Darwin soldier busted down in rank for drunkenly groping subordinate’s breast

A DARWIN soldier who drunkenly groped a female subordinate’s breast while on an exercise has been busted back down to the same rank as his victim

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A DARWIN soldier who drunkenly groped a female subordinate’s breast while on an exercise at the Mt Bundy training area has been busted back down to the same rank as his victim.

Sergeant Michael William Buswell, 39, pleaded guilty in the Defence Force Magistrates Court at Robertson Barracks on Tuesday to one count of assaulting the corporal during exercise Buffalo Run last year.

Flight Lieutenant Emma Palmer, prosecuting, told the court Buswell and the woman were both part of a team of chefs catering the exercise when Buswell made the call to buy some alcohol for himself and his juniors on August 27.

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Flt Lt Palmer said grog was banned on the exercise without the commanding officer’s written permission, which Buswell didn’t have at the time.

Nonetheless, the group began drinking after dinner that night, with Buswell becoming “heavily intoxicated” on whiskey before deciding to give the group’s only female member a shoulder massage.

Flt Lt Palmer said the unwanted touching made the woman uncomfortable and she left the room but Buswell followed her into the kitchen where he continued the shoulder rub.

She said Buswell then moved his hands towards her breasts and touched one of them while telling her she was “hot”, making “comments about her arse” and trying to kiss her.

When the “much younger and more junior” woman told him to stop, Buswell apologised and left the room.

In sentencing Buswell to a reduction in rank to Corporal, magistrate Group Captain Scott Geeves said the offending was “not the behaviour the defence force expects of a senior NCO”.

“Such behaviour must have been confronting and deflating for this young lady and moreover, disappointing to her in the current climate whereby the ADF has gone out of its way in terms of training and education to confirm that this type of conduct is never regarded as appropriate,” he said.

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Gp Capt Geeves said if not for Buswell’s prior good character, remorse, good prospects for rehabilitation and early guilty plea he likely would have dismissed the former Sergeant from the Army altogether.

All DFM rulings are subject to automatic review.

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