A Navy commander facing charges for allegedly raping a female subordinate in 2016 was actually “engaged in a bizarre role playing sexual game” with the woman, the officer’s attorney said this week.
Cmdr. John M. Neuhart is facing potential court-martial in connection to the incident, which allegedly took place at the woman’s San Diego residence after the two were out drinking.
An Article 32 hearing was held Tuesday, where the presiding officer reviewed the evidence and will make a recommendation to superiors in the coming weeks if the case should go to trial.
Neuhart was tried twice in civilian courts in connection to the allegations, but both ended with a hung jury.
A San Diego judge dismissed the case as Neuhart faced a third trial in June.
Neuhart’s current civilian attorney, Michael Hanzel, said this week that the accuser “created this allegation of sexual assault,” but that they were role playing.
“When you look at it out of context, it might seem jarring or shocking,” Hanzel said in an email to Navy Times recounting his argument at the hearing. “But this is role playing, and both of them are participating in it, and both have been for a lot of the night.”
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Before the alleged incidents took place at the lieutenant’s home on Sept. 12, 2016, in San Diego, the accuser worked for Neuhart when he commanded Helicopter Sea Combat Squadron 25 in Guam.
“She created this allegation because in the middle of this role playing, she and her former CO are caught having sex in her house because a neighbor walks over in the middle and jumps to a conclusion and calls the police,” Hanzel said. “She is about to get caught with a commanding officer and either they are both about to go down or he is.”
Neuhart was relieved of command about a week after the alleged incident.
The woman is not named in the Navy’s charge sheets, and Navy Times does not identify alleged sexual assault victims.
Hanzel said the accuser chose to make Neuhart take all the heat for their consensual impropriety.
“Some people are capable of doing that, and she did, and that’s what happened in this case,” he said.
Neuhart was tried three times in San Diego civilian courts in connection to the allegations. Two trials ended in deadlock, when the juries could not reach unanimous verdicts.
In June, a judge dismissed the case against Neuhart, who was facing a third trial, San Diego media reported.
In past cases, prosecutors said Neuhart tried to rape the lieutenant after they had been out drinking at a bar and went back to her San Diego residence, the Associated Press reported.
During the second trial, the junior officer testified that Neuhart attacked her after forcing his way into her home and only stopped when her screams alerted a neighbor. Neuhart fled out the back of the residence and was arrested by police after he fell and broke his leg, the AP reported.
He recorded part of the encounter on his phone, and a woman can be heard shouting, “No! Stop!”
She screamed at him to leave her house and told him roughly 90 times to stop trying to have sex with her, according to AP.
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Both sides acknowledged the woman was inebriated after heavy drinking at a bar with Neuhart, and surveillance video showed her hugging and kissing him before they got into a limo headed back to her residence.
At the trial, Neuhart said the woman consented to going home and having sex with him, and that he recorded a portion of the encounter in case she later accused him of rape.
The Navy accepted jurisdiction on Neuhart’s case after the civilian judge dismissed the case in June, according to the San Diego Union-Tribune.
Navy spokesman Brian O’Rourke declined further comment on the charges the Navy is pursuing.
“The charge sheets speak for themselves,” he said.
In addition to the attempted rape and sexual assault charges, the Navy is seeking to try Neuhart for “drinking to excess with junior officers under his Command” and fraternization for “hugging and kissing a junior officer,” according to charge sheets.
He also faces a fleeing apprehension charge for trying to run from San Diego police that night, charge sheets state.
Neuhart could also be tried for indecent visual recording for making a recording of “the private area” of the woman’s, as well as for assault consummated by a battery for grabbing and pinning the alleged victim on the couch, according to charge sheets.
He also faces potential charges for breaking into the lieutenant’s home.
Navy charge sheets also cite him for conduct unbecoming an officer for engaging in sexual activity with a drunk junior officer in the back of an Uber that night, according to charge sheets, as well as for going back to her home as a married man with the intent to have sex.
At Tuesday’s Article 32 hearing, defense attorney Hanzel said there was reasonable grounds to believe Neuhart fraternized, “and that she was committing frat (sic) with him, mutually and consensually.”
There were also grounds to believe both of their conduct was unbecoming, he said, and that she committed perjury and obstruction of justice.
Hanzel said there is no probable cause for the rape and sexual assault charge, and that the other charges should be handled via non-judicial punishment or a board of inquiry.
“That would be a fair resolution of this case based on the evidence in front of you and based on what happened here,” he said.
A naval aviator, Neuhart enlisted in the service in 1995 and received his commission in 2000, according to service records.
While the New Jersey native was fired as commander of Helicopter Sea Combat Squadron 25 after news of the alleged incident emerged in 2016, he remains officially assigned to the unit.
Geoff is the managing editor of Military Times, but he still loves writing stories. He covered Iraq and Afghanistan extensively and was a reporter at the Chicago Tribune. He welcomes any and all kinds of tips at geoffz@militarytimes.com.
