An Army sergeant found to have been absent without leave (AWOL) for a total of 78 days in a two-year period has lost his High Court challenge to a decision to discharge him from the Army.
Sgt David Carroll (48) had sought to overturn that decision in judicial review proceedings but, in a reserved judgment yesterday, Mr Justice Daniel Herbert dismissed the challenge.
The case arose after Sgt Carroll, who had completed 29 years of service in the Army by June 2003, applied for a fifth period of continuance of two years of service to enable him have the required 31 years of service to qualify for a pension.
However, his commanding officer on December 19th, 2005, assessed his conduct as unsatisfactory and recommended that his continuance in service was not in the interests of the Army. The reasons given were that Sgt Carroll had, in the two years prior to his being assessed, been absent without leave for a total of 78 days.
Sgt Carroll was discharged from the army with effect from January 13th, 2006, which did give him 31 years of service and qualified him for a military pension appropriate for that period.
In his judgment, Mr Justice Herbert noted Sgt Carroll was born in April 1958 and would have been obliged to retire from the Army on reaching his 60th birthday. The sergeant had argued his assessment was unfair and that he should have received a prior warning about his conduct prior to the assessment being carried out.
The judge said Sgt Carroll continued to go absent without leave even after October 24th, 2002, when he was paraded in the presence of the regimental sergeant major and told that, because of his disciplinary record to date, it was not proposed to recommend his continuance in service. Nor had repeated "trials" and punishments stopped him from continuing to go absent without leave on a regular basis, the judge added.
This matter concerned the Army, a disciplined organisation vital to the security of the State and where the reliability and availability of each serving member, and especially a member of the rank of sergeant, were of overwhelming importance, the judge said.
He was satisfied that Sgt Carroll must have been fully aware of the seriousness and inevitable consequence of "this flagrant, serious and repeated offending".
There was "nothing irrational" in the finding that Sgt Carroll's conduct was unsatisfactory and that his continuing service was not in the interests of the service.