Anyone hear about something down at USNA?

I have heard through some Yard sources here about a group of youngsters (3/c) in trouble for cocaine possession in Bancroft. NCIS involved.

This is hearsay, of course. I hope there is no truth to it, but every few years mids decide to do bonehead things with drugs.
 
Skipper, respectfully I going to agree with you and hope there is no truth to this. NCIS is no joke, they came to my ship once and took away some bad players.
 
When mids do “crime stuff” and not garden variety misconduct admin rule-breaking, I always think of the impact on parents and family. All the sweat equity invested in the process to get an appointment, all the family involvement and Navy pride - dissolved in an instant.
 
Hurricane12 said:
Completely separate from the original post that spawned this thread, this “Academy Insider” guy seems like kind of a tool.
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He's a '17 Grad and a former basketball player. Didn't really know him but he had a pretty positive reputation in the Brigade. I do agree that the whole concept is a little toolish.
 
Capt MJ said:
I have heard through some Yard sources here about a group of youngsters (3/c) in trouble for cocaine possession in Bancroft. NCIS involved.

This is hearsay, of course. I hope there is no truth to it, but every few years mids decide to do bonehead things with drugs.
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This is true.
 
I am not naive, and I also understand that like any school USNA has its fair share of disciplinary issues, but that really surprises me.
 
Rescue#1 said:
I am not naive, and I also understand that like any school USNA has its fair share of disciplinary issues, but that really surprises me.
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In the past 25 years: car theft ring, text book thief, cheating scandals, Percocet thief, various other drug cases, selling porn, bike theft, breaking and entering in Annapolis, assault, rape, and a murder (though that was committed senior year of HS and found out while the murderer was a Plebe, and her co-felon was a USAFA doolie).

Smart, athletic, skilled people can also do bad things. The vast majority of mids are fine, upstanding people who generally do the right thing, a few excursions into administrative rule-breaking aside.
 
Capt MJ said:
Smart, athletic, skilled people can also do bad things.
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Particularly smart, athletic, skilled, entitled people who've been stroked their entire lives. They've either hoodwinked everyone along the way or are incapable, post adolescence, of coloring outside the lines.

Capt MJ said:
The vast majority of mids are fine, upstanding people who generally do the right thing, a few excursions into administrative rule-breaking aside.
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Couldn't agree more.
 
It's unfortunate, but as CAPT MJ says, these things come up from time to time. We all expect more , and I think USNA does a pretty good job at admitting the best and the brightest, but there will always be some bad apples slipping in and making the rest look bad. The worst part is that the press gets hold of these things and has a field day bashing USNA .
 
It may be time to retire the “best and brightest” phrase.

This description pops up often - particularly in descriptions of Academy students. It isn’t really accurate (no disrespect intended). But there are ROTC, PLC, OCC and even non-military students who should be considered within that group as well.

The application and vetting process works well but hasn’t proven to weed out morally bankrupt students with great success. This will continue to be a challenge for all military entrance programs.

Thankfully, the VAST majority of Officers (regardless of the path) have exceptional character, and a strong moral compass.
 
Old Navy BGO said:
It's unfortunate, but as CAPT MJ says, these things come up from time to time. We all expect more , and I think USNA does a pretty good job at admitting the best and the brightest, but there will always be some bad apples slipping in and making the rest look bad. The worst part is that the press gets hold of these things and has a field day bashing USNA .
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No - the worst part is that these **REMOVED** took spots that would otherwise have been appointments of honorable American men and women who would have done the Academy proud and served our nation accordingly.
 
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No - the worst part is that these **REMOVED** took spots that would otherwise have been appointments of honorable American men and women who would have done the Academy proud and served our nation accordingly.
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We'd all like to think this, but we really have no way of knowing. It's like saying that, if USNA had admitted candidate Y to USNA instead of candidate X who later quit/dropped out of USNA, Y would have stayed. X probably thought he/she was going to stay until something happened that caused the situation to change. The same thing could have happened to Y.

Ditto with conduct issues. There is no way to know whether folks who "go bad" at USNA started out bad or something happened along the way. And to say, "no way would it happen to [X] who was not admitted" . . . we can't know that. X may have been great or X may have turned out also to be a bad apple.

I'm not in any way condoning the actions of those who violate USNA's rules, the law, or the Honor Concept. Only that we shouldn't assume that someone who was not admitted would have acted differently had he/she been admitted. Nor, sad to say, is there any foolproof way to differentiate the good and bad apples during the admissions process.
 
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I don’t know if related, but there is an issue with prescription drugs in the services as well as society. Not too long ago a ring was broken up at USMA.
The docs are put in a tough situation. If they don’t give out narcotics for pain they risk being reported by nurses and patients as the government has deemed pain to be a symptom that must be treated and cured. I know surgeons who have faced multiple congressional investigations for NOT giving patients more pain killers months after surgery when it was obvious they had become addicts. Then when the addiction comes to light they are pilloried for giving out too many pills.
 
USMCGrunt said:
It may be time to retire the “best and brightest” phrase.

This description pops up often - particularly in descriptions of Academy students. It isn’t really accurate (no disrespect intended). But there are ROTC, PLC, OCC and even non-military students who should be considered within that group as well.

The application and vetting process works well but hasn’t proven to weed out morally bankrupt students with great success. This will continue to be a challenge for all military entrance programs.
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I get your point, and agree that there are plenty in other officer programs , and non-military that are every bit as good and bright. However, I won't retire the phrase as that should be the objective of all our Officer accession programs, to attract the best and brightest we can get. My point is the system doesn't always work, but it should't take away from all the very good Midshipman, or deter good candidates from applying.

Any word on how many involved ? It's obviously being held pretty close to the vest, as I don't seen any press yet.
 
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