Former Lackland trainer receives 1-year sentence

Staff Sgt. Kwinton Estacio is led away from the 37th Training Wing Headquarters after sentencing in his trial at Joint Base San Antonio-Lackland on September 12, 2012. Staff Sgt. Kwinton Estacio is led away from the 37th Training Wing Headquarters after sentencing in his trial at Joint Base San Antonio-Lackland on September 12, 2012. Photo: Tom Reel, San Antonio Express-News Photo: Tom Reel, San Antonio Express-News Image 1 of / 3 Caption Close Former Lackland trainer receives 1-year sentence 1 / 3 Back to Gallery

A jury Wednesday evening handed a boot camp instructor 12 months in prison, reduction in rank to airman and a bad-conduct discharge after he pleaded guilty to having sex with a recruit under his command.

Betraying no emotion while standing, his hands clasped, Staff Sgt. Kwinton Estacio quickly left the courtroom after the trial ended. Neither his attorneys nor prosecutors would comment.

One of 17 basic training instructors who have been investigated for having illicit sexual contact with female trainees, he pleaded guilty to charges that could have landed him in a lockup for 13 years.

Things could have been much worse.

A jury earlier Wednesday found him not guilty of sexually assaulting a young female trainee identified as Airman 1, sparing him from facing another year of prison time. The charge was downgraded from sexual assault, which carried a maximum 30-year sentence.

If Estacio had been convicted of sexual assault or wrongful sexual contact, the Air Force would have been required to notify state officials so he could be placed on a sex-offender registry, said Lt. Col. Mark Hoover, an Air Force training command attorney.

Shortly after the verdict was read, Estacio gave a brief, emotional unsworn statement. He did not testify, and the defense called no witnesses.

“I wanted to apologize to the Air Force, to the MTI corps, my family and also to Airman (1),” he said, choking back tears. “I ask for your mercy. I know you don't have to give it, but I ask for it.”

The trial was the fourth at Joint Base San Antonio-Lackland since the Air Force late last year revealed a sex scandal on the base involving basic training instructors and recruits.

Only one of the instructors, Staff Sgt. Luis A. Walker, got a lengthy sentence. He was given 20 years earlier this summer for raping one trainee and having sexual contact with nine others. One other trainer went to jail for 30 days and another three months.

The Air Force so far has identified 39 trainees, all of them women, as victims in the scandal. There had been 43 as the week began, but the number fell after investigators determined that some had received text messages or phone calls that were not sexual in nature.

Estacio began the trial facing three charges and several specifications, the most serious of which alleged he sexually assaulted Airman 1 in a darkened supply room last October. The military judge, Lt. Col. Matthew Van Dalen, found him not guilty on that charge Tuesday after finding there wasn't enough evidence to support it.

The judge accepted the lesser charge of wrongful sexual contact, and jurors deliberated nearly five hours before finding him not guilty — a major victory for victory for the defense, which sought to show their client believed the woman consented to have sex.

Estacio pleaded guilty to violating an Air Education and Training Command rule prohibiting trainers from having personal relationships with trainees. He also admitted to meeting with two other trainers under investigation in violation of orders, and obstructing an Air Force investigation.

Defense attorney Mark O'Neil, an Air Force captain, opened his plea for a light sentence by conceding the end of Estacio's three-day trial “was not a good day for anyone.” But he argued the government's call to send Estacio to prison for four years and give him a dishonorable discharge, was too extreme.

That sentence would have branded Estacio among “the worst offenders” when there was a “whole person” to consider, one who had spent a decade in uniform, deployed three times and been a top-rated instructor with a family, O'Neil said.

“He is a federal convict for what he did,” O'Neil said. “He is a federal convict right now and will be for the rest of his life.”

But a prosecutor, Maj. Shaun Speranza, countered that prison time and a dishonorable discharge were fitting for Estacio, who lured the woman and a fellow airman to the supply room, where he and another trainer waited for them.

Estacio performed oral sex on Airman 1 while the other trainer, Staff Sgt. Craig LeBlanc, is accused of having intercourse. He goes on trial next month.

“He took full advantage of his position to use one of his trainees as a sex toy and he thought it was OK,” Speranza said, adding that Estacio “didn't think twice” about obstructing investigators.

Calling Estacio “selfish” and “dishonorable,” he said the ex-instructor failed to grasp that what he did was wrong, as shown by the fact that he told other accused instructors that he felt betrayed by the social isolation he faced after charges surfaced.

“He feels betrayed,” Speranza said, “because he got caught.”

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