years… “The most powerful government official we have is an informed citizen.”
Now I realize that many people will not believe what you are about to read about the U.S. Military and that is ok. I don’t want you to just believe what I say just because I say it.
I want you believe me because the military even admitted to their wrongdoings in a 2017 report from the Department of Defense Judicial Proceedings Panel, on the barriers to the fair administration of military justice in sexual assault cases, where the military acknowledges deliberate obstructions to manufacture convictions. You will read examples of these barriers particularly when it comes to the make-up of the jury, whether it be unfairness by race, or a conflict of interest.
I want you to hear some of the more than 400 stories from many of our innocent service members hurt by these unjust practices, and imagine it happening to you or someone that you love.
I have a retired military investigator willing to come forward and confess what he was instructed to do when investigating sexual assault claims and I am asking other retired military investigators to come forward and share your stories.
I want you to go online, google, and read the account of a Navy Seal (Senior Chief Keith Barry) also falsely accused and convicted of sexual assault who while in solitary confinement, was denied his medication in prison.
His case was only overturned after someone came forward and told of the Navy’s top federal prosecutor, Vice Admiral James W. Crawford, on the phone with another Admiral, telling him not to overturn the case even though the evidence didn’t support the conviction.
I want you to ask yourselves if the U.S. military identified these problems in 2017 as illegal, why would they continue? I want you to ask if there was Unlawful Command Influence in that one case, did the military investigate other cases where it also took place?
I want you to believe me when you read about these unfair practices and the destructive results they produce. Then, I want you to help me, my son, and the many others receive justice.
Now I will share some things about my son’s case and several other cases. There are many more details that you would find jaw dropping:
My son was a squadron commander and deployed five times in defense of this great nation. He discovered that his now ex-wife was not only having an extra-marital affair, but she later became pregnant with the other man’s child.
After discovery of her affair, he initiated divorce proceedings and was granted custody of their daughter, which led to her false allegations saying that my son sexually assaulted his wife while they were married.
Civilian prosecutors declined to prosecute after local civilian police officers found ZERO evidence to support any claim from his wife. So my former daughter-in-law turned to the military.
The deck was stacked against my son because the Judge Advocate General of the Air Force (the Air Force top federal prosecutor), Lieutenant General Richard T. Harding, passed the unlawful order to all Air Force judges’ that in a he-said/she-said case, the victim is to be believed. Not knowing this instruction, my son chose a judge alone panel instead of a jury, testified in his own defense, was found guilty, and sentenced to 3 and 1/2 years in a military prison.
After my son’s conviction, I spoke with his wife’s lover on a recorded phone call where he admitted that he lied on the stand when he testified against my son, and that my son’s mother-in-law paid him $100K prior to his perjured testimony.
My son was granted a post-trial hearing, after US Congresswoman Martha Roby submitted a congressional to the Air Force based on my recorded phone call. The Air Force affirmed to Congresswoman Roby in an official statement that my son could present evidence of what was discussed with me on the recorded phone call, and that the military judge had full authority to order a new trial.
However, at the post-trial hearing, the Air Force secretly stripped those authorities from the judge stating he was not authorized to hear the evidence or even order a new trial, and ordered my son back to prison.
My son was sent back to prison without being able to present evidence to prove his innocence, received a Dishonorable Discharge from the military, cannot see his daughter, and was forced to register as a sex offender. He can’t find gainful employment and is punished every day due to his wrongful conviction, all because the Air Force ordered their judges to believe all victims.
Think about all of the countries that the United States criticizes for human rights violations and then imagine the violations done in our own country against those who serve this nation.
Erik Burris was an active duty Major in the United States Army, serving at Ft Bragg, North Carolina as the Chief Military Justice Prosecutor (lawyer) for the 82nd Airborne Division. He spoke out against the Army policy of sending cases to court martial without evidence and numerous other forced tactics in cases alleging sexual assault.
He even testified at a sexual assault trial to highlight the pressure to prosecute and get convictions (regardless of the lack of evidence) he and others were receiving with regards to these cases. Similar to my son, when his now ex-wife wanted a divorce, she went to the Army to make accusations against Erik.
During the investigative hearing to determine if the case should go to trial, the investigating officer, a female Lieutenant Colonel, said the case should NOT go to trial and summarized, “It was not the case that [the accuser] was untruthful on just one instance, but that she delayed reporting to family and never reported to civilian law enforcement, DFPS, North Carolina CPS or the Army, or that new allegations seemed to be revealed every time previous allegations raised didn’t produce the desired result.”
The Lieutenant Colonel also concluded his accuser’s “testimony and statements, both sworn and unsworn, were found to be exaggerated, skewed and/or fabricated”.
In spite of the investigating officer’s recommendation to not take the case to trial, the Army prosecuted Erik anyways, hand selected his jury, and even convicted him of sexually abusing his daughter via “tickle torture”, even after a supervisor of child protective services testified to refute the allegations by the accuser. The Army sentenced Erik to 20 years in prison! (he is still currently in jail)
Micah Carroll (top middle of picture with baseball hat), a former Air Force service member, suspected that his wife (also a service member) was having an affair while he was deployed to Afghanistan. After initially denying the affair, his wife confessed and they agreed to work on the marriage. Two months later, Micah suspected his wife was having another affair and so he purchased a motion activated camera in his bedroom to find out for sure.
Micah confirmed that his wife was having another affair, this time with another married service member. Even though Micah once again tried to make his marriage work, his wife filed for divorce.
After receiving a 50/50 custody agreement, Micah attempted to get primary custody of his children and presented evidence of both of his wife’s extramarital affairs. The court kept primary custody with the mother.
After Micah’s children asked to live with him, he was informed of a sexual assault investigation against him by his now ex from the United States Air Force.
He was initially charged with 13 counts of sexual assault, where 12 were either thrown out or he was found not guilty. The military convicted him for setting up a camera in his bedroom to see if his wife was having an affair, and he was not allowed to mention that his wife was having affairs during his trial.
The charge inferred that he received some sort of sexual gratification from filming the acts because he was not in the images himself, even though the images were of his wife in his bedroom with another man. To the best of his knowledge, neither his ex-wife nor the service members having affairs with his wife, were ever punished.
David Montalvo III was an active duty Marine. One night in his barracks his friend brought over his girlfriend and one of her female friends. The ladies brought alcohol and all interactions were positive. At one point in the evening both of the ladies departed as one of the ladies had another commitment.
At approximately 3 AM, both ladies returned to the barracks. The girlfriend went to see her boyfriend and her friend went to see David, but David was passed out drunk in his bed. David’s friend let the girl into his room.
David’s accuser initiated oral sex with him while he was sleeping and passed out drunk. So yes, she sexually assaulted him because he was unconscious and could not consent.
Upon waking, David continued to have sexual relations with his accuser multiple times. They both went to sleep and David missed formation with his unit. A Marine came inside his barracks room and noticed both him and his accuser sleeping. They both got up and got dressed and told each other to have a good day.
The accuser and her friend took naps and went to work without incident. Later that day, David was informed that he was being accused of sexual assault.
David passed 3 polygraph (lie detector) tests but later told that it was inadmissible in court. David is Mexican –American and his accuser is white. His panel or jury consisted of 8 white males. The military recently acknowledged that racial biases are prevalent in the military, with the Marines being amongst the worse. If just one member of the jury has these biases, you can imagine its influence on the others?
David was accused of forcible oral, vaginal and anal sex and was found guilty of the vaginal and anal charges and sentenced to 9 years in prison and a Dishonorable Discharge. He was denied evidence and a continuance based on receiving limited evidence right before trial. Both his friend and his friend’s girlfriend who was a friend of the accused, were never called to testify on David’s behalf even though both of them were willing and able.
Arvis Owens was a Commander in the Navy.
His accuser is white, Arvis is black and like David, all of the panel members (7) were white males.
His accuser told investigators that the kissing and touching was consensual, and during their encounter she changed her mind, but she also testified that she never expressed to Arvis that she had changed her mind. During the encounter, his accuser also testified that neither she nor Arvis lifted her form fitting-pencil skirt, but that it rose automatically which also simultaneously caused her legs to open automatically, straddle him in a chair automatically, and open mouth kiss him automatically. Ladies, has any or all of that “automatically” happened to you before?
Arvis testified under oath on the witness stand that his accuser raised her pencil skirt and did all of those other things and that none of it happened automatically.
According to his accuser’s testimony, this occurred after she changed her mind. She also had another sexual encounter with him later that day, laughed and joked with Arvis throughout that day and took a picture of him. His accuser refused to sign her statement to investigators (spending several hours changing it) after consulting with her mother and an attorney she hired to sue the government (but not Arvis).
The government acknowledged settlement negotiations, but refused to provide details to Arvis at trial to support his defense that she was doing this for the money. During a preliminary hearing under oath, the accuser’s mother lied on the stand about past fraudulent business dealings.
Again, Arvis testified in his own defense and was found not guilty of all sexual assault charges except one (6 of 7). During sentencing, Arvis’ accuser contradicted another earlier statement and the jury asked to “revote” the single “guilty” sexual assault finding but the judge, the convening authority (Navy Admiral) and later the Navy Court of Appeals, decided not to overturn his conviction nor grant a new trial even when jury members wrote letters saying that he was not guilty of sexual assault.
The same panel found him guilty of violating a general order even though the judge later stated, there was no evidence shown in court that proved he was guilty of violating that general order. To the best of his knowledge, the jury never even received a copy of the general order. So how could he be guilty of violating a general order with no evidence at trial it was presented to the jury?
A government lawyer even discouraged some of Arvis’ coworkers to testify on his behalf, committing unlawful command influence. After jury members agreed to write letters on Arvis’ behalf, the judge issued an illegal order to the jury even though prosecutors didn’t ask for that order.
The judge later ordered a hearing (after a defense objection) and at that hearing the prosecutor asked the judge to issue the order that she had already given to restrict what the jury could say in a letter of support.
The government later claimed that no letters were written by the jury on Arvis’ behalf and then after an appeal court granted him a new convening authority’s action, it was proven enough of his jury members wrote letters after the trial to show they would have found Arvis not guilty, but the Navy refused to overturn the charge or grant a new trial. The Navy took the extraordinary step to request his case to not be reviewed on appeal.
Damion Yates was an active duty Air Force service member. His accuser was also his friend and coworker. Damion is black and his accuser is a white married female. Damion’s accuser asked to stay at his house for 1 week and he said yes, but she told her husband that she would be staying at another location. Her husband did not like the fact that she was Facebook friends with Damion.
After staying with Damion, his accuser’s husband found out that she did not stay at the location she told him. She filed sexual assault charges after her husband confronted her about this fact.
The accuser told her husband, investigators, Sexual Assault Response Coordinators (SAPRs), and testified in court that she believed that Damion would not be home when she stayed at his house.
She also stated that Damion had “set her up” and then she changed her testimony after Damion produced text messages that they exchanged about their time together showing that her previous testimony was false, and that she knew she’d be staying with Damion.
The judge conducting the investigative hearing to determine if the case would go to trial had serious doubts about her credibility due to the “demonstrably false or misleading testimony, to which she gave multiple times” and recommended that the case be thrown out.
All members of Damion’s chain of command including a 4-star General agreed, and Damion’s case was subsequently dismissed. Nearly six months later, another military command whose General was a lead advocate on sexual assault, decided to charge Damion again based on the same allegations with zero new evidence.
Prior to trial, his service assigned defense attorney even told him that he should not choose a jury and go judge alone, because a jury would see a big black man (he was a former body builder) and a small white woman. But remember in my son’s case, the Air Force Judge Advocate General gave the order to all judges in a he-said/she-said case, the credibility goes to the victim.
Damion was found guilty by a lone military judge, sent to prison, giving a Dishonorable Discharge, and is also a registered sex offender. To the best of his knowledge, his accuser who was married, was not punished for committing adultery.
Rick Livingston was an active duty army officer and pilot. His wife, also an active duty army officer, had an affair while she was on deployment. Rick asked her to attend counseling to save their marriage and everything appeared to be going well until a verbal argument ensued about the affair where she punched Rick in the face.
In self-defense Rick slapped her, and held her hands so that she couldn’t hit him again. She left and later reported to the Army that Rick sexually assaulted her. According to the Army, the 68 pages of texts between his wife and her boyfriend did not prove an affair because Rick needed photos, but to prove sexual assault all she needed was a verbal statement.
Despite all of the evidence supporting Rick and an Army investigation which was excluded due to inappropriate investigative tactics, Rick was found guilty and sent to prison for 20 years! His ex-wife later forged his signature to a check. The military would not charge her, because his father was able to recover the funds.
If you find these stories appalling, please sign the petition and forward it to your friends and family. We want President Biden and members of Congress to direct an independent third party to review these cases and others like them, to correct these wrongs. We want these cases overturned. We want the military to answer how they could order service Judge Advocate Generals to instruct military judges at trial to circumvent due process, no matter how outlandish the accusation.
These service members will never live normal lives because of these false convictions and being labeled as sex offenders. Many of the skills they gained over long careers have degraded and some people will never give them a chance even when these charges are overturned. Many other former servicemembers refuse to come forward because they fear what will happen to them. Despite what some may think, being on the sex offender registry is a punishment in this country.
At least one sex offender a month is killed in this country. They are targeted, sometimes randomly, for violence and people almost never take the time to consider that they may be innocent.
Many employers are afraid to hire them for fear of what customers may think and those who can find employment are so under employed that it is a struggle to survive. They are restricted on where they can live. They are targeted for searches. They are denied professional certifications and access to many professional organizations. They are denied access to schools and in many cases, they can’t even see their children.
We are asking for retired (current would be great too) military sexual assault investigators, prosecutors and defense attorneys to come forward and be honest about what the military ordered you to do in order to manufacture convictions.
If you or a loved one has a similar experience, please contact your congressional representative, your local media, and www.helpsam.org (email: ahenning@helpsam.org). HelpSam is a very small organization and it may take time for them to contact you.
We are also asking that you tell your loved ones to avoid joining the military until service members receive fair and just legal treatment. Our children should have the same protections as their enemies foreign or domestic. If your children still insist on joining, please, please have them ask about the rights that they give up so they don’t get punished unjustly.
I know that some may reject our campaign and that is ok. We know that the people who support us believe in justice for all and imagine what it would it be like if they or their loved ones had to endure such unjust treatment.
1. Please sign the petition and forward to your friends and family.
2. If you or your loved ones have a similar story contact your local media, your congressional representative, and www.helpsam.org (email: ahenning@helpsam.org).
3. We are asking that an independent body to review these cases, other cases like them, and reverse these injustices.
4. And pray for our Military. They should not have to fight to protect our country, and fight to protect themselves from our country.
