A Purple Heart and three-time Bronze Star Medal recipient and colonel from Fort Bliss has been found guilty of sexual harasement and sentenced to three months in military prison.
Col. Michael A. Robertson commanded the 31st Combat Support Hospital in Afghanistan from January 2010 to last November, when he was relieved of duty after being accused of sexual harasement.
Over the course of 39 years, Robertson served in the United States Army in Vietnam, Kosovo, Grenada, Iraq and Afghanistan, among other areas. Among witnesses who testified in his defense were four active or retired generals who said his service was exemplary and his character exceptional.
After two and a half days of testimony, Judge David Robertson deliberated for two hours and found him guilty of storing innapropriate pornographic images on his government computer, sexual harrassment and maltreatment of three women, wrongul touching (without sexual component) of five women, making innapropriate sexual comments to those women and possibly others and showing them and possibly others innapropriate sexual photos.
The judge found him not guilty of the most serious charges of sexual assault, which would have required him to register as a sex offender.
“(He had) no intent to gratify or arouse himself. … This was the colonel’s way to lighten the mood. Was it the most appropriate? Clearly it was not,” Michael Robertson’s defense attorney argued. “But his behavior was not criminal.”
A woman who served with the colonel in Afghanistan and testified Tuesday that she never wanted to work under him again changed her testimony Wednesday.
“I was feeling a lot of pressure and coercion from a group of females,” she said, referring to the eight women accusers. “I actually would feel fine working under him again. He may have had a cocky personality, but I always knew he had my best interest at heart.”
The prosecution said the colonel was a “sexual predator” and asked the judge to sentence him to military prison for 11 months, the amount of time the accusers spent working under him.
“Duty, honor, country — clearly, he forgot these words,” argued a prosecuting militarty attorney, who later asked the judge to “show (Michael Robertson) that rank is not immune to justice.”
The judge ordered the colonel to pay a fine of $10,000 over the next three months and said he would be reprimanded, which means a disciplinary document explaining the situation will remain in his military record permanently.
After he was found guilty, the colonel walked over to one of the victims and said, “I’m sorry.” She started to sob and walked away, appearing to make sure to not let him touch her.
Later, before he was sentenced, the colonel looked at the women who accused him from the stand and said, “I would like to apologize for any and all of my actions that led to these proceedings being necessary. It was never my intent to harm or offend any of (the women) and I will take that burden to my grave.”
The colonel’s mental health doctor at Fort Bliss testified that he was sexually abused as a young child by a male caretaker and currently suffers from Post Dramatic Stress Disorder and depression.
After he serves his sentence, Michael Robertson will be able to retire as a colonel. He has two active-duty sons serving in the U.S. Army in Afghanistan.
Article source: http://www.kfoxtv.com/news/news/colonel-sentenced-military-prison-sexual-harassmen/nFZX8/
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