THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Thursday, July 11, 1996 TAG: 9607110377
SECTION: FRONT PAGE: A5 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY DALE EISMAN, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: WASHINGTON LENGTH: 57 lines
The Navy and one of its most decorated pilots are again wrestling over the flier's attempt to secure a promotion to captain.
Each side insists that the next move is up to the other in the long-running drama of Cmdr. Robert E. Stumpf, a Virginia Beach-based aviator whose two-year effort to win a promotion has been stymied by questions about his conduct at the Tailhook Association convention of naval aviators in 1991.
Officials acknowledged this week that a special inquiry into Stumpf's case, ordered by Navy Secretary John H. Dalton, essentially has been on hold since Stumpf walked out of an under-oath interview with Joseph G. Lynch, the Navy's assistant general counsel, in mid-June.
The inquiry ``was prosecutorial,'' Stumpf's lawyer, Charles W. Gittins, asserted this week. ``It was clearly an effort to find some reason not to promote'' his client, he added.
Gittins said Stumpf is ``weighing his options,'' including the possibility of retiring from the Navy, and will not participate in Lynch's inquiry without a change in the ground rules.
Dalton ordered Lynch to take a ``fresh look'' at the Stumpf case in May, after a promotion board reportedly recommended his advancement to captain. Sources suggested at the time that the secretary wanted to compile a comprehensive record on Stumpf and, in particular, on his attendance at Tailhook.
A Navy board of inquiry long ago cleared Stumpf of any criminal acts at the convention, where dozens of Navy and civilian women were groped or sexually assaulted by drunken aviators. And Dalton has said repeatedly he believes Stumpf should be promoted.
But the Senate Armed Services Committee, which reviews military promotions, has voted at least twice to oppose Stumpf's advance. Navy officials have suggested that Dalton ordered Lynch to take another look at the case in an effort to address questions raised by the senators.
Stumpf's case has become a cause celebre for Navy retirees and conservative activists across the nation. His defenders argue that in the process of demonstrating its concern about sexual harassment, the service has sacrificed the careers of Stumpf and other talented naval aviators.
Stumpf's Senate critics have never spelled out their concerns in public, but they apparently focus largely on the aviator's failure to stop what became a bawdy party in his squadron's Tailhook convention suite.
Stumpf has acknowledged being present during a striptease act in the suite, but the board of inquiry concluded he had left by the time the stripper performed a public sex act on another aviator. His critics are said to argue that as squadron commander, Stumpf should have interceded to stop the rowdiness before things got out of hand.
There also have been questions about Stumpf's use of a Navy F/A-18 fighter to fly to the convention. Lynch apparently was pursuing a line of inquiry on that when Stumpf and Gittins stopped the interview. ILLUSTRATION: Photo
Cmdr. Robert E. Stumpf walked out of an under-oath interview that
his lawyer termed prosecutorial. by CNB