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Navy SEAL’s death during training exercise ruled homicide
charlotteobserver.com
SAN DIEGO - His lips turning blue and his face purple, the Navy SEAL trainee dressed in full gear was struggling to tread water in a giant pool when his instructor pushed him underwater at least twice – actions a medical examiner ruled Wednesday made his death a homicide, not an accident.
The homicide ruling on the May 6 drowning of 21-year-old Seaman James Derek Lovelace raises questions about the safety of the grueling training that produces the U.S. military’s most elite fighters. It also raises questions about where the line is drawn between what is considered to be rigorous training designed to weed out the weakest and what is abuse that leads to a homicide.
Lovelace, of Crestview, Fla., was in his first week of training in Coronado, near San Diego. An autopsy found he drowned. The report noted he also had a heart abnormality but said the problem was only a contributing factor.
The homicide ruling does not necessarily mean a crime occurred, and the instructor has not been charged.
The medical examiner said some may consider the death an accident, especially in a “rigorous training program that was meant to simulate an ‘adverse’ environment.”
But “it is our opinion that the actions, and inactions, of the instructors and other individuals involved were excessive and directly contributed to the death,” the report said.
The drowning marked the third death of a SEAL trainee this year, including one who committed suicide after dropping out of the training and another who was killed in a car accident.
It’s highly unusual for a training death for any service branch to be classified a homicide.
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