CAMP LEJEUNE, N.C. -- Marine Corps Capt. Richard J. Ashby was acquitted yesterday of all criminal charges in the deaths of 20 skiers in the Italian Alps, a verdict that brought members of his family leaping to their feet and relatives of the dead to tears.
Ashby, 31, an eight-year veteran Marine who yearned to fly while growing up near the El Toro Marine Corps Air Station in Southern California, stood at rigid attention when the verdict of not guilty on all charges was read.
The pilot from Mission Viejo, Calif., did not react, did not so much as flinch -- even as his mother and sister jumped up behind him and screamed with delight.
Later, still looking as though the verdict had not sunk in, a pale Ashby said: "This has been a tragedy for all involved. My heart and my thoughts and prayers go out to the families of the victims of this tragedy."
Many of the victims' relatives were stunned by the acquittal, which came after seven hours of deliberations in a U.S. court-martial despite an earlier demand from the Italian government that Ashby and his crew be tried in the Italian courts.
Several relatives of the dead hugged and cried as the verdict was read, and a Marine escort reached out to steady them as they left the tiny military courtroom.
Later, they expressed disgust that Ashby's mother, Carol Anderson, and his sister, Cary Lee Horsager, shouted with such glee. They also complained that neither Ashby nor his family has personally apologized to them.
"I buried my husband a year ago. Today it was his second funeral," said Rita Wunderlich.
"If Mr. Ashby really feels sorry, why didn't he tell us?" she said. "Right now he is a free and innocent man and could have come to us. He could have looked into our eyes. But I don't know if he can do that."
Emmi Aurich, who lost her son and his wife, said: "I came here with the wish to find justice here in America. I really trusted the American justice system. I don't know if you can imagine how disappointed I am."
The eight jurors -- three of them pilots, all of them captains or higher-ranking officers -- refused to publicly discuss how they arrived at their decision. But, suggesting they were split, they had asked the judge earlier yesterday how they should proceed when one side wanted the other to reconsider its findings.
Beyond that there was no indication of the jury's internal dynamics. But because six votes were required to convict, as few as three votes for acquittal would have produced a verdict of not guilty.
Too low, too fast
Evidence presented in the four-week trial suggested that Ashby was flying too low and too fast during the routine training mission when his jet clipped two cable car wires in the snow-covered Cavalese Valley. Twenty skiers fell 370 feet to their deaths.
Ashby would have faced a maximum of about 206 years in prison had he been convicted on all charges -- 20 counts of involuntary manslaughter, one count each of negligence in destroying the Italian cable car system, damaging his $60 million EA-6B Prowler jet and dereliction of duty.
He still faces a second court-martial on a single charge of obstruction of justice for allegedly hiding and then helping destroy a videotape recording that his co-pilot had made during the Feb. 3, 1998, flight.
Also still scheduled to be tried -- on the same charges as Ashby -- is his navigator, Capt. Joseph P. Schweitzer 31, of Westbury, N.Y.
The plane's two back-seaters -- Capt. William L. Raney II, 27, of Englewood, Colo., and Capt. Chandler P. Seagraves, 29, of Nineveh, Ind. -- were given immunity from prosecution in return for their cooperation with Marine Corps authorities.
Should Schweitzer also escape conviction, it would mean that no member of the Marine Corps would be held criminally responsible for one of the worst military mishaps in the continuing deployment of U.S. forces abroad.
Speaking in Boston, Italian Premier Massimo D'Alema said he was "really baffled by this ruling. With that kind of a massacre, with so many casualties, I think it is a duty to ensure that justice is done."
D'Alema, who today will attend a previously scheduled meeting with President Clinton, said Italy will "explore all the legal ways" to hold those responsible accountable.
White House spokesman Joe Lockhart said the administration would "continue to work closely with the Italian government to ensure that all claims resulting from the tragedy are handled expeditiously."
Ashby declined to say anything beyond his expression of sympathy to the victims, well aware that he could spend as much as a year inside a military prison if he is convicted in the next court-martial on the obstruction of justice charge.
Asked about the second trial, his civilian attorney, Frank Spinner, said, "We still don't know how that's going to be resolved."
Angry families
John A. Eaves Jr., a Jackson, Miss., attorney who is representing some of the German and Polish families, said they are angry that while the U.S. government has paid $20 million to the gondola company, the families have received no financial restitution. One woman who had lost three loved ones was offered $50,000, he said.
Eaves also said that with the Ashby acquittal, the victims' families now must file claims in Italy with NATO -- the Northern European defense pact for which Ashby and his crew were deployed. He said that process could take eight to 10 years.
"We just ask that we be treated fairly like an American would be treated," Eaves said. "If this had happened in Vail, Colo., these claims would have been resolved a long time ago."
Pub Date: 3/05/99