5 Marines Suspended After Recruit's Death

[Syrinx]

COLUMBIA, S.C., Feb. 19 (AP) - Five marines have been suspended while
the authorities investigate the death of a recruit who died during a
training exercise, military officials said on Saturday.

A Columbia television station, WIS, recorded a Marine drill instructor
grabbing the recruit, Jason Tharp, by the shirt and hitting him in the
chest a day before Mr. Tharp died. The drill instructor is among those
suspended. The other four marines apparently witnessed the incident.

Mr. Tharp, of Sutton, W. Va., drowned on Feb. 8 in a swimming pool
while participating in a water-survival training course at Parris
Island.

Military officials have said the drill instructor's actions violated
regulations.

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/02/20/national/20marine.html

[Coventina]

1. Well, he may have been spared a worse fate than he got

I hate being so cynical.

[Disturbed]

2. How did this poor guy drown in the pool...

with instructors close at hand?

[LisaL]

3. That's what they are trying to investigate.

I wonder why there is a video from the day before, but nothing on the day of the drowning.

[davepc]

5. Because the local TV station wasent there the next day doing their story

as they were the day before.

[MSgt213]

9. Not only drill instructors are there who are lifesaver qualified, but

there are instructors there who's only job is to teach water survival and who's main job is to watch out for the safety of the recruits first. This is a classic example of a breakdown in leadership. I would also question why these drill instructors felt the need to physically force someone who they couldn't mentally force into that pool. Were they getting such pressure not to drop someone for failing that they felt they couldn't just fire the guy. If the recruits are true volunteers then if they want to quit, why can't they?

[AtTheEndOfTheDay]

15. I was a army lifeguard at Ft. Bragg

and we did drown proofing almost every day. Nobody did or would have drowned under my watch. Something really incompetent or stupid or downright evil was going on here. I hope these instructors rot in Leavenworth.

[Erika]

4. The parents have already cried foul

He told his parents he was being picked on. You'd think they would all be wildly crazy at the thought of serving in Iraq.

[roguevalley]

6. I saw that boy. He look thin, young and terrified. Those fascists

better get the ax. You know they let him drown. If I were his mother I would hunt them down and kill them. The video makes me sick when I watch it.

[physioex]

7. I saw it on television.....

Show that every highschool kid who is thinking about joining the military.......

[sffreeways]

8. Same here it infuriated me

They murdered him there is no doubt in my mind. He was terrified that was obvious and that instructor had it in for him. If I was that parent I'd find a way to kill that son of a bitch. It made me so upset I couldn't friggen watch it.
I've recently stopped watching the news. I can't take it anymore, it's getting to me big time.
That poor kid had no idea what he was getting into. My son was a Marine and I hated it. When he joined something like what happened to that child was my worst fear. Bastards.

[ugarte]

10. I agree, he was probably "allowed to drown"

...while no one lifted a finger. Sick, sick, sick.

[Occulus]

11. It's a mentality of the stereotypical "jock"

This happened to me in high school.

We were out on the football field during phys. ed. one day, and there was a short lull in activity while we were waiting for people to finish their run around the track. We were congregated on the mat the pole vault area had under it; I was lying on my stomach talking to someone.

I wasn't such a popular kid (to put it mildly), and I found out that day just how 'invisible' I was. It was very windy, and the wind caught one of the tall, metal, spiked poles the pole vault bar lays across. It tipped over and landed square on the back of my head.

I blacked out for a few seconds, but I told them I was fine (my mistake; I now know when you lose consciousness after a head injury you should get thyself to hospital immediately) and that was that. The phys ed "teacher" (I put this in quotes because the man was about sixty pounds overweight and, when angry, looked like he was a stroke or heart attack waiting to happen; clearly unfit to teach phys ed in every way aside from his weight- pushy, always angry, intimidating... just a bad teacher all around) saw it all happen and didn't lift a finger.

This thin, scared Marine recruit was exposed to the exact same mentality. He shouldn't have been there, he wanted to try; everyone knew he wasn't cut out for it, and some thus treated him with open contempt.

In other words, to the stereotypical jock-mentality types who let this happen, he wasn't 'man enough', so they had to 'toughen him up'.

[sffreeways]

13. Exactly

and my tax bucks are going to train a young man that obviously isn't cut out for the Marine Corp then I paid to have him abused and eventually killed because the professionals around him werent competent or humane enough to send him home.

When my son was a Marine I had the opportunity to meet many of these guys and a good number of them were in there because it was either the service or jail. That's a fact. This instructor was probably one of those types. A sadist with kids like this to torture at his disposal. Why toss this kid and save the taxpayers when he could humiliate and assault him legally for sport.

They should come down on this guy hard but I suspect they won't. This happens far too often. There were several kids in my sons barracks that were suicidal, I now can see why. Kill yourself before they can kill you.

This young man was obviously terrified of that particular training or he wouldn't have had the nerve to refuse to do it. His worst fear realized. How horrible is that.

[KayLaw]

14. God!

Can you imagine losing a child that way? I'd be beside myself with grief. All these people are someone's baby.

:cry:

[Redstone]

12. "They were waist-deep in the Big Muddy, but

the big fool said to push on."

Some things never change.

Redstone