A naval flight officer and Naval Academy graduate is facing attempted murder charges for allegedly strangling his fiancée in late 2017, according to Navy charge sheets and a Florida sheriff’s arrest report.
On Dec. 19, 2017, Lt. Cmdr. Jason Scott Doyle, 35, allegedly threw the unidentified woman down on a couch and strangled her before chasing her out of a St. Johns County residence and choking her again “with intent to kill,” according a charge sheet provided to Navy Times.
Military prosecutors also charged Doyle with battery for allegedly striking the woman repeatedly in the face and an additional specification for communicating a threat.
“If I can’t have you, nobody will…I’m going to kill you,” Doyle told the victim, according to prosecutors.
Doyle also faces an obstructing justice charge for allegedly urging the victim to make an untruthful statement about the incident in May 2018.
Doyle declined comment through his private attorney, Jeffrey Lustick.
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St. Johns County sheriff’s deputies were called to a residence on the evening of Dec. 19. 2017 and found Doyle involved in an argument with a woman, whose name also is redacted in the arrest report obtained by Navy Times.
Doyle threw the woman onto a couch and began choking her, but she was able to escape to a bathroom, according to the report.
“(Doyle) forced his way into the locked bathroom and continued the physical altercation by slapping (the woman) with an open hand to the face,” the report states.
The woman fled again, and Doyle caught up to her and began choking her again, according to the police report.
After threatening to kill her, the woman was able to get away and call 911, deputies wrote.
Deputies arrived and found Doyle in the backyard with a loaded gun, according to the report.
“(Doyle) was ordered to the ground at gunpoint and secured without incident,” the report states.
The woman was found with injuries to her neck consistent with being choked, plus "a noticeable knot on her forehead from an unknown cause which occurred during the physical altercation,” according to the report.
Doyle and the woman had been living together “as a family for six months,” and had been engaged for a year, deputies wrote.
The woman told authorities that Doyle had threatened to kill her or her children, and that she thought he was capable of killing her, according to the report.
Initially arrested by deputies on a third degree felony battery charge, Doyle was later turned over to military authorities for prosecution.
His trial is scheduled to begin in April, according to Doyle’s attorney.
Doyle graduated from the Naval Academy in 2005.
He was stationed with Patrol Squadron 30 in Jacksonville, Florida, from April 2015 to March 2017, but during the time of the alleged incident he was assigned to Patrol Squadron 47 in the state of Washington, according to his service records.
The “Golden Swordsmen” fly P-8A Poseidon maritime patrol aircraft out of Whidbey Island, Washington.
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.
