Staff Sgt. Christine Fetrow said she resisted the embraces of Sgt. Maj. Gene McKinney but feared the sergeant major of the Army would "ruin my career" in retaliation. McKinney pursued her for four years, Fetrow said, once cautioning her: "I'm a very powerful man that makes thing happen - good and bad."
Fetrow was the first of an expected 50 witnesses to testify against McKinney in a court-martial. If convicted, he could face 55 years in prison and be stripped of his rank and retirement benefits. The trial, expected to last four to five weeks at Fort Belvoir in Fairfax County, Va., could provide a window on what some studies have said is widespread sexual harassment of women in the military.
McKinney, who was removed from his Pentagon job in October, is charged with 19 counts of harassing and assaulting six different military women. Defense lawyers have said that none of the witnesses is more important than Fetrow, a military police officer who was placed in a classified witness protection program after she agreed to testify.
Sharpton's appearance marked a dramatic high-point in a trial that has dragged on for three months, filling an antique Dutchess County courtroom with racially incendiary charges reminiscent of a decade ago when Brawley's story horrified the nation.
After laboring for 10 years to graduate from race-based street politics to mainstream Democratic politics, Sharpton acknowledged he never quizzed Brawley on details of her story, saying, "I would not engage in sex talk with a 15-year-old girl." He also acknowledged that he could not produce evidence to bolster his televised claims in 1988 that a then-assistant district attorney named Steven Pagones was among those who raped Brawley.
Testifying in a defamation suit brought by Pagones, Sharpton asserted that he believes he acted well within a long tradition of civil rights leaders advocating for victims of racial injustice. "I think Martin Luther King faced a defamation suit," he said, in the first of several references to the slain leader. "If anything, I think (this lawsuit) confirms my growing status."
Adamkus plans to retain dual citizenship even as he takes the helm of a country that abuts the Baltic Sea: Lithuania. It is his native land - the land he fled more than 50 years ago.
In October, he successfully challenged Lithuania's residency requirement for presidential candidates. Then, with the help of votes from other Lithuanians abroad, won a five-year term as head of state.
After his inauguration later this month, Adamkus will begin work in a 14th century palace in Vilnius, the capital. Previous tenants include Czar Alexander I and Napoleon.
02-10-98
| Previous Article | Next Article |
should be sent to: daily.letters@umich.edu | should be sent to: online.daily@umich.edu |