Pacific edition, Sunday, June 24, 2007
DAEGU, South Korea — A Camp Carroll soldier was sentenced Friday to six months in confinement for drunk and disorderly conduct, disobeying an order and destroying government property.
Pvt. Darrell Tyrone of E Company, 2nd Battalion, 1st Air Defense Artillery Regiment, pleaded guilty to all charges except one specification of failure to obey an order. He was found not guilty of that specification.
The charges stemmed from different incidents, according to court testimony.
On April 1, Tyrone “kicked up a ruckus” with Korean National Police during an off-base incident, defense attorney Capt. Patrick Davis told Stars and Stripes. Davis said a military policeman testified earlier in the day that Tyrone had kicked and spat at the Korean police and at some point tried to set his own pants on fire, but that his client said he was too drunk to remember the incident.
Another witness testified that after Tyrone argued with a co-worker at a barracks barbecue, he threw his drink, punched a wall and punched a window.
Davis told the five-member court-martial panel that Tyrone was stressed out because he was being processed out of the Army for a pattern of misconduct and hadn’t been paid for months because his wages were garnished to repay an enlistment bonus.
The maximum penalty the soldier faced was one year in jail, forfeiture of two-thirds pay and allowances and a bad-conduct discharge.
Prosecutors argued that Tyrone’s history of alcohol-related misconduct was grounds for a punitive discharge, four months confinement and the maximum pay forfeiture.
Davis argued that Tyrone was “a bad fit” for the Army, but that he was still a hard worker and a good person.
