Court-Martial Humor
I just don’t think you can make up the s*#t that sailors will do. From the crazy Canuck Navy (courtesy of the National Post):
A second military court martial is being convened against a Canadian Forces seaman accused of disgraceful conduct after a prank involving a glass of milk and a sailor’s penis.
The unusual case happened aboard the HMCS Nanaimo when the coastal defence vessel was visiting Seattle in 2009.
A leading seaman in the ship’s mess poured the last of the chocolate milk; mess protocol dictates he refill it. Master Seamen W.L. Boyle told him to refill it and the sailor of a slightly lesser rank said he would do it after lunch.
An argument ensued and the junior sailor left, presumably to get fresh milk. While he was gone, MS Boyle took the glass of milk, unzipped his overalls and, according to one witness, inserted his penis into the drink, swirled it around and returned the glass to the table.
The sailor was warned by a shipmate not to drink it.
MS Boyle was charged with disgraceful conduct and conduct to the prejudice of good order and discipline, under the National Defence Act, which he was found not guilty of almost a year later. The military appealed, however, and won a retrial on the disgraceful conduct count.
But the most surprising aspect of the case may be that the military has taken it so far.
“The whole thing is just silly,” said Jack Granatstein, a military historian and research fellow at the Canadian Defence and Foreign Affairs Institute. “Why is the government wasting all of this time on two courts martial and appeals, spending literally thousands of dollars, for a minor, stupid prank?”
What exactly MS Boyle did to the milk remains in dispute; after taking the glass, he turned his back to most sailors in the Junior Ranks Mess.
He testified at his hearing at Canadian Forces Base Esquimalt, home to the Canadian Pacific Naval Fleet, that he only pretended to soil the milk.
“The accused testified he wiggled his torso to give the appearance of him inserting his penis into the glass and swirling it around, but he did not actually do so,” says the appeal ruling.
So if he’s guilty, and I think I speak for the sailors on his next ship, I hope they don’t punish him with extra duty in the mess.
We had a USCG case where the mess worker confessed to rubbing the CO’s chicken sandwich on his groin just before serving it to the CO. The adsep board gave him an Honorable Discharge…They must have known the CO!
Wouldn’t a traditional naval means of expressing opprobrium … like, say, keelhauling … be a more fitting response?
And then there’s the client who relieved himself in a wine glass belonging to the female airman into whose room he’d broken, and he placed the glass in the freezer. When the female’s boyfriend (also active duty) suspected that the frozen concoction was urine, the boyfriend decided the best way to confirm his suspicions was to…Yeah, a Darwin Award winner in the making.