Marines Put Gay Man in Hospital. Will Anyone Prosecute?

<a href="http://chathamsheriff.org/Corrections/Operations/Bookings72hrs.aspx">Chatham County Sheriff's Office: Keil Cronauer and Christopher Stanzel</a>

Fight disinformation: Sign up for the free Mother Jones Daily newsletter and follow the news that matters.


[UPDATE: This story is being updated regularly with information from the US military. Please check for new updates at the end of the story.]

Two young Marines are sitting in a military brig this morning, accused of beating a gay man in Savannah, Georgia, so badly he had a bruised brain and two seizures. And while details on the case are just emerging, it has huge implications for the end of “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell,” as well as the justice system in Georgia, which lacks hate-crime laws and charged the men with a simple misdemeanor.

The service members, Keil Joseph Cronauer and Charles Stanzel, were barhopping in Savannah, just over the border from the base where they’re stationed, Marine Corps Air Station Beaufort, South Carolina (of The Great Santini fame.) According to the Savannah Morning News, one of the Marines grew convinced that 26-year-old Kieran Daly, who came out six months ago, winked at him.

In police parlance, an altercation ensued. Daly was punched in the back of the head so hard, he had to be taken to the hospital.

The Marines, who were caught on foot after fleeing the scene, say they were “being harassed by a gay man and wanted to get away from him,” but eyewitnesses and Daly himself disputed that account:

“The guy thought I was winking at him,” Daly said. “I told him, ‘I was squinting, man. … I’m tired.'”

Daly said one of the men told him he demanded respect because he served in Iraq. And at least one hurled slurs at him as he tried to walk away.

“That’s the last thing I remember is walking away,” Daly said.

Obviously, an investigation is ongoing, and no one’s guilty yet. But if service members on liberty can’t hold their liquor or their emotions—and regardless of what happened, that much seems clear here—there’s a long way to go before the military will be able to successfully integrate gays and lesbians in the military ranks.

Worse still is the fact that, since Georgia doesn’t recognize hate crimes under state law, Savannah authorities had to charge the two men with simple misdemeanor battery. “It leaves me wondering why Georgia is one of five states that doesn’t have a hate crime law on the state level,” Daly told the Morning News from his hospital bed. The Marines have since been transferred to military custody on their base.

In a perfect world, the Marines—who don’t suffer misconduct lightly—would prosecute Cronauer and Stanzel to the fullest. As riflemen trained in hand-to-hand combat, an Article 32 investigation for assault with a deadly weapon (namely, their hands) wouldn’t be out of order here. But in a military where a sexually abusive doctor with repeat offenses gets a week in the brig, what the Marine JAGs will do here is anyone’s guess.

[UPDATE: Gunnery Sgt. Chad McMeen, the public affairs officer for Marine Corps Air Station Beaufort, tells me that Lance Cpl. Stanzel and Cpl. Cronauer are “in an on-base restriction status” pending the outcome of multiple investigations: a military one, a Chatham County, Georgia, one, and “possibly an FBI investigation.” While McMeen could not confirm the latter, FBI involvement would likely indicate that the Marines’ behavior is being examined for evidence of federal hate crimes. “Both squadrons (to which the Marines are assigned) are conducting an investigation,” McMeen says. No telling how long the investigations will take, but “a lot of it hinges on Chatham County,” he says, adding that until the inquiries are closed, Stanzel and Cronauer will remain on “barracks restrictions.” A comment from the Marines’ air wing commander is expected to follow shortly. MoJo will keep you posted.]

THE FACTS SPEAK FOR THEMSELVES.

At least we hope they will, because that’s our approach to raising the $350,000 in online donations we need right now—during our high-stakes December fundraising push.

It’s the most important month of the year for our fundraising, with upward of 15 percent of our annual online total coming in during the final week—and there’s a lot to say about why Mother Jones’ journalism, and thus hitting that big number, matters tremendously right now.

But you told us fundraising is annoying—with the gimmicks, overwrought tone, manipulative language, and sheer volume of urgent URGENT URGENT!!! content we’re all bombarded with. It sure can be.

So we’re going to try making this as un-annoying as possible. In “Let the Facts Speak for Themselves” we give it our best shot, answering three questions that most any fundraising should try to speak to: Why us, why now, why does it matter?

The upshot? Mother Jones does journalism you don’t find elsewhere: in-depth, time-intensive, ahead-of-the-curve reporting on underreported beats. We operate on razor-thin margins in an unfathomably hard news business, and can’t afford to come up short on these online goals. And given everything, reporting like ours is vital right now.

If you can afford to part with a few bucks, please support the reporting you get from Mother Jones with a much-needed year-end donation. And please do it now, while you’re thinking about it—with fewer people paying attention to the news like you are, we need everyone with us to get there.

payment methods

THE FACTS SPEAK FOR THEMSELVES.

At least we hope they will, because that’s our approach to raising the $350,000 in online donations we need right now—during our high-stakes December fundraising push.

It’s the most important month of the year for our fundraising, with upward of 15 percent of our annual online total coming in during the final week—and there’s a lot to say about why Mother Jones’ journalism, and thus hitting that big number, matters tremendously right now.

But you told us fundraising is annoying—with the gimmicks, overwrought tone, manipulative language, and sheer volume of urgent URGENT URGENT!!! content we’re all bombarded with. It sure can be.

So we’re going to try making this as un-annoying as possible. In “Let the Facts Speak for Themselves” we give it our best shot, answering three questions that most any fundraising should try to speak to: Why us, why now, why does it matter?

The upshot? Mother Jones does journalism you don’t find elsewhere: in-depth, time-intensive, ahead-of-the-curve reporting on underreported beats. We operate on razor-thin margins in an unfathomably hard news business, and can’t afford to come up short on these online goals. And given everything, reporting like ours is vital right now.

If you can afford to part with a few bucks, please support the reporting you get from Mother Jones with a much-needed year-end donation. And please do it now, while you’re thinking about it—with fewer people paying attention to the news like you are, we need everyone with us to get there.

payment methods

We Recommend

Latest

Sign up for our free newsletter

Subscribe to the Mother Jones Daily to have our top stories delivered directly to your inbox.

Get our award-winning magazine

Save big on a full year of investigations, ideas, and insights.

Subscribe

Support our journalism

Help Mother Jones' reporters dig deep with a tax-deductible donation.

Donate