Darwin soldier avoids jail for sending colleague a dick pic

A soldier who sent a colleague a dick pic will keep his job after being handed a 28 day suspended sentence.

A DARWIN soldier who sent a colleague a dick pic will keep his job after having been handed a 28 day suspended sentence and busted back to the rank of private.

The man, referred to in court documents only as Corporal Veltman, pleaded guilty in the Defence Force Magistrates Court in August to using a carriage service to cause offence.

The court heard both he and the female soldier were members of Darwin’s 1st Combat Signal Regiment when they attended a social function at a local pub in November 2020.

Veltman sat next to the woman and told her to look at her phone and when she did, she discovered he had sent her a picture of his penis via Facebook Messenger.

The woman told Veltman she had a boyfriend and later caught an Uber home after he had left the hotel.

In sentencing, magistrate Group Captain Scott Geeves said Veltman was a “relatively inexperienced” soldier in terms of rank “but a mature man with much life experience, including previous service and operational deployments”.

“Despite his conduct, the defendant was highly regarded with a number of character references tendered on his behalf,” the judgement reads.

“His conduct in the workplace, in the intervening period, had also been outstanding.”

Capt Geeves said Veltman had also shown genuine remorse and had good prospects for rehabilitation.

“The complainant’s statement outlining her unsurprising disappointment in the defendant’s behaviour and the effect that it has had on her was also taken into account,” the judgement reads.

“This type of conduct was, in the DFM’s view, wholly inconsistent with service standards and displayed a lack of respect.”

The latest revelation comes after a Darwin Army officer spoke out when another soldier was also allowed to keep his job, despite pleading guilty to distributing intimate images of another officer without her consent.

The officer, who spoke to the NT News on condition of anonymity, said the leniency reflected a double standard when compared with the consequences for similar behaviour in civilian workplaces.

The woman said the sentences diminished the credibility of the Australian Defence Force’s Pathway to Change — Evolving Defence Culture 2017-2022 reform agenda.

“We get training on this kind of stuff every single year, it’s not avoidable, no one can say that we haven’t been told this is what you don’t do,” she said.

An ADF spokesman said the organisation “does not tolerate unacceptable behaviour in any form” but could not comment on individual cases “due to the Privacy Act”.

An earlier version of this article reflected court documents that wrongly identified the complainant and Corporal Veltman as being members of the 5th Battalion, Royal Australian Regiment. The ADF has since confirmed those documents were in error.