News
2007-03-01
Air Force officer
found guilty of rape
An Air Force
officer accused of drugging and kidnapping servicemen he met
in bars was found guilty Tuesday of raping four men and
att
An Air Force
officer accused of drugging and kidnapping servicemen he met
in bars was found guilty Tuesday of raping four men and
attempting to rape two others. A nine-member military
jury deliberated for about seven hours in Capt. Devery
L. Taylor's court-martial. Taylor gave no reaction
upon hearing the verdict.
Taylor, the
former chief of patient administration at Eglin Regional
Hospital in Florida, faces a maximum of life in prison.
Sentencing was to begin Wednesday.
''I am pleased. I
am emotional, but I am very, very pleased,'' said Maj.
Kathleen Reder, a military prosecutor. ''These men can sit
up a little straighter now; I am proud of them,'' she
said of the six victims who testified.
Martin Regan,
Taylor's civilian defense attorney, declined to comment
before sentencing.
Military
prosecutors described Taylor, 38, as a serial rapist who met
men in bars, spiked their drinks with the
''date-rape'' drug gamma-hydroxybutyrate, or GHB, and
kidnapped them.
Taylor was
charged with two counts of attempted sodomy, four counts of
forcible sodomy, two counts of kidnapping, and one count of
unlawful entry.
Taylor testified
that he had consensual sex with five of the men and that
the sixth, who is openly gay, raped him. Regan said the men
lied to protect their military careers. Four of the
men were in the military when they met Taylor, and a
fifth wanted to join the Navy and feared being
identified as gay, Regan said.
Regan said
Taylor's only crime was being gay in the military and
violating the ''don't ask, don't tell'' policy, which bars
people who are openly gay from serving in the armed
forces. (Melissa Nelson, AP)
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