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A former military sergeant has been sentenced to six months in prison for sexually assaulting a 19-year-old soldier who subsequently ended her life.

Warrant Officer the former sergeant, forty-three, pinned down Royal Artillery Gunner the victim and tried to kiss her in mid-2021. She was located without signs of life five months later in her barracks at the Wiltshire base.

The defendant, who was sentenced at the legal proceedings in the Wiltshire region earlier, will be placed in a correctional facility and registered as offender database for a seven-year period.

The family matriarch the mother remarked: "The assault, and how the armed forces neglected to defend our daughter subsequently, led to her death."

Military Response

The armed forces stated it did not listen to the servicewoman, who was originally from Cumbria's Oxen Park, when she reported the assault and has said sorry for its management of her allegations.

After an inquest into the soldier's suicide, the accused confessed to a single charge of physical violation in last fall.

Ms McCready said her daughter ought to have been alongside her loved ones in legal proceedings this day, "to see the individual she accused held accountable for what he did."

"Instead, we appear without her, living a life sentence that no family should ever have to face," she continued.

"She followed the rules, but the individuals in charge failed in their duties. Those failures destroyed our daughter utterly."

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Court Proceedings

The legal tribunal was informed that the violation took place during an field exercise at Thorney Island, near Hampshire's Emsworth, in mid-2021.

Webber, a senior officer at the period, initiated inappropriate contact towards Gunner Beck following an evening of drinking while on assignment for a military exercise.

The victim claimed the sergeant said he had been "anticipating an opportunity for them to be alone" before grabbing her leg, restraining her, and attempting to force intimacy.

She filed a complaint against the sergeant after the assault, regardless of pressure by military leadership to persuade her not to.

A formal investigation into her death found the military's management of the allegations played "a significant contributory part in her demise."

Mother's Testimony

In a statement read out to the judicial body previously, Ms McCready, expressed: "She had just turned a teenager and will always be a teenager full of energy and happiness."

"She believed authorities to safeguard her and following the assault, the confidence was shattered. She was extremely troubled and fearful of the sergeant."

"I observed the difference before my own eyes. She felt helpless and deceived. That assault destroyed her trust in the structure that was meant to protect her."

Sentencing Remarks

When announcing the verdict, The judicial officer Alan Large stated: "We have to consider whether it can be handled in another way. We do not believe it can."

"We are satisfied the seriousness of the crime means it can only be dealt with by incarceration."

He told Webber: "The servicewoman had the courage and good sense to demand you halt and directed you to leave the area, but you persisted to the extent she considered she would remain in danger from you even when she returned to her personal quarters."

He continued: "The subsequent morning, she made the complaint to her loved ones, her acquaintances and her commanding officers."

"Subsequent to the allegations, the command opted to address your behavior with light disciplinary measures."

"You were interviewed and you accepted your conduct had been improper. You prepared a letter of apology."

"Your career advanced without interruption and you were in due course advanced to senior position."

Background Information

At the investigation into the soldier's suicide, the coroner said military leadership pressured her to cease proceedings, and merely disclosed it to a superior officers "once details became known."

At the time, the accused was given a "minimal consequence discussion" with no further consequences.

The inquiry was further advised that mere weeks after the incident the soldier had also been subjected to "continuous bullying" by another soldier.

A separate service member, her superior officer, sent her over four thousand six hundred SMS communications confessing his feelings for her, along with a 15-page "personal account" outlining his "personal thoughts."

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Official Statement

The armed forces expressed it provided its "sincerest condolences" to Gunner Beck and her family.

"We will always be sincerely regretful for the shortcomings that were identified at the formal investigation in winter."

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