Posted on 01/05/2005 2:10:43 AM PST by kattracks
RALEIGH, N.C. (AP) — A soldier who re-enlisted with the Marines after becoming a Seventh-Day Adventist has been jailed for refusing to pick up a gun. Cpl. Joel D. Klimkewicz, 24, of Birch Run, Mich., was sentenced last month in a court-martial to seven months in Camp Lejeune's brig. He also received a reduction in rank to private and a bad conduct discharge.Klimkewicz was charged with refusing to obey order two years to draw a weapon from his unit's armory for a training exercise in preparation for an Iraq deployment.
In refusing the order, Klimkewicz told his superiors he was a conscientious objector and cited his new status as a member of the Seventh-Day Adventist Church.
The church supports noncombatant status for its members who serve in the military, but leaves such decisions to a member's individual conscience.
Klimkewicz joined an Adventist church in Jacksonville in 2003, a year after he re-enlisted. He sought conscientious objector status, which was rejected in last March.
"Conscientious objector status has to be granted," said Capt. Jeff Pool, a spokesman for the 2nd Marine Division at Lejeune. "Since his package was denied, it was just simply disobeying an order. That is what he was charged with."
The timing of Klimkewicz's conversion and re-enlistment were issues in his case, church attorney Mitchell Tyner said Tuesday. The Marine Corps said he should have known better than to re-enlist after joining the church, he said.
(Excerpt) Read more at nj.com ...
joined an Adventist church in Jacksonville in 2003, a year after he re-enlisted
So did he re-enlist before he re-enlisted, or did he become an Adventist before he became one?
You should not expect the liberal media to get the facts straight.
You severely misunderestimate John Kerry..
How do you do the superscript in your tag line? It's even superscript in the source code - I didn't think that was possible.
Hope that the pu$$y enjoyed that Big Chicken Dinner!
Yeah, what's wrong with this picture? Regardless, this guy should not have reenlisted and the Marines should kick him to the curb with an OTH discharge.
Works for me. Give this whack a Bad Conduct Discharge and send him on his way. And make this fruitcake pay back any reenlistment bonuses or other incentives that he may have gotten for reenlisting.
What does that even mean? This journalist needs to take a reading comprehension class and his editor should be sacked.
It's AP, what do you expect?
Yep, AP isn't known for their brilliant news reporting. I didn't get to read the whole article because I'm not a subscriber to nj.com, but I'm sure they found a way to blame Bush.
RE your other post. I wonder if this was his way of conning some money out of the military (reup bonus). How much are they paying now anyway.
No doubt. The ONE thing the Corps doesn't play around with is recouping their losses. If he got any bonus, he'll be paying it back, trust me. Either a lump sum or out of any tax refunds for the next 100 years.
I just copied & pasted it from the MS Word symbol. I think the FR script is preset to recognize some of them .. dunno how what decides which ones. I know that it used to not recognize the euro symbol € and then it did.
He went on and on for about an hour while I finally found the chain and lined it up properly over the cam sprocket. When I stood up, he asked if I was interested in joining. I asked him if he or anybody else in his church was helping us fight in Vietnam. He told me that they were against all fighting and that he had heard some Adventists had served as medics but none would fight.
I told him that I only respected those that went to Vietnam to serve - particularly as medics/Navy Corpsmen and that I would listen more when he got back from his service in Vietnam.
"But until that time, stay off my lawn"
I'm not sure what the re-up bonuses are now, and it probably depends on what job specialty the guy is in.
This is my rifle.
This is my gun.
One is for fightin',
And one is for fun.
This is proof of my law of religion, which is "There can be no good coming out of anything that has to do with William Miller."
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