The Navy on Monday announced it will not pursue criminal charges against the instructor who repeatedly submerged a sailor during Navy SEAL basic training in California last May.
Cmdr. Liam Hulin, head of the Naval Special Warfare Basic Training Command, concluded no crime had been committed during the incident that killed Seaman James Derek Lovelace.
“Our thoughts and prayers remain with the Lovelace family,” Hulin said in a Navy statement. “No loss of life in training is an acceptable loss.”
“To honor those who have fallen in combat we must provide the most realistic and operationally relevant training possible,” said Capt. Jay Hennessey, commander of the Naval Special Warfare Training Center, in a statement. “To honor those who have fallen in training we must effectively mitigate the risks of that training.”
The San Diego County Medical Examiner had ruled Lovelace’s death a homicide because he had been dunked twice by his instructor despite struggling to tread water. The probe also found Lovelace had both an enlarged heart and abnormal coronary artery that may have contributed to his unexpected death.
However, a doctor would have conducted a medical exam on Lovelace prior to his being admitted into the training program.
