Posted on 07/15/2006 8:40:47 AM PDT by Excuse_My_Bellicosity
DENVER - An Air Force officer with hundreds of hours of combat time pleaded guilty Friday to defacing cars with bumper stickers supporting President Bush, and was given a two-year deferred sentence and ordered to pay for the damage he caused.
Lt. Col. Alexis Fecteau, a decorated officer who flew 500 combat hours in the Gulf War, Kosovo and Bosnia, pleaded guilty to felony mischief and must pay restitution to the owners of the damaged cars to clear his record.
Fecteau, 43, of Colorado Springs, did not speak during or after the hearing.
Fecteau's lawyer, Patrick Mulligan said his client, a 20-year veteran, has submitted his retirement papers. Negotiations are under way to determine at what rank and with what benefits he will be retired.
Mulligan said he will work with other lawyers to determine how much must be paid in restitution. ''Fecteau has always expressed a desire'' to pay for the damage he caused.
Mulligan said the plea agreement ''affords Lt. Col. Fecteau the opportunity to get back on track,'' noting his record will be cleared in two years if he stays out of trouble.
Fecteau originally faced 13 charges for defacing vehicles at the Denver airport from January to July 2005. Fecteau admitted to investigators he had vandalized cars starting around the time of the November 2004 election, but pleaded guilty to a single charge of criminal mischief that named all 13 victims.
Fecteau blacked out pro-Bush bumper stickers, then spray-painted an expletive over them.
After the charges became public, Fecteau was removed as director of operations for reserve forces at the National Security Space Institute at Peterson Air Force Base in Colorado Springs.
Eh, not a prob.
I always figure that the reason for the enemedia's slow news days are due to the fact that THE GOOD GUYS ARE WINNING, and they're reluctant to report it.
Second Lieutenant sounds fine to me.
Airman Basic sounds better.
Sounds suspiciously French.
SACRE BLEU!!!!!!!
I think it's being reported now because he pled guilty yesterday.
Exactly. I would have thought an 0-5 would have had slightly more maturity. Very disappointing.
It doesn't matter if he did it in uniform or not.
Yep, how amazingly stupid does this guy have to be to build up his record, rank, and reputation over an excellent 20 year career and then give it all back for a felony conviction because he was out defacing cars in an airport parking lot? (And a normal person would expect EVERYTHING at an airport to be monitored, even the parking lot.) It wasn't a drunken one-time thing, he did this over 7 months. Unbelievable.
"Yeah, MacArthur rotted in jail for dissing Truman ... NOT !"
MacArthur had a serious policy disagreement with his boss. He did not act like some nine-year-old kid or a feminazi pulling some petty stunt.
You do have a point. OTOH, MacArthur was a much more prominent military hero than some obscure Lt.Col that no one except his mother ever heard of.
Give him "The big Chicken Dinner"
Allow me to translate for some of the civilians out there who have never worn the uniform: "The Big Chicken Dinner" is code for a Bad Conduct Discharge.
Defacing the bumper stickers wasn't felong, I don't believe.
I think his service record accords him a far amount of slack in the matter.
Lt. Col. Alexis Fecteau, a decorated officer who flew 500 combat hours in the Gulf War, Kosovo and Bosnia, pleaded guilty to felony mischief and must pay restitution to the owners of the damaged cars to clear his record.
The military takes a real dim view of its officers committing felonies. The military is deciding right now what rank to knock him down to for retirement purposes.
Good One. I don't advocate asassination but in this case....
Um...OK
What a disgrace.
He didn't just deface stickers. He blacked them out and then wrote his own message in letters 18" high. This latest article cleans it up to make it sound like a minor prank. One vehicle alone had $2,500 in damage.
Don't ask, don't tell?
Sounds suspiciously French.
Yes, I believe it's French for Fecal
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