I am a Surface Warfare Officer (SWO) for the United States Navy & I’m Blowing the Whistle on Our Toxic Work Culture
(This account was written and submitted to MLAA by the author, a U.S. Navy Surface Warfare Officer.)
September 2, 2024
I am a Surface Warfare Officer (SWO) for the United States Navy. I am speaking out about the hostile workplace and harmful culture still promoted by both the SWO community and by the Navy. During my first tour, I experienced social ostracism, harassment, and retaliation for reporting these problems. I saw leaders get away with trashing offices and calling subordinates derogatory names. I saw a victim of rape get mocked by her peers. I watched myself undergo a forcible mental health evaluation after filing a bullying/harassment complaint. I watched my world fall apart when no one believed me. I witnessed other officers mistreat, exploit, and discriminate against junior sailors.
For context, it must be understood that SWOs are billeted for a career path to eventually command ships, and these officers run entire departments and divisions and play an enormous role in the overall command climate aboard their ships. My story isn’t centered on sexual assault (though it’s part of my story) but on the abuses in authority, workplace hostility, and harassment from a Naval command that very intentionally fostered a target-rich environment for abusers.
I graduated at the top of my class, and I had the top Navy ship selection and excelled in all my Navy schools. I have years of work experience as a civilian, so I arrived to this warship ready to learn and genuinely excited about my new career in the Navy. But in the Navy is where I encountered some of the worst people I have ever met in my entire life.
Humiliated & “Disciplined” for Reporting Pay Issues
For the first three months of being in the Navy, I was not paid. Because it was during COVID, I had nowhere to go, no base, no family nearby to stay with. I wasn’t allowed to leave beyond 50 mi of my duty station, but I commissioned nowhere near a base with any resources I could take advantage of. My OIC—a SWO Lieutenant—kept claiming the pay issue would get fixed in 2 weeks, yet I had not filled out any forms for receiving an LES, so I had to pressure him multiple times to get this paperwork. I had just finished school and owed a hefty student loan payment (due to my age, I received no Navy benefits for school). I lived out of my car, and then eventually, I rented a tiny storage room in an old hotel downtown with community bathrooms and questionable neighbors. My room was approximately 7 ft x 11 ft with a tiny window in the top corner. For three months, I asked about my pay. I had even suggested that I get modified orders and sent to the main base in Norfolk, which had the administrative capacity to solve this issue. He refused and kept me in the dark about nearly everything. He was supposed to mentor me on transitioning to the Navy. I didn’t even know some of the customs and couldn’t even order my uniforms as I had no way of getting a CAC. At one point, I sent him a message saying, “Is this pay issue going to get fixed any time soon? It’s been three months, and I’ve been struggling to financially survive.” He immediately called me and said, in a cold, angry tone, that I should never talk to him that way ever again and scolded me as if I was at fault for demanding that he do his job. I had no idea who was in my chain of command. I barely knew how the Navy worked or who to call or what to do. I was in an area well over 8 hours from a Naval base and didn’t have the means or the permission, with COVID, to go to the closest station. Eventually, after constantly pressuring him and the retired chief at the school’s office, I got my paycheck with backpay, but my finances were screwed up for months after this. I had no government travel card because I had no address long enough to obtain one (and didn’t even know much about it). I had to use my personal credit card for the Navy PCS process, which involves a 5-month school pipeline for all SWOs that requires staying in Navy or approved commercial lodging at the government rate (about $100 per night). In other words, I was paying up to $15,000 to go through Navy schools with the promise that I’d be reimbursed (of course, reimbursement does not cover credit card interest and taxes).
After maxing out two credit cards, I arrived to my first ship overseas in a foreign country. My paycheck at this point dropped to $500. My entire chain of command was informed, but my workload was insanely busy, especially for a brand new ensign who had just showed up. Two months passed with my pay still being screwed up, and I started to get really frustrated and depressed because I had bills that I couldn’t pay and an apartment that was supposed to be covered by the Navy but was taking weeks and weeks to process. I expressed this to my department head when he kept dumping more and more tasks on my plate, yet I had received no update about my pay issue. I was irritable towards my upper chain of command, but I didn’t do anything illegal or inappropriate. The next day, he sat me down and gave me a counsel chit (which is like a writeup). It’s often punitive and purposed to “teach” you how to be better. This was infuriating. I wasn’t seeing any money coming in, yet I was in trouble for “muttering under my breath,” for flicking a pen onto a desk during a meeting, and for having a bad attitude. He said that back in 2013 the government almost shut down and that he almost didn’t get paid, but because he believed in serving the country and had the true Navy spirit, he would’ve happily still gone to work. He said, “Your work and pay have nothing to do with each other.” The fuck they don’t. You work to get paid. It doesn’t matter if you’re a patriot or not. No one works for free regardless of how patriotic they are. I started crying right in front of him, and I felt so disrespected to be branded unprofessional for demanding the pay issue get corrected without having a smile on my face. I had just uprooted my entire life to join the Navy overseas and was now in $15000 of debt as a result of a combination of piss-poor leadership and a confusing, bureaucratic change of station process.
I complained to the XO about the counsel chit, and, after I vented for several minutes about how unfair this was, he informed me that he was the one who told my DH to write the counsel chit. I felt sick. He had manipulated me into expressing my true feelings, which I would’ve refrained from doing if I had known he was in on me being disciplined. Then the XO said, “Better stop with the waterworks and look! Your LES says you’re getting $500 next month! That’s great!” He looked me directly in the eye as he said those words with a shit-eating grin on his face, knowing he was antagonizing me on purpose. This is a SWO cult thing—always be positive and have a good attitude. The reality is that officers are taught this “professional behavior” to shut people down when they make demands while lacing it with some bullshit Navy leadership mantra that sounds progressive and positive. For new ensigns in training, this type of thing is purposed to manipulate us into never complaining and taking the blame for everything. They want to gaslight officers into believing that remaining silent and positive about your problems is a sign of toughness or resiliency. I was told by a senior officer on that ship that my life would be easier and it would make me a better person if I just repeated to myself over and over: “Everything is my fault.” This was the beginning of what would be a living hell on that ship.
Hostile Environment, Bullying, & General Harassment
I was assigned as the Gunnery Officer, and I loved my sailors. I deeply loved them. They were (and still are) like my little brothers. When I first arrived to the division, they were incredibly distrustful of leadership and were difficult to win over. One of my goals was to ensure that they had a good quality of life outside of work. This means that I tried by best to give them healthy, reasonable working hours, ensuring that they would not be working late all the time or be regularly slammed with last-minute tasks at the end of the day, which was the norm with their previous leadership (and on the ship as a whole). They were very happy with me, and we accomplished a lot together.
But for 8 months, I was terrorized by a warrant officer who was the assistant to the department head. But he’s not really the problem. It’s the fact that no one did a fucking thing about him when I notified my chain of command that he was unprofessional, inappropriate, and hostile. This warrant screamed and yelled constantly, showed up to work hungover (possibly still drunk from the night before); he would throw things around the office in the presence of others, even causing damage to supplies or materials. He threatened me whenever I confronted him about his behavior, and he made one of my sailors cry on a regular basis simply because she wasn’t the most dependable sailor, which doesn’t justify terrorizing her or treating her with gross disrespect. He frequently tried to get my sailors and me to break safety protocols to quickly obtain the results desired by the chain of command, and he lied and did shady things to compensate for the Department Head’s incompetence. The DH was also bullied terribly by his peers, so I honestly felt sorry for him. There was a period of time in which we got along really well, and I was his “super divo.” He had big plans for me. All that changed.
I mourn these two relationships because at first the warrant was incredibly helpful to me, and I had even asked him to be my mentor. I admired his knowledge, and he taught me how to be a good division officer. I later realized this is a type of love-bombing. He deliberately won me over so that he could use me. Additionally, he was going through a divorce, and once his family moved away, he returned as almost a different person. He was always hungover and horribly unprofessional and short-tempered. He constantly slammed doors and stormed off over the smallest things. At first, I was empathetic and tolerated his behavior, but eventually I realized that there is no excuse for abusing others. It was like working with Dr. Jekyll/Mr. Hyde.
Frat Boy Culture & Rape in the Wardroom
On top of all this, I didn’t fit into the wardroom. In any other job, this wouldn’t matter, but for the SWOs, being part of the good ol’ boys club was crucial, though I didn’t know it at the time (and honestly really don’t care even now). I was a civilian for many years prior to joining the Navy and had a vast work history in a variety of different jobs, from the bottom to the top. It was difficult being around people 10 years younger than me—many of whom had never worked anywhere else. Essentially, many Naval officers come from privileged backgrounds, some with an entire military lineage, and are “bred” to be officers through whatever commissioning source they go through. Even as ensigns, they are given an enormous amount of authority and power over their personnel despite having never probably worked for minimum wage. Most of them don’t know what it’s like to survive on their own, living off paycheck to paycheck as was the case with myself, and some would make snotty comments towards the enlisted, who they looked down upon (i.e. “if you don’t like how things are, then you should’ve gone to college”—a comment one of the JO’s had said directly to his enlisted watchstanders). There was definitely a “frat boys” kind of vibe in the wardroom. Some of them had officer parents, and if they went to the Naval Academy, they had undergone even more brainwashing than what is typical in the military. I didn’t exactly fit in. I was extremely isolated. Not being part of the “in group” made it challenging to receive the training and knowledge I needed to pass boards. I had joined the Navy primarily to find a community of ship-drivers. It was disappointing and lonely. All these elements are important for understanding why the Navy cannot adequately address SA/SH, abuse, bullying, and hazing.
To paint a clearer picture of the wardroom, one of the female junior officers was sexually assaulted twice by another member of the wardroom. The perpetrator is unknown to me, but I was very uncomfortable in the wardroom after that. I had picked her up from the police station and then taken her to the hospital. The next day, I got chewed out by the warrant in my department because my LPO had added her to the muster report despite that she was absent. Sleep-deprived, I had completely missed it on the muster, and unable to produce an SIQ chit from medical or reveal what had happened to her, I argued with the warrant for over an hour on the phone and listened to him bitch me out. Are we to expect a rape victim to remember to send her SIQ chit to her boss the morning after a rape? Why didn’t the base hospital contact ship’s medical? Why wasn’t there a little bit of grace for my DH who honestly didn’t deserve to get yelled at by the CO? He wasn’t even privy to this information. Thankfully, the survivor didn’t get in trouble. She got qualified and transferred, but after she left, two JO’s gossiped about her on the bridge—making it seem funny that she got drunk on her birthday and ended up in the police station and hospital later. It disgusted me to realize that, while they may not have been fully aware of what happened to her, they had enabled the sexual assault as bystanders. That they were talking about it publicly on the bridge made me sick. I told them it was an inappropriate conversation, and, of course, this only further ostracized me from the wardroom. But having seen the condition she was in mentally and physically following the assault, I was sick with anger and disgust at several members of the wardroom. I didn’t want to eat with them and avoided the wardroom as much as possible. They just seemed so oblivious to the struggles and tragedies of those not as privileged or lucky as they were. And honestly, they really didn’t care to be better people, but “high quality” SWOs at this command were those who were the most “mission-oriented.” That was seen has having good character. How they treated other people was irrelevant.
Pressured to Endanger My Sailors
The warrant in my department was so aggressive with “getting results,” he’d frequently try to get my sailors to circumvent proper procedures to get the job done. The catch is that if they got caught, it would be them who would go up to Captain’s mast, not the warrant—not the one who told them to do it. On multiple occasions, he placed them in these uncomfortable, risky situations that were relatively minor, but there were a few incidents that could’ve resulted in serious injury, death, or, at the very least, career damage. He tried to force me and my sailors into an inaccessible, unauthorized space to retrieve a piece of damaged equipment. This space is not only supposed to be locked (this ship NEVER locked it), but it was legally considered a “confined space,” meaning that it had to be certified as safe for entry by a Gas Free Engineer. Of course, I didn’t know this at the time, but I knew we weren’t supposed to be in there if the corresponding GTG was running. I followed up with my sailors and verified that it was unsafe by checking with the EDO, who said we weren’t authorized to enter. So I informed my chain of command of this. They didn’t reply as it was a Saturday before we were going underway. However, on Monday morning, the warrant had retrieved the post (illegally dragging two random, unfortunate sailors into that dangerous space), and chewed me out, claiming I was a weak leader for not finding another way in. Let me be clear: there was no way to legally access that space, and I refused to endanger myself and my sailors over a worthless piece of admin centered on unused, irrelevant equipment. This task was, in no way, mission-critical or even slightly important in the scheme of things. We could’ve died, and I know that if I had asked those two sailors to enter that space with me, they would’ve done it. That’s how much they trusted me. That’s why the military hierarchy can be so easily misused. Those sailors had been subjected to textbook abuse before I arrived, and they trusted me to protect them when it came down to giving orders. I felt I had been manipulated by my chain of command to betray my sailors.
Incidents like that were regular and eventually made me feel unsafe, anxious, and depressed because my job ultimately is to protect my personnel—many of whom were incredibly young—and I was under constant pressure from my chain of command to jeopardize their safety, even if they didn’t say it outright. I also was making little progress on my SWO qualification. If you don’t get your qualification, you get fired, re-billeted, and/or kicked out of the Navy. Other people saw how this warrant behaved and knew he was toxic and had a drinking problem, but no one did anything. That’s what’s so disgusting. No one did a damn thing. He can’t claim ignorance, like he simply didn’t know that what he was doing was illegal, as someone who’d been in the Navy for 20 years. He 100% was aware of his actions. He truly is a danger to personnel and has never been corrected because he gets the chain their results. The issue isn’t him alone—it’s the fact that the Navy organization continues to enable people who operate like him.
Forced to Lie & Hindered on Qualification Process
On another occasion, I routed a piece of admin that documented operational defects on equipment that was still usable with specific conditions and safeties in place. However, as it was routed, my chain of command revised and edited so many things that the document was no longer technically accurate, and it flat-out lied about the status of the equipment. It was one of my junior sailors who saw this, and he was very upset and explained the inaccuracies to me. He said that this sheet of paper was the only thing between him and Captain’s Mast. If something were to go wrong, it would be the division that would get into trouble, not the officers who screwed up the documentation. Agreeing with him, he and I both argued with the warrant, who refused to reroute an accurately written document because it would make the department head look incompetent in front of the CO. I feel like I really let down my sailors in caving to the warrant’s demands. I should have fought harder and talked to the XO, but, based on previous interactions, I knew the XO was part of the problem. I was scared to make waves even if it was the right thing to do.
Multiple times, both the warrant and my DH inhibited my progress on my qualification. For example, I had a meeting set up with another JO to go over ATTWO scenarios for my qualification, and the warrant got into a long argument with me over this—literally harassing me on the phone regarding information, data, updates. He had his claws in me so deep that I couldn’t just turn off my phone and walk away. I had to constantly respond to him within minutes, or else he’d threaten me. On another occasion, I had sought advice from a female LCDR for finding time to work on my qualifications. She told me to set some boundaries and notify my department head of when I’d be participating in trainings. I did what she said and sent an email that was like, “Sir, I plan to work on my Team Leader qualification between 1000-1100 on Tuesday and my ATTWO qualification between 1400-1500 on Thursday. My chief can be contacted for matters of the division during this time, but if you have an emergency, feel free to reach me.” My DH freaked out when he saw this message and told me, “This is not how we do business. I am going to speak to the SWO about this.” I literally was being prevented from going to trainings, which, in turn, caused me to get behind on my qualification.
“Redistributed” for Reporting Harassment & Unsafe Conditions
Finally, the warrant had another temper tantrum during our morning meeting and chewed out one of my sailors (he always singled her out, in particular), and she broke down into tears. She hadn’t done anything to justify this level of hostility, and I told her so. Angered that I had undermined him, the warrant flung up his hands and stormed out, slamming the door. This was witnessed by my Department Head and DLCPO. I forcefully said, “I do not like how he treats me or my sailors. He is inappropriate and unprofessional.” And my Department Head replied, “Well, you can talk to the CMEO or the Chaplain, but that guy gets me results.” Then he left, and I started sobbing. This leader—who was supposed to be my mentor and have my back—was basically telling me that the CMEO and the chaplain were a joke, and that as long as he got what he wanted, he didn’t care who got hurt or damaged in the process. Both these men had oversight over the well-being of their subordinates but rarely demonstrated any true care, mentorship, or healthy, professional interactions. His goal, as is the case with many officers, was to get a nice, little pat on the back from his CO and make himself look good and advance his career. If people truly cared about the “Navy mission,” then personnel well-being would be the focus.
My DLPCO consoled me and explained that this warrant treats me and everyone like shit and that I should tell the XO and CO about this. Because of how my pay issue was handled and the overall atmosphere of the wardroom, I didn’t trust that the command would side with me. So the DLCPO told the CMC about the hostile environment in the weapons department. The next day, I was unexpectedly pulled in the XO’s office where he interrogated me about how I was not getting along with the warrant or the DH. I described to him the situation, and he was defensive and accused me of being insubordinate. He referenced an incident in which I had refused to remove my paper tray from the weapons office. The DH was upset that the office was messy and threw out all my study notes, my administrative documents, the stuff I needed to route, everything onto the floor. He said he was tired of the clutter and told me to claim a file cabinet, but when I placed my work documents into a file cabinet, the warrant ripped them all out and threw a bunch of my things away. I was constantly being pushed around and bullied like this, and I was fed up, so I had collected my documents, placed them in a paper tray, and put them back on the desk where I worked. It was petty, but I was ultimately trying to stand up for myself. So when the XO was saying I was insubordinate, he was referring to the above paper tray incident. He threatened me with the UCMJ over a stupid paper tray in response to me reporting an unsafe work environment in which leadership was throwing heavy objects, pressuring me to risk my sailors’ lives, forcing me to lie and break rules to accomplish tasks, etc. He replied, “He [the warrant] is trying to help you! And you’re here complaining about him! You’re an unqualified ensign!” as if to say “who do you think you are?” Being an unqualified ensign doesn’t mean I deserve harassment and disrespect and a dangerous environment. He claimed that I had brought all of this upon myself by being confrontational. Standing up for myself and trying to follow safety procedures isn’t confrontational. He continued, “Even if there are problems with the warrant, can you not take the good things from his leadership and learn?” and I said, “Yes, but I have the right to walk away from him too. I don’t have to engage with him if he’s going to be disrespectful to me.”
At this point, I told him I didn’t feel safe or respected at work and hoped that it would click—that using such precise language would suddenly make him think, “Oh, she’s reporting harassment, and that’s illegal, so I’ll do something about it.” But no.
I was then forced to speak to the CO. The XO had slandered me, so the CO, without clearly knowing any details, claimed I was insubordinate and didn’t like “being told what to do.” He said I had a reputation for “siding with the sailors.” It’s not about siding with the sailors. It’s about doing what’s right, and often times, the sailors were right. Every good leader should take feedback from their subordinates. I described to him what the warrant did on that morning where he made a female sailor cry and how the DH had responded by saying he didn’t care as long as he “got results.” I was conveying a situation that any normal, reasonable person would deem to be a hostile environment full of harassment and inappropriate behavior. Instead, he said, “You know what I think? You just don’t like how WEPS [DH] runs his department. And you’re not doing your job.” The Senior Watch Officer was there and said, “I know it’s easy to run with the sailors and treat the Department Head like the ‘big, bad wolf,’ but the sailors will hide behind you and suck the life out of you.” It was such a disgusting comment. Every officer should view their enlisted personnel as people to care for and members of their team and community. The statement was so dehumanizing that it changed my entire perspective of that officer and of the wardroom. I felt deeply ashamed to be an officer then. I said, “I have been told over and over that I’m a good division officer, so this is the first time I’m hearing that I’m not doing my job.” And the SWO replied with, “Well, if you aren’t following orders, then you aren’t doing your job.” Were these people deaf? Were they not listening to anything? I do not have to follow unlawful orders. It became very clear to me then that my entire chain of command was trying to intimidate me and keep me silent on their borderline criminal behavior. Towards the end of the conversation, the CO asked, “Do you even want to be here?” as if I was causing trouble due to some inner dissatisfaction with my choices. If someone reports harassment to you, and you reply with “do you even want to be here?” that’s victim-blaming. It’s a means to silence someone. It’s a refusal to take meaningful action to address the real problem.
After that conversation, I was removed from the division and placed into a fake, made-up job with no sailors or interaction with anyone. I felt like I was just being thrown into a padded room to do busy work. I didn’t even have any work to do, and I had to invent work for myself. It was humiliating, and it only exacerbated the ostracism from the other junior officers who had “real” jobs. Rumors were flying, and my former sailors knew I had been fired for rocking the boat. When I announced I was being moved out of the division, my sailors cried and were incredibly upset by what happened because they knew that I was no longer there to protect them, and we loved each other. I cared for them so much that it hurts now just writing all this down. It has been almost 2 years since this happened, but there isn’t a day that I don’t wake up in the morning and think about them and what happened. There was no evidence that I had not been doing my job. In fact, it was quite the opposite. The DH had considered me his star divo throughout the summer and had plans for me to take over a warfare area, which was usually reserved for Second Tour Division Officers. He was trying to get me into Tomahawk school too, but the warrant shut that down, claiming he was looking out for me, but the reality was that he didn’t want to be stuck doing MY work while I was in school developing knowledge. The CO and XO claimed I was removed as GUNNO for my “safety,” but the truth is that they didn’t like how I was documenting the illegal activities and feared for THEIR careers. Both the warrant and the DH should have been disciplined and forced to change their behaviors. By removing me, neither one of them had to do anything differently. Their behaviors, if anything, got worse, based on what my formers sailors had told me. Why was my job the one in jeopardy? I hadn’t actually done anything illegal or wrong. Yet over and over, it was my career that was threatened and ultimately damaged for taking a stand against dangerous people.
Favoritism Towards Junior Officers
One day, while in a liberty port, one of my former sailors from CG communicated his anger about what he had witnessed officers doing in port illegally. I confided in a trusted chief—my DLCPO—about this, and he was very alarmed, saying that he had to tell the CMC because officers drinking while on duty could get the entire Triad fired. He ended up reporting this, and the XO chewed him out. I don’t know what happened during this conversation, but that chief was never the same. He spent his last two months on board in silence, not caring about anyone. He had always been so loved by everyone, and he had always cared about the well-being of the sailors. He just didn’t care anymore. Then I was dragged into the XO’s office where he wanted to know who accused who of what. I wasn’t willing to give out the sailor’s name because I knew he’d experience retaliation and that the junior officers wouldn’t get disciplined at all. I was threatened, for the second time, with Mast, as he claimed that me not reporting such information was a violation of the UCMJ. I told him I had reported it to my chain of command—the DLCPO. I later apologized to this chief, knowing that it was partially my fault he had been beaten down. No one could touch the precious wardroom, and the XO had questionable relationships with some of the JO’s, even inviting two of them over to his house to drink with him while his wife was away. Officers frequently violated liberty rules while in liberty ports, and so did enlisted, but the issue is that only the enlisted got caught and sent up to Mast. One of the officers even showed up 40 minutes late to duty, missed turnover, and returned without a required liberty buddy and didn’t face any disciplinary action. Everyone saw him walking up the brow during turnover, and they all turned a blind eye. But if a junior sailor had done that, they would’ve gone up to Mast.
Discrimination Against Female Junior Sailors
While in Combat Systems in my fake job, we had a new Combat Electronics Division Officer who allegedly suffered a mental breakdown. I do not know the details of that situation, but it seemed very convenient for the command to get rid of her since she was struggling to adjust. She ended up filing an IG complaint, but, honestly, if you are administratively separated, the IG is even less effective than if you were still attached to the military. The military loves using “Adjustment Disorder” as a reason to get rid of women, in particular, and usually those women suffered from harassment, assault, bullying, etc. Anyway, I took over as the new CE divo, and I immediately clicked with the sailors. We did excellent on a huge inspection and were even acknowledged by the Department Head—CSO (the Senior Watch Officer who had been present at the above meeting with the CO). Of course, it was hell working for this man. He once manipulated us into working on a Saturday, for example, but then didn’t even show up. For a leader to have an entire division work on a Saturday and not be there with us says so much about what snooty garbage he truly is. I tolerated this, however, because it’s not like I had a choice, but it made my job harder. I also got figuratively punched in the face for routing a sailor’s leave during the inspection. With support from my chief, I had added a special circumstances “buck slip” into the leave chit—something we were told we could do if someone wanted leave during an inspection. I had already had the discussion with the sailor that it probably wasn’t going to get approved, and he was fine with it. I was going to try anyway. Well, I was scolded for this, and CSO was like, “Now I have to look like the bad guy for saying ‘no,’” and boohoo. He gets paid a 6-figure stipend to be a DH. I don’t care about his hurt feelings. Plus, all anyone had to do was mark “no” on the chit. That’s it. But apparently, it wasn’t enough to deny the sailor the leave; the CO had to leave gratuitous notes on the chit, claiming his time was wasted and that our focus needed to be on the inspection. And then the XO had this long conversation about how wrong it was for me to route the chit. But then the CO ended up approving this sailor’s leave, so I wrote him a “thank you” note and put it into his box as a professional courtesy. That led to another really uncomfortable conversation in which I was accused of trying to “curry favor” from the sailors and that he was disturbed that I “sided with the sailors.” You would’ve thought the guy believed I was going to commit mutiny. Well, these small situations foreshadowed what was to come.
My division suffered some enormous, unexpected losses due to health issues and disqualifications—nothing that anyone could prevent. It put a significant amount of strain on us at first, but we were still doing okay and on top of our maintenance. However, it appeared CSO and our sleezy, new DLCPO (I’ll call him CSMM) were panicking over the future without any solution or real justification. They were just suddenly really hard on me, and I don’t know why. They wouldn’t say what was not getting done or what the issue was. We were still completing our tasks just as we had been during the inspection (and EVERY division is behind on something; it’s just the way it is on a forward-deployed ship). But they were caught up in appearances. For instance, if I allowed my division to leave at 1400, they freaked out. This is a SWO thing—that if your people complete their worklist early, then you’re supposed to add more work to their list. That’s shitty leadership, because people want to be rewarded for their work. If you continuously add more work to the worklist, your people aren’t going to put in any effort into completing it, knowing that you’re not going to let them go home afterwards.
On top of that, one of my sailors lost a family member, and she took emergency leave. When she returned, she was obviously depressed. After a lot of discussions with the HMC and the sailor, we agreed she’d be safe and functional just doing maintenance. I very deliberately gave her a light workload. Plus, she was transferring in less than 2 months. My LPO and I had encouraged her to just focus on her packout and on making arrangements to transfer, which, while overseas, is quite a time sink. We didn’t need her that much in the division anymore and had already filled her role.
CSO and CSMM then started constantly bothering me and my chief about how she’s not doing enough work. We had her work covered down by other members of the division, so their obsession with her was purely out of principle. They also believed that since she had gone to the funeral, that her grieving was over and that she needed to suck it up and go back to working. At one point, CSMM took a picture of her in her civilian clothes in the afternoon and sent it to me as if he had caught her in the act of skating home early from work. I was annoyed and told him I had let her go home early and that he needed to back off. CSMM was supposed to be mentoring and helping the sailors and helping me negotiate with the department head. But he was just CSO’s little henchman and was notorious for flirting with female chiefs and junior sailors. One of my sailors had even described him as a “fuck boy” with his slicked back hair. Both CSO and CSMM kept saying things like, “Time for your sailors to earn their paychecks,” and “you have no oversight over your division.” But none could produce any evidence that we weren’t getting work done. I produced weekly documentation of all our tasks (which I doubt they even read). They just were unhappy that I gave my sailors an opportunity to have a life outside of work by letting them go home at a reasonable time. We stayed late only when necessary. After being on deployment where you’re working 24-7, you don’t get that time back. I was doing my best to give them time at home while completing tasks.
One of my sailors had an unexpected pregnancy, and she was extremely concerned about her privacy and was worried the ship would think she was a “shitbag” for getting pregnant since there is a sexist navy stereotype about women deliberately getting pregnant to get out of deployment. My chief and I reassured her that we would maintain her privacy. When we told CSO, he responded with disgust and accused another sailor of impregnating her, even launching an investigation, which went nowhere, of course. Then he told the pregnant sailor’s watchbill coordinator to remove her from the duty section and made a throat-slicing gesture with his hand, saying, “She’s done.” So when the sailor discovered she had been removed from duty without any warning, she freaked out and was in tears. Then the CSO publicly blurted out her medical status during a department meeting and then again in the CSMC (a public space for conducting tagouts, maintenance, etc.). This was after I had warned him no less than three times, including sending him two emails stating that the sailor was extremely upset by the disrespect towards her privacy. So the CSO begrudgingly put her back into her duty section, and the sailor, by this time, was so upset, that she was trying to get clearance from her doctor to get removed from the ship. The CSMM then said to her, “You’re just trying to get out of duty!”
She ended up filing a CMEO complaint against the CSO. This was straight-up pregnancy discrimination. But all he got was a little slap on the wrist.
Mental Health, Bullying, and Reprisal
Shortly after, I received a counsel chit regarding “how the military works” and concerns I had listed on my FPC. The FPC is a document on which every person aboard the ship writes a list of their stressors and a list of their resources; it’s purposed to be a tool leaders use to help someone struggling with personal problems like divorce, death, finances, bullying, etc. On my FPC, I had brought up “fear of reprisal” and “fear of losing sailors” and “bullying/ostracism from the wardroom” and “lack of support on my qualifications” and “command climate.” All these things were true. It was ballsy for me to do it, but I was so fucking sick of it. I was extremely stressed out by the horrible environment and watching my sailors suffer too. They were like family to me. It made me ache to see them cry or want to leave the ship due to how they were treated. Nothing had changed in the command despite how vocal I had been about the issues, and I had been accused of creating an “us versus them” environment by defending the sailors. To top it off, one of my sailors had been sexually harassed by two chiefs—one of them being the HMC, and one being the CSMM. Only the HMC was fired after sending her sexual messages. There wasn’t enough evidence to fire the CSMM.
During this “counseling” with CSO and CSMM (and another junior officer present as a witness) I was told I had PTSD from being in the weapons department. PTSD is a medical diagnosis that can lead to disqualification from military service without benefits. This alarmed me significantly, since the CSO was not a doctor, and I definitely had not been diagnosed. This condition is not on my medical record. I didn’t draw attention to this issue specifically but discussed that the command climate was a serious problem, and CSO said it wasn’t fair for me to list all these negative things on my FPC if I hadn’t talked to him about it. I replied that he was one of the sources of the issues and that I didn’t trust him and that he contributed to the environment. I told him that how officers treated enlisted personnel at this command was shameful and upsetting and that it made me not want to be an officer. I felt disgusted with the expectations for how I was supposed to treat my own personnel. I was then berated for the next 40 minutes over my mental health concerns. I felt cornered—like I had no witnesses for myself, no one there to support me. The CSO was angry that I hadn’t attended a CREDO group therapy event that he had recommended to me (a check in the box to claim he had tried to help me). I am not religious, and the last thing I needed was to spend my entire weekend at a religious-based group therapy event when what I needed was a better work environment with support and friendship. I had every right not to go, and no one can force someone to go to something like that. In an attempt to get him off my back, I told him I was seeing a civilian therapist I had known for years. He zeroed in on this and claimed that I should see a military therapist, and then he ordered me to make an appointment with the Mental Health Evaluator, who was a former SWO and not a licensed therapist. She was the waterfront entity who branded personnel as “fit for duty.” Anything you say to her is NOT confidential and will be sent to the CO. I argued with him, but he ordered me to make the appointment by a specific date and that the appointment had to be before another specific date. This is super controlling, abusive behavior, and it’s not legal for a DH to order another officer to get a mental health evaluation. I was being treated like a mental patient in a hospital. I told him I wasn’t crazy, and, of course, by saying that while being really emotional and worn down, I sounded crazy. He was calm and even smiled despite I had asked numerous times to leave the meeting and was distressed and uncomfortable. He scooted his chair up super close to me and got in my face where he whispered, “You’re a Surface Warfare Officer, and sometimes you have to have uncomfortable conversations.” His tone and body language were threatening. I felt sick and upset. Even though I was on the verge of crying as I left the room, he was completely calm and unfazed and said “thank you, Ms. [my name]” over and over again, following closely behind me, demanding that I acknowledge him. Everything about that meeting was sickening. An MHE goes on my medical record permanently and can lead to discharge. It was clearly an attempt to get rid of me for being vocal about the discrimination against the pregnant sailor and for producing documentation of the illegal actions I observed. I wish I could convey just how disturbing it was to see his facial expressions. It was like he was sexually getting off from hurting and dominating me. He got pleasure from this—the way he smiled and looked at me. He genuinely enjoyed seeing me getting knocked down several pegs.
I filed a CMEO complaint the next day, in tears and so fearful for my career, while he went on leave and posted on his Facebook a reading recommendation “Working with Difficult People” as if to jab me. Fuck him and fuck the Navy.
Treated Like a Criminal
I told the new XO that my DH had made me uncomfortable. The XO, still fairly new to the command, was genuinely compassionate, but he seemed fixated on me seeing a military therapist too, claiming that a civilian therapist wouldn’t understand. I felt like my chain of command was trying to weaponize the military mental health system to have me removed from the ship. The Mental Health Evaluation (MHE) is purposed to provide an avenue for people who are in danger of committing suicide or homicide. It is not supposed to be used to get rid of people you don’t like.
There is no acknowledgement at this command, or by the Navy as a whole, that harassment, abuse of authority, or hostile work environment leads to mental health issues. If you seek help after experiencing the above, especially if you’re an officer, your career is ruined. I saw 3 department heads get fired for doing the above after being treated like shit from their CO. The Navy seeks to compartmentalize everything into a neat box. While there is acknowledgement that sexual assault is a problem and comes with adverse mental health consequences for survivors, Navy leaders fail to recognize the shipboard ingredients that led to the assault. They treat all incidents as if they occur in vacuum, devoid of the larger context of the command climate, the social dynamics involved, or the lack of effective policies and definitions and trainings that address workplace hostility. They are pointlessly concerned that ordering sailors to do work would cause them to be accused of promoting a hostile environment. None of that is true obviously.
I was removed from Combat Systems and placed in another fake job, this time in Engineering. It was basically a secretarial job, purely administrative. I had no sailors and almost no interaction with a chain of command. It was demeaning work and led to further ostracism. I also was banned from Combat Systems spaces. This is crazy because I hadn’t committed a crime. CSO, on the other hand, was under investigation for no less than 5 complaints at the time, and CSMM was under investigation for sexual harassment. CSMM was positioned as acting CMC while being investigated when the actual CMC went on leave—to give you an idea of how “great” this environment was. And CSO was eventually made acting XO, also while under multiple investigations. I got onto a computer in a Combat Systems space to transfer some files and PSTs to computers in engineering, and the CSMM kicked me out of the space, saying I wasn’t allowed in there without an escort. I was being treated like a suspected terrorist.
Nonetheless, a few of the other junior officers—the nice ones—finally seemed to notice and acknowledge that there was a problem on the ship and how I was being treated was not fair. They helped me with my qualifications, so that is the only positive thing that came of being moved to engineering. I sobbed when I was removed from CE division. I can’t believe that the command would do this AGAIN. These people truly believed they could do whatever they wanted to me. Please bear in mind that I was not under investigation, I wasn’t being accused of a crime, I hadn’t actually broken any rules or policies. All I had done was say the command climate was a problem and that sailors should be treated better. This wasn’t for my safety or wellbeing. They seemed to think that by treating me like I was crazy and a threat to the ship that it would make it real somehow. Once I realized what they were doing, I forced myself to go stone cold, as much as I could, just to get through my tour.
I continued to progress on my qualification and was on the final stretch. I was standing watch as an under-instruct for Officer of the Deck. The over-instruct gave me directions for calling and talking to the CO. I was immediately yelled at, so after the phone call, I was incredibly upset and told the OOD that the CO didn’t want me on board the ship and didn’t want me to succeed. The OOD was very new, so he didn’t want to deal with the drama and dismissed me from the bridge because he could tell I needed a breather and space. I can’t say I blame him, but I definitely wasn’t in a good state of mind overall after experiencing everything that had happened. I actually had a license to drive ships and was comfortable on the bridge normally. However, I was extremely uncomfortable communicating with a CO who had done nothing but dismiss my harassment and bullying complaints and then was continuously hostile to me. Afterwards, we pulled into port, and since I was on duty, I went to get armed up for my quarterdeck watch and the Duty Armorer said he couldn’t. I didn’t understand why or what was going on and asked the Section Leader about it. He was one of the CMEOs and well-aware of my complaint but told me to go talk to the accused about it, offhandedly mentioning the “friction” between us. It turns out I had been placed on the “Do Not Issue” (DNI) list, which meant I wasn’t allowed to have firearms. This is for people (1) who had gone up to Captain’s Mast and were on restriction, (2) who were suicidal, or (3) who were a danger to others. Then I was called into the CO’s cabin with several department heads where the CO said I had made bridge watchstanders uncomfortable with my comments and that he was forcing me to get a Mental Health Evaluation (MHE) to see if I was fit for duty. I said, “[The Warrant] and CSO made me uncomfortable but they weren’t forced to get MHEs.”
You have to understand that this is an enormous overreaction to me simply having an attitude. Emergency MHEs are for people who have threatened to kill someone or themselves. They are for situations in which the CO legitimately thinks someone will cause serious harm. All I had done was tell the OOD that the CO was always shitty to me no matter what I did and then left the bridge as an Under-Instruct (not a qualified watchstander). But I was treated like an insider threat—a person who was going to commit a mass shooting or sabotage.
So while in a liberty port, I was forced to have this virtual meeting with the MHE, and I asked her about confidentiality; of course, she wouldn’t give me an answer, so I told her that I thought this whole session was reprisal. I didn’t lie to her about my feelings, but I was careful with my words. And during this meeting, the CO leaned against the door to ensure I was at this meeting, as if I was a fucking prisoner who would try to run away. Then he went out and enjoyed his drinking and eating and partying. If he truly was concerned about how “dangerous” I was, then he wouldn’t have gone out and had fun. He facilitated this situation to make me look and feel crazy, and I was beginning to believe him. During this “appointment,” it was obvious she had been prepped about the context, and she brought up questions too specific for her not to have been in the know on my situation. She had even asked me about why I didn’t eat in the wardroom, and, being a smartass, I replied, “Do you want to eat with your boss every meal, every day?”
Obviously, the MHE deemed me fit for duty, much to the dismay of my CO who was clearly trying to get me kicked off the ship so that he could tell the wardroom and the crew that he’s a really good, caring guy who got me the help I needed just in time. Even the other JO’s who caught wind of this thought the CO’s decision to treat me this way was insane. The CO demanded to know what I wanted. He asked this question with fury and frustration, like I was driving him mad. I told him that I wanted acknowledgement that what CSO and the warrant had done to me was wrong and to know I could report a crime or harassment or any other protected communication up my chain of command and NOT experience reprisal. We argued over what was considered “hostile environment.” He said that he was allowed to throw things as long as these objects didn’t hit me. This pissed me off. In the CMEO instruction, throwing things would fall under “threatening and intimidating behaviors.” I told him so. He attempted to gaslight me by claiming that I just hadn’t adjusted to the military environment (subtly trying to cite “Adjustment Disorder” again). By constantly bringing up my civilian background, he was attempting to damage my credibility and deem me “unreasonable”—something that could render a CMEO complaint ineffective.
You can’t fucking tell me that I can waltz into someone’s space and start hurling books and binders while screaming expletives and threats, that this is perfectly acceptable behavior becoming of a professional commissioned officer. You can’t convince me that I’m allowed to do this in front of a group of anxious junior sailors and that if I disagree, then I’m crazy and have a mental disorder for believing no one should be subjected to those behaviors. At this meeting, I was told I was hostile and difficult to work with (a tactic users abuse is to reverse the accusations onto the victim). I replied, “My sailors don’t think I’m difficult to work with,” and he said, “Well, this isn’t a popularity contest and that won’t get you a good FITREP.” As if I spend my entire existence at work trying to get a good FITREP, but the reality is that many SWOs operate in this manner. They care more about their careers than about their personnel. Then the CO asked, “Are you happy here?” as if the problem was me—that I was just depressed and mentally ill and, therefore, creating all these situations. I was unhappy because of the bullying and harassment and gaslighting I had experienced. The culmination of everything above was the direct cause of my depression, but I wasn’t dangerous, suicidal, or unable to do my job. There was no evidence to suggest I was not fit for duty and, therefore, the force ordered MHE was not justified. He proceeded to guilt-trip, claiming he was spending oh-so much time on me and giving me all this undeserved attention (none of which I wanted). He said I was entitled for wanting to know whether or not the harassment and bullying I reported was addressed and even tried to claim it was the same process in the civilian world, which is laughable because he’s been a Navy brat his whole life and wouldn’t possibly know how world outside of the military operates. A victim of a crime seeking accountability is not entitlement even in a military setting.
At this point, I filed a whistleblower complaint through the IG because I didn’t just fear for my military career, I feared more for my civilian career. What would happen to me if I was institutionalized in the military mental healthcare system? What would that mean for my opportunities in the civilian world?
Ineffective IG Process
Here’s the thing about the IG, they’ll essentially just tell your command to back off. They picked up the investigation immediately. It was enough for me to finish getting qualified and then transfer early to a much better command for my second tour. But the IG is ineffective overall when it comes to accountability. My investigation is still ongoing and it’s been a year. They allow investigations to rot in their “review” stage for years and years so that the victims separate or retire eventually without ever receiving justice. I strongly believe the IG does this intentionally. While investigating my reprisal case, they said that the documentation I had sent them was more related to hostile environment and that they could only investigate reprisal in this situation. I said that it was impossible to investigate reprisal without investigating hostile environment. Like everything else in the Navy, the IG compartmentalizes complaints into a vacuum, ignoring all the ingredients that led to the problem. It was very frustrating explaining how I had experienced reprisal because the investigator asked, “Well, how is this reflected on your FITREP? That’s what we need in order to substantiate the claim.” I wasn’t going to get a FITREP for another 9 months! Also, why wasn’t being removed from my job after reporting harassment and filing a CMEO complaint not considered reprisal?
I attempted to get the other JO’s to corroborate my statements as they had revealed to me a lot of disturbing threats and things that the CSO had done to them personally. They never came forward, so it just made me look like a liar when I brought this up. In the meantime, I gave SAPR trainings as a VA that half the officers—including the CSO—didn’t attend.
Reprisal for Appealing CMEO Complaint
The CMEO process is managed by and filtered through the CO, which makes it completely ineffective if the subject of your complaint is in your chain of command. He deemed my complaint “unsubstantiated” and didn’t take it seriously. Multiple voluntary witness statements, documented evidence, and emails were not submitted with the complaint. Furthermore, the complaint is supposed to be processed within 60 days. Legal and the Command Climate Specialist held onto the complaint for 5 months! They didn’t respond to any inquiries, nor did they tell us that the complaint was missing documentation. The investigation was also not carried out in accordance with the Navy instruction. The investigator was not only the same rank as the accused, but she was his peer. She was the same billet, and they frequently talked to each other via email about professional matters. She was his colleague. This was an enormous conflict of interest, and the investigator is supposed to be a superior officer to the accused. Legal and the CMEO even acknowledged this, but it had no bearing on the outcome of the investigation because the CO gets to call all the shots. The ISIC (above him), knowing this, never stepped in and overrode him. No one gave a shit that this investigation was a farce. I received the unsatisfactory results of the complaint, and so I appealed it and wrote a very scathing statement about how the CO had deliberately corrupted the investigation. The day after I submitted the appeal, I received a Letter of Instruction, telling me I was in danger of being “non-obtained” (kicked out of the Navy for not getting qualified). This letter also tried to compare me to the OOD involved in the Fitzgerald accident, which is a horrible, career-ruining comparison. Just to be clear—the CO had publicly announced what a great job I had been doing on all our evolutions as OOD under instruction. I had been praised by watchstanders as well. I told the CO that this LOI conflicts with his statements. Furthermore, I received the LOI after failing an OOD board with the Second Tour Officers. This is not a “real” board. Most people fail this board because it’s purposed to prepare for the board with the Department Heads and the CO. I received a counsel chit for failing this board twice (also totally normal), and it was cited in my LOI. That a practice board could be used against me is egregious. What’s the point of a practice board if it’s considered real? The LOI was issued to me for reaching my 18th month without an OOD letter. Another JO was in the same situation as me (but wasn’t ever bullied or harassed), yet he received no LOI. I added this LOI to the IG complaint for review and eventually, I got qualified as OOD. Never in my life had I ever been considered a dangerous or unsafe bridge watchstander or ship-handler. Prior to the Navy, I had excellent reviews from captains and mates. Even the CO of this ship had to admit I knew how to run a bridge and drive a ship. A month later, I was notified my appeal was still not substantiated, so I filed my second and final appeal. I’m still awaiting results, and it’s been almost a year.
Nothing will come of it. I will receive no justice. The CSO was eventually spot-promoted to Commander. During his final days at the command, at a promotion ceremony for two junior officers, he said to them, “I better not hug you or else Ms. [my name] will report me.” He said this loud enough for everyone in the wardroom to hear, including the CO. No one intervened, no one corrected him, no one shut him down. This is a man who had multiple bullying/EO complaints filed against him. Mocking me publicly only proved my complaint right, but none of it would ever matter. I didn’t even tell the IG because, as far as the IG was concerned, if it’s not on my FITREP, then it’s not reprisal despite the damage done to my career, my reputation, my lack of safety, the persistent ostracism from the wardroom. Your CO can try to ruin your life, but I guess if he didn’t write, “You suck” on your FITREP, then the IG will never substantiate your claims. Also, the amount of bullying and harassment I experienced certainly would slow me down and would affect my FITREP in a way that isn’t visible to others. FITREPs for unqualified junior officers are based almost purely on qualifications. So the effects of reprisal simply aren’t obvious on paper.
Sexual Assault: Who Cares?
Right before I transferred (6 months early), I got so sick that I had to go to the (new) HMC. This was the first time I’d been sick enough to have to visit the ship’s doc. While checking my heartbeat, he groped my breast…hard. It wasn’t just brushing up against it or accidentally grazing it. He grabbed it and squeezed with his fingers as if to help position his stethoscope. No one else was in the room, and I remember thinking, “I’ve had this test done hundreds of times since childhood. Not one doctor or nurse has grabbed my tit during this test.” I just didn’t care. I was so worn down and so tired and knew no one would believe me that I didn’t say anything. I was bigger and stronger than him. I could’ve beaten the shit out of him as I have done with men who’ve tried that with me in the past, but then I would’ve been kicked out of the Navy because why would this command support me? To them, I was the “boy who cried wolf.” I was crazy and a pathological liar and insubordinate and allegedly suffering from PTSD (though no such medical diagnoses exist on my record). A part of me knew HMC was aware of my MHE, and, therefore, he knew I had less credibility and that’s why he sneaked in his little violation of my body, like I was just this ragged thing that no one important cared about, that I was now fair game since the system had failed me. I was nothing to the command. If I accused him, he’d just bring up my MHE. I have sailors who would’ve killed him if they knew. I wonder how many other sailors he’s harassed and assaulted throughout his career under the noses of toxic commands who brag about not having any harassment reports and believing that silence is a good thing.
The biggest myth in the Navy SWO community is that keeping silent while your chain of command terrorizes you makes you tough and resilient—that by enduring it, you’re a true SWO with the poise and strength to lead. No, it makes you a fucking coward. It makes you the opposite of everything military service is supposed to stand for. Succumbing to the pressure to join in on the bullying of enlisted personnel and of the JO’s who fail to fall into line doesn’t make you strong. It makes you a shitbag. Not a single fucking officer intervened and said to me, “What they’re doing to you is wrong and illegal. I will help you. I will stand with you.” Not a goddamned fucking officer called out the chain of command and said that it was wrong to discriminate against a pregnant sailor, that it was wrong to endanger personnel to get results, that enlisted personnel should be treated with respect and care. Maybe if I had gotten drunk with the wardroom and made myself “cool,” then it would have been different. I didn’t have anyone looking out for me, so I had to be that officer who looked out for my sailors. I tried to give them everything this command refused to give me. You know who stood up for me in the end? The enlisted. Do you know who corroborated my statements? The enlisted. Do you know who gave me unending support and community and loyalty? The enlisted. My sailors. I didn’t get my SWO pin out of patriotism or for the wardroom or for any Navy ideal. I did it for my sailors because I didn’t want them to see the one officer they trusted and looked up to get bullied off the ship.
My entire experience at that command was like having someone beat the shit out of me until I cried, and then deem me “not fit for duty” for bleeding and having broken bones, and then accuse me of faking my injuries when I managed to avoid medical disqualification. I may have a SWO pin, but I am no goddamn SWO. I am myself.
Maritime MeToo: An Expanding List of Survivors of Maritime Sexual Harassment, Assault, & Abuse Who Have Shared Their Stories Publicly
MaritimeMeToo: Survivors Who Have Publicly Shared Their Stories of Maritime Sexual Harassment, Assault, & Abuse.
If you are aware of a name/story that should be added to this list, please email help@maritimelegalaid.com or leave a comment on this post. Find other stories of maritime abuse shared anonymously in the Survivors Speak section of our website. Last Updated December 3, 2023.
By MLAA
Hope Hicks (Midshipman-X): U.S. Merchant Marine Academy student first shared her story on MLAA on September 28, 2021.
Elsie Dominguez: On November 29, 2023 U.S. Merchant Marine Academy graduate Elsie E. Dominguez filed a lawsuit against the U.S. Navy alleging that while working as the civilian 1st Assistant Engineer aboard the USNS Carson City she was drugged by a spiked drink while ashore and then raped by the vessel’s captain. Dominguez alleged in her lawsuit that Navy and Military Sealift Command (MSC) officials failed to protect her from sexual assault.
Elizabeth McNie: California Maritime Academy professor who shared her story on MLAA in 2022.
Midshipman-Y: U.S. Merchant Marine Academy student, class of 2024, told her story in a lawsuit she filed against Maersk in June of 2022 and sat for a television interview with CNN in 2023.
Ashley Codrington: American merchant mariner sexually harassed at sea by her Captain. Ashley shared her story with the National Broadcasting Corporation of Denmark (aka DR.DK), the largest and most influential media outlet in Denmark in June of 2022. In 2023 Ashley settled her civil claims against the shipping company.
Erika Lawson: U.S. Merchant Marine Academy graduate. She shared her story of being sexually assaulted during her Sea Year with the Washington Post in 2016. Erika is the first known survivor of maritime sexual assault to share her name, face, and story publicly.
Maggie Williams: California Maritime Academy graduate shared her story on MLAA in 2022: “I Was a 19 Year Old California Maritime Deck Cadet Alone on a Container Ship. He Was 15 or 20 Years Older and an Officer. I’m Not Sure if It Was Rape, but It Was Definitely Not Consensual.”
Ryan Melogy: U.S. Merchant Marine Academy graduate, MLAA founder, has written and spoken extensively about his experiences of being sexually harassed and assaulted by Captain Mark Stinziano aboard the M/V Maersk Idaho in 2014 and 2015, as well as the nearly decade-long legal saga that ensued, and the shipboard harassment and assaults Melogy endured as retaliation.
Chelsea Tapper: U.S. Merchant Marine Academy graduate. Chelsea courageously spoke out in Newsday in 2017 and shared her powerful story “Kings Point Must Change” on MLAA in 2020.
Linsey Knight: Longtime merchant marine officer and member of the International Organization of Masters, Mates & Pilots. Knight told CNN in March of 2023 “she was cornered and kissed by one crew member and fondled by another as an apprentice on her very first sailing voyage and was raped by an officer on a ship years later…I did not report my incidents because of shame, fear of retribution, firing, being labeled as … that bitch who ruined a good man’s life or career or reputation.”
Stephanie Vincent-Sheldon: A graduate of the U.S. Merchant Marine Academy, she is the only USMMA student known to have had a sexual assault case criminally prosecuted, and that was back in 1997, when she reported an older male student barged into her room and molested her in her bed. Stephanie told her story to CNN in 2022, “Culture of fear at Merchant Marine Academy silences students who say they were sexually harassed and assaulted.”
Ann [Last Name Withheld]: British merchant navy officer told her stories of sexual abuse at sea to German public broadcaster DW in April of 2023: “But she's more hopeful now, because speaking about her experience takes some of the power away from her tormentors, she said. ‘It should be their shame, not mine.’"
Don Burnham: U.S. Merchant Marine Academy Class of 1956. Don shared his story with MLAA in 2022, “USMMA Class of 1956 Graduate Recounts Being Assigned to a Ship with a Sexually Predatory Captain During Sea Year in 1954.”
Craig Failla: Former student at the U.S. Merchant Marine Academy, Craig shared his story with MLAA in 2021, “I Had to Quit the U.S. Merchant Marine Academy After I Was Subjected to Months of Horrific Sexual Harassment and Abuse During Sea Year. I’m a Man, and I Will No Longer Stay Silent.”
Valerie Russo: While sailing as Chief Steward aboard an American President Lines containership, Russo was sexually harassed by the Captain of the vessel. Russo later told her story in a lawsuit filed against APL.
Sophie Scopazzi: Sophie has repeatedly shared her story of sexual harassment, threats, and anti-trans discrimination endured while a student at the California Maritime Academy. She has shared her story in the L.A. Times in 2022, in an interview with MLAA in 2022, and repeatedly on her blog CSUMStudentVoice.org
Katlyn Harmon: Maine Maritime Academy graduate shared her story of being raped on campus at MMA in a powerful televised interview with WABI5 in June of 2021, “Maine Maritime Academy graduate shares personal story of being assaulted on campus.”
Tamara Bryant: In 2010, while serving as a NOAA federal fisheries monitor aboard the F/V Sea Farmer II, Bryant was subjected to a week of outrageous and persistent at-sea sexual harassment by John Cusick, a crew member aboard the vessel. Bryant reported Cusick, and then federal prosecutors in Massachusetts brought criminal charges against Cusick under the Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management Act. At trial, Cusick was convicted on one count of impeding, intimidating, sexually harassing, and interfering with Bryant in the performance of her duties. Bryant’s case is one of the only successful prosecutions of an American mariner for sexual misconduct committed at sea aboard a U.S.-flag commercial vessel.
Jessica Ryals: Graduate of the U.S. Merchant Marine Academy and Master Mariner. In April of 2023 Ryals spoke out publicly in an explosive L.A. Times investigative report titled “CSU Women Say they Faced Sexual Abuse and Harassment on a Training Ship,” which detailed a myriad of problems associated with Cal Maritime’s training ship T/S Golden Bear. The L.A. Times story stated that while serving as Chief Mate of the Golden Bear, Jessica Ryals filed a formal complaint against the vessel’s Captain, and that a subsequent Cal Maritime investigation, completed in October of 2022, found that the Captain had sexually harassed and retaliated against Ryals in violation of CSU policy. In the L.A. Times story, Ryals also recounted retaliation and harassment she faced in the wake of speaking out against the Captain, and said that she was forced to leave Cal Maritime, ending her dream of becoming the first woman to captain the Golden Bear. “I cared very greatly about educating and graduating the next generation of merchant mariners and being a mentor and helping to train and guide these young people,” Ryals was quoted as saying. “It absolutely broke my heart to feel like that was all taken away from me.”
I was Sexually Assaulted by the Captain of a Sailing Yacht on My First Night Aboard the Vessel. Now I’m Fighting to Make Crewing Safer and to End Impunity for Predators at Sea.
This account was written by maritime sexual abuse survivor Chloe Russell, who created the Facebook community Sailing Safely for Women to help others after her own experience of assault onboard a sailing yacht. You may also support Sailing Safely for Women via Patreon.
I was completely new to sailing when I decided to try volunteer crewing on a sailboat in 2020. Via an online crewing platform, I found a captain willing to host me in exchange of my work on his boat in Tahiti, French Polynesia.
After checking his professional profile, and agreeing on the framework of this ‘board for work’ collaboration, I flew there in January 2021 to embark on his boat. Unfortunately, on the first evening of my first night on board, anchored a few hundred meters away from a remote French Polynesian island, he sexually assaulted me. I was so distraught and shocked that I froze and went into dissociation, not knowing how to process what was happening to me. I was far away from home, in a vulnerable state of isolation and shame. To this day, I haven't healed from this experience, and I have lingering post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), insomnia, addiction, isolating behaviour, depression and avoidance mechanisms when it comes to my interactions with men, among others.
Alas, I quickly discovered, via a local French Polynesia sailing Facebook group, that I wasn't the only one having been ‘ambushed’ on a sailboat as a volunteer female crew in order to be assaulted, harassed or abused. I since virtually met many women and girls to whom this had also happened, and therefore decided to create myself (with the support of other mobilised sailing people, women victims and men who are aware of the phenomenon, and fed up with it) a Facebook group to raise awareness of these criminal acts and provide safety precautions advice to new female volunteer crew. This was in the spring of 2021.
Since then, the group has grown to being more than 7,000 members strong, and has reached out and helped more than a hundred victims process what had happened to them, and feel supported. I have also compiled a blacklist of the worst abusers, including convicted rapists who, unfortunately, can freely recruit on online crewing platforms which do not systematically verify ID (‘too costly’, they say), much less do criminal background checks. I have conducted extensive and bitter advocacy for these platforms to become safer (alas unsuccessfully so far, except one French platform which was immediately in support).
Because victims are so traumatized, ashamed, left stranded in remote parts of the world, and there is often no material evidence of their assault, 99% of the time they don't press charges, don't make noise, and the aggressions continue, as well as impunity.
I therefore decided this had to change and embarked, along with the Facebook group, in an advocacy effort which included reaching out to ISWAN for help on the matter. I have received nothing but incredible support from the ISWAN staff and the Yacht Crew Help hotline. It was very healing for me.
I have also worked with some ministries, police authorities of several countries, other NGOs and charities, and the media. My goal is to push for a global protection framework for professional and voluntary crew to be enforced everywhere, including on online recruiting platforms, and encouraged for the many Facebook groups of several hundred thousand members where captains and crew e-meet.
Beyond that, my goal is also to show that impunity is over for crimes committed at sea where laws are harder to enforce, and that the sailing community needs to confront/shun the abusers and embrace clearly a ‘NO TO ANY FORM OF ABUSE’ mentality, which alas today clearly lacks, as more often than not, the victim is still the culprit.
ISWAN’s new resource, developed based on my own list of safety precautions which I compiled with the support of the Sailing Safely for Women (SSW) Facebook community is crucial in this effort, and I hope will help to equip and empower crew to make the right choices, and to be fully informed when it comes to their safety.
If I had seen these safety precautions prior to starting my own search for a boat to volunteer on, I can confidently say that I wouldn’t have been assaulted. I wasn’t aware, as I am now, that so many sexual predators were using their boats to isolate women and girls to assault them. The ‘surprise’ effect is what allowed my victimisation. Information is empowerment, and the beginning of the end for impunity, as abusers know that their ‘methodology’ is no longer kept secret by silence, and the shame of the victims.
I thank ISWAN, and all the organisations/individuals who participated, for hearing my trauma and that of the other victims, for supporting me and this effort, and for participating in making the seas safer for all of us.
If you have been affected by any of the issues in Chloe’s story, you can contact ISWAN’s free, 24-hour helpline Yacht Crew Help to speak to someone confidentially. All contact details including Live Chat can be found at www.yachtcrewhelp.org. If you would like to share your own story on MLAA’s “Survivors Speak” blog—either anonymously or with your identity—visit MLAA’s contact page for more information.
Sam Irvin Subjected Me to Horrific Sexual Harassment & Abuse. I Lost 20 Pounds b/c I Could Barely Swallow Food. When He Reads This Statement He’ll Know the True Extent of What He Put Me Through
(This statement was written by the victim to U.S. Coast Guard investigators in connection with the Coast Guard’s S&R case against Samuel Sullivan Irvin, III. MLAA obtained the statement through records requests. It has been edited for length and to protect the identity and dignity of the victim)
During my first voyage with Chief Mate Samuel Irvin he incessantly harassed me. This harassment was not of a sexual nature. He constantly berated me about my job performance which has always been of the highest order. I do not remember the exact details of most of this harassment, I mainly remember only how I felt and the effect that the harassment had on my emotional state. I do remember that he would call me on the hand held radio as often as every five minutes while I was on cargo watch reminding me repeatedly to do things that were routine activities which I had never forgotten to do.
He was quite astute in noting what my insecurities were and insulted me in those areas both personal and professional. I was always worried about forgetting to do things, so he would aggressively question me about my duties, making me assume that I had forgotten to do things. He would laugh after I had run around double checking myself, only to find out that I had performed my duties flawlessly. He knew that I saw myself as old, fat, and unattractive so he frequently made remarks about my looks, age, and weight.
He liked to tell anyone who would listen that I was fat and lazy. He called me on the ship's internal phone during my rest hours several times a night to ask me questions which could have easily waited until morning or that he could have found out from someone who was awake. Once when he had apparently been drinking, he called me hourly right up until midnight when I had to go to watch. When we tried to wake him for watch he didn't answer his phone. I eventually had to send his Able-bodied seaman to wake him. The next day he pointed out how exhausted I was and told everyone that I didn't have the stamina to go to sea. He wasn't discreet in spreading rumors about me among the crew about my inability to handle the job.
At the time I didn't realize that this was a campaign on his part to intentionally harass me. I had lost my confidence in my ability as a mate and was always fearfully waiting for his criticisms. I even thought that it was my fault when he couldn't be awoken to come to watch on time. He would show up at fifteen or twenty minutes past the hour. It never occurred to me that the smell of alcohol on his breath accounted for his inability to be woken.
During my first voyage with Irvin I lost 20 pounds because I was so stressed by the hostile work atmosphere that I had a hard time swallowing food. During the voyage Irvin convinced me that he was on the fast track and would be the next permanent captain at Maersk Line, Limited. He told me that both the captains on the ship were his mentors and were pushing for him to make permanent captain. He further informed that the fleet manager was his personal friend and a fellow Kings Point alumnus who would make sure that he was advanced and Captain [REDACTED] would be run out of the company. I foolishly believed him and thought that any complaint I could have made about him wouldn't have been believed.
During my second voyage with Chief Mate Irvin I was very cowed by him and didn't question anything he told me. I am not sure the exact date that Captain [REDACTED] came to the vessel. It was either on January 24th in Charleston, or shortly thereafter. After Captain [REDACTED] left the vessel, Irvin’s harassment changed in nature. It began with the wake-up calls. Irvin insisted that I be the one to wake him up, not the AB on watch. When he answered the phone, he would speak, in what I can only call a bedroom voice, which was low, gravely and sexy. He would say things like, “I was dreaming of you.” I found this very uncomfortable and asked the able seaman to make the wake up calls. This didn't work, since he ordered me not to let the AB make the calls anymore, because he didn't trust the AB to make a proper wake-up.
During the sea passage between Charleston and Houston, he escalated to his wake-up talk to telling me about his "dream" which would be of a very pornographic nature. I remember three dreams that he told me about. The first one was that he dreamed that for some reason there was a bed on the bridge and he dreamed that he was fucking me while trying to keep an eye on the horizon for traffic. The next was that he and I were fucking in the bridge head unbeknownst to the captain, pilot, and helmsman who were bringing the ship into port. The last one I remember was that he was sitting in the captain's chair on the bridge and that I was giving him a blow job. He thought it was funny that his only thought during the dream was that he would get into trouble if the captain came in and found him sitting in his chair.
After the first “dream” when he came onto the bridge for his watch I asked him if he remembered what he said to me when he answered the phone. He said no, that he must have still been asleep. I actually believed him. After one of the calls he would be very contrite and nice to me during the watch turnover, but by the time I crossed paths with him that day the professional harassment started again.
In Houston there were no night mates assigned to the vessel so I was working the cargo watch. I went to the bridge to make coffee for Irvin who was coming on watch. I had to open a new can of coffee. As I was opening the coffee the opener slipped and I cut my hand on the ragged lid. By the time I got the flow of blood stanched and a paper towel wrapped around my finger, the trash can was filled with bloody paper towels. I went out onto the bridge wing so that I could watch the bunker barge while I waited for Irvin to relieve me on the watch. When he saw the bloody towels in the trash he came out onto the bridge wing and demanded to know who got hurt. When he found out it was me he was very solicitous and checked my hand to make sure the cut wasn't as bad as all the blood made it look. This was the first time he saw a spot of dirt on my face and took his time brushing it off and telling me how cute I was. He was nice to me all the next day, and managed to find other dirt spots to wipe from my face that day when no one was around.
I realized that he was treating me nice because I had let him touch me. I was very uncomfortable about that. I talked to my then-husband and told him what had happened. He told me that letting Irvin touch me was rather indiscreet, and warned me that Irvin might have gotten the wrong idea. I assured my husband that I would keep at least three feet between me and the chief mate.
When I tried to maintain a distance from Irvin he would morph back into “cruel Sam” again. His swings between being nice and menacing were noted by the officers and crew. Crew members would greet each other in morning with the question, “Do we have the Good or the Bad Sam today?” It was about this time that he began inviting me to drop by his room for a glass of wine. I never took him up on these offers, informing him that I never drank aboard ship. After each time that I refused these invitations he became more verbally vicious to me.
Over the five days following sailing from Houston Irvin began touching me in more familiar ways. I found that if l rejected his advances he would verbally harass me throughout the day. If I allowed the touching it won me hours and sometimes a whole day of peace. He began to make a point of catching me alone in the elevator where he would pin me against the wall and try to kiss me. It was approximately February 5th when I first gave into him. I was rewarded for letting him, with some very friendly treatment for a day.
Shortly after I let him kiss me in the elevator he was very late relieving me on watch. I was placing a position on the chart when he came into the bridge. Because of my height and the height of the chart table I have to lean very far over the table to place a plot on the upper part of the chart. I was leaned over the starboard chart table when Irvin brushed his hips against my bottom, and reached over and grabbed my shoulder. He pulled me up right and turned me halfway around. He trapped me against the chart table, by pressing his pelvis into my right hip. He reeked of alcohol when he kissed me.
I thought that the kiss was all I was going to have to put up with when he surprised me by pressing me into a French kiss (the elevator kiss had been a closed mouthed kiss) and sliding his right hand down my jeans penetrating my vagina with his fingers. I am ashamed to this day that I didn't fight him and yell for the AB who was just outside the closed curtains of the chart room. I was rewarded by my inaction with a long stretch of peace. During this time he began to act giddy. He acted like he was courting me. I knew that I had to go along with all his advances if I wanted this peace to keep going. I felt that I had given him a de facto consent by not reporting his earlier abuse. I was scared that the captain would find out what was going on and blame me for it.
On the morning watch he came up on watch on time for once. I was filling out the log book on the port chart table, when he came up. He whispered to me to give him my hand. I thought he was going to place something in my hand in the darkness. He did: his penis. He pressed my fingers around his penis and held them in place, not letting me pull away. In a loud voice he continued the watch turnover, asking me what the course, RPM, and traffic was before letting my hand go.
At this point I had no self esteem left and I stayed in my bed sleeping or attempting to sleep whenever I didn't have to be working. I totally blamed myself for the situation. I rationalized his actions by telling myself that if I was a better mate, and if he wasn't drinking, he wouldn't do these things to me. I didn't realize that all the harassment was grooming behavior to make me think the whole thing was my fault…
At this point the harassment changed again. While Irvin was still sexually abusing me, the rewards of the good treatment stopped. He started spreading rumors that I was chasing him around. He began telling me that I was a slut…
Just based on what little I told him, the Captain asked me if I wanted to file a formal complaint against Irvin. I told him that I was going to try to sail as chief mate with Maersk Line, Limited and didn't want to ruin my chances of advancement. The captain made me promise that if any other woman was harassed by Irvin that I would come forward and support her in any manner needed to resolve her case.
When a new Chief Mate joined the vessel to replace Irvin, I tried my best to forget what had happened. By this time I had lost 40 pounds and the new Chief Mate was shocked by my haggard look. On Irvin’s final day aboard the ship, I thought he had already left the vessel and made the mistake of getting into the elevator. Irvin joined me before I could escape. He tried to kiss me again and I fought him off. He just looked at me with pure evil in his eyes and said, “I can't believe that after everything that happened that I still want to fuck you.”
I was so ashamed at what had transpired that it has taken me the last four years to tell bits and pieces of the story. Finally, when he reads this statement he will know the true extent of what I went through.
In no way do I expect to profit from this statement. Making my charges public will only damage my career. By going public I have pretty well assured that I will not be assigned as permanent chief mate at any company. I am going public because I have to atone for all the women that must have abused by Samuel Irvin because I didn't step up and take him out of his position of power when I had the chance.
Signed,
[REDACTED]
I Saw Capt Samuel Irvin Sexually Harass the 2nd Mate Throughout the Voyage & Saw Him Place the Vessel in Serious Danger. Irvin Also Told a Pilot He Wished His Own Daughter Would Commit Suicide.
(This emailed statement regarding Samuel Sullivan Irvin, III was written to the Maerk Line, Limited General Manager regarding allegations made against Irvin by a female 2nd Mate. The author served as Chief Mate during the voyage in question before later becoming Captain of the vessel after Irvin went on vacation. The statement confirms and supports the 2nd Mate’s incredibly serious allegations of misconduct by Captain Irvin. It was obtained by MLAA through records requests)
[REDACTED] - Master
From: Master [REDACTED]@MLLFLEET.COM
Sent: Wednesday, November 29, [REDACTED] 9:41 PM
To: Maersk Line, Limited General Manager, QESS [REDACTED]@mllnet.com
Subject: Confidential Statement Regarding Samuel Irvin
To Whom it may concern;
I witnessed the following during voyage falling between October 14th and November 18, aboard the [REDACTED]. I was serving as Chief Mate during those dates and fleeted up to Master in Charleston on 18 November.
In general, I was very aware of a constant effort by Capt. Irvin to create moments when he would be alone with Second Mate [REDACTED]. Captain Irvin used the excuse of "training" to foster unwanted attention on 2M [REDACTED]. On two occasions in front of many witnesses, Capt Irvin countered my orders for the 2M to perform her duties and “kept her with him” for “training.” 2M [REDACTED] was Very Uncomfortable and asked Capt Irvin many times in my presence to "leave her alone" so she could "do her job."
2M [REDACTED] had come to me many times complaining of this harassment and shared some incidents with me.
When it became apparent that the harassment was because she would not get involved sexually with him, I advised her to start making notes of incidents, date, time, place, who was there etc. During our European coastwise, Captain Irvin was speaking of the 2M in a derogatory manner in front of 4-8 AB, the North Sea Pilot, and myself. I told Capt Irvin that he should leave her alone so she could do her job. He later came to me and told me he was not harassing her, just training her. I replied that she's had enough training and to leave her alone. He replied he would continue to "train her" regardless.
One incident I found very disturbing took place on 03 Nov 2006 just as I came on watch at 0350 hours. We were approximately 6 NM from the Brixham pilot station. I checked the chart and quickly went out into the bridge and straight to the 10 cm radar. The situation was that the vessel was still being conned by 2M with Capt Irvin smoking a cigarette in the Stbd wing doorway. Capt Irvin was asking 2M [REDACTED] what the current was doing in Dover Straights. There were many small fishing boats and coasters about. And, at 3 NM and a point on the port bow, was the [REDACTED]. They had just dropped off a pilot and were heading out of the channel. We needed to make passing arrangements and turn to the port to shape up for the pilot station. As an experienced Master, I was upset that Capt Irvin had let his single minded harassment put the vessel in a situation where 2M [REDACTED] was flustered and not able to concentrate on her job and he had not taken over the conning of the vessel. I immediately put it in hand steering, made passing arrangements, and initiated a course change within a minute of coming on watch. I found this VERY unprofessional and a serious danger to the vessel and crew. Later on, I had to counsel the 2M and advised her that if she were not able to wake the Master to call me. This did not happen though. I was informed that they had called Capt Irvin numerous times and had to go down and physically wake him up.
Captain Irvin also spoke in front of deck officers, watch AB's, the North Sea Pilot, myself and the Charleston river pilot about sexually intimate details of his wife, stating that, "She is so fat I have to think of someone else to get my rocks off.” Coming into Charleston on 18 Nov, as we approached the new bridge, I asked the pilot, “Have you had any jumpers?” He replied they had two, but the one of just a week before died. Capt Irvin made a loud statement that he wished his daughter would succeed in a second suicide attempt and save him allot of aggravations and money. I said to the pilot, "What do you say to that?" The pilot agreed that there was nothing to be said. He later came to me and asked if Capt Irvin was "Alright?" This kind of candid openness about one's family was not welcome by anyone and displays the poorest of taste and erodes the natural respect that goes with the Master's position and title.
There were many more incidents but this should give an idea of the constant harassment and the hostile environment created by Capt Irvin. I don't like that Capt Irvin has put me into this position where I had to "intercede" in the daily routine of the 2M and provide almost daily counseling.
I swear that the above is true.
Captain [REDACTED]
M.V. [REDACTED]
Maersk Line, Limited
Sat Tel: [REDACTED]
Sat Fax: [REDACTED]
TIx: [REDACTED]
Mobile Tel: [REDACTED]
Email: [REDACTED]@MLLFLEET. COM
---Original Message-----
From: [REDACTED]@mllnet.com
Sent: Tuesday, November 28 [REDACTED] 8:28 PM
To: Master - [REDACTED]@MLLNET. COM
Subject: Confidential
Please send your statement to my personal e/mail ([REDACTED]@mllnet.com).
Thanks for accommodating me today. Someone will revert with the next phase of the process.
Regards,
General Manager, QESS
Maersk Line, Limited
[REDACTED]@milnet.com
Office: [REDACTED]
Fax: 757 852 2207
Cell: [REDACTED]
Through Constant & Insane Sexual Harassment, Capt. Sam Irvin Prevented Me from Doing My Job, Undermined My Confidence & Placed Ship & Crew in Danger b/c I Would Not Agree to Sleep With Him
(This statement regarding Samuel Sullivan Irvin, III was written by the victim and submitted to the U.S. Coast Guard. It was obtained by MLAA through records requests. Portions have been redacted to protect the identity of the victim)
TO: COMMANDANT, U.S. COAST GUARD
From: 2nd Mate [REDACTED]
INCIDENT HISTORY & HARASSMENT BY CAPTAIN SAMUEL SULLIVAN IRVIN ONBOARD MAERSK LINE, LIMITED VESSEL
Immediately upon reporting aboard the vessel, several crew warned me not to get into the elevator with the just promoted Captain Samuel Irvin. When I asked why they all replied that he was not to be trusted alone with a woman.
26 OCT [REDACTED] 2330 I received a phone call from Capt Irvin. He said, “Come to my room and listen to some music.” Because of the warnings about the elevator and then later warnings about keeping some distance from him, I was very leery. Also, the small amount of time I had been in his company I knew that I didn't care for him and also that he wanted to get friendly with me. When he called me and asked me to come over I said, “Are you crazy? I've got watch in a few minutes and I have to pick up my laundry.”
After that incident (phone call), Capt. Irvin made it a point to come up to the bridge during my watch (12-4) EVERY DAY and HARASS me about anything. He would ask “Do you know this?...Do you know that?” He created a VERY HOSTILE work environment for me everyday. Witnesses to this harassment were the following individuals; CM [REDACTED]. 8-12 AB [REDACTED], 12-4 AB [REDACTED], and 4-8 AB [REDACTED].
I was so mentally exhausted at the end of my watch EVERYDAY. I told the Chief Mate, when he relieved me, “I can't get any of my work done, I cannot even think anymore!” This hostile environment continued the entire 5 week voyage until Captain Irvin went on vacation. Even after I complained to Chief Mate [REDACTED] (who became Captain after Irvin went on vacation) and told Irvin to leave me alone, Irvin never stopped and continued to harass me, belittle me in front of the crew and spoke ill of me to the unlicensed crew. He also shared sexual jokes with the watch AB's listed above in which I was the object of the jokes. I found this entirely offensive, an erosion of my leadership position and the most unprofessional behavior I have seen in the 12 years I have been in this profession. Every watch, and it didn't matter whether it was the 12 to 16 or the 00 to 04 watch, Captain Irvin would be calling or be on the bridge harassing me non stop.
Very soon after the onset of harassment began, I asked the CM and watch AB's to watch out for me as I became too nervous when he was around. They would come onto the bridge whenever possible, whether on watch or off, to make sure I didn't spend too much time alone with Captain Irvin.
03 NOV [REDACTED] 0000-0400 watch. The approach to the Brixham pilot station inbound was at the end of my watch. Traffic was busy and steady for the 4 hours and I was to call the Captain at the position/time designated on the chart. At approximately 0315 I called the Captain. I let the phone ring about 20 times or more. There was no answer. I informed my AB that I will try and call again in a few minutes for the Captain as we were approaching the Brixham pilot station very shortly. I called the Captain again and let it ring more than 20 times again, no answer.
This is the most dangerous situation I have experienced in my career…Not being able to reach the Captain upon entering a pilotage area. I was in full control of the busy traffic and at one point I had to make a course change to the north. However, I had to send the AB down to the Captain's room to get him out of bed. Captain Irvin finally came up about 10 minutes before the end of watch (0340). I had AB [REDACTED] standing by the helm and ready to make the course change to turn the ship to north. Captain Irvin stood by the wing door smoking and commenced asking me what the current was doing, what the set was, etc, etc. He didn't even look at the radar or the chart on the way in. He did not take over the conning of the vessel so I still had the conn. I knew generally what the current was doing simply by looking at the data displays on the radar, but that wasn't enough, he expected me to interpolate what the current was at Dover Strait and we weren't anywhere close to Dover Strait.
I was so flustered with his interrogation that I could not concentrate on the navigation of the vessel during this critical time. The 4-8 AB came on watch and I immediately put him on hand steering to make my course change while Captain Irvin was still talking and interrupting my Maneuvering and Navigation of the vessel. The Chief Mate walked onto the bridge and sized up the situation immediately, took the conn, made a VHF call to the [REDACTED] which was 3 miles away on a collision course, make passing arrangements and turned the vessel to safely pass the vessel and steering clear of the many fishing vessels that were out.
All of this I could have done with no problem as I have much experience in the Far East where heavy traffic is normal. But because of Captain Irvin’s harassment, he prevented me from doing my job, undermining my confidence, and allowing the vessel to be placed in a dangerous navigational situation. Plus, as he went by me I couldn't help but smell alcohol on his breath. I have NEVER experienced this kind of unprofessional conduct and it was to such a degree where the ship and crew were put in risk because of his need to harass me until I would agree to go to bed with him. This was the most insane situation I have been put in.
04 NOV [REDACTED] At anchor in Rotterdam. Captain was showing me the arrival slip on the computer. I was already feeling uneasy because of our close proximity to the computer. And there was no one else on the bridge. His routine throughout the voyage of making sure no one is around when “he wants to show me things on the computer” made me very uneasy ALL the time. So, when we were filling in the arrival slip, he told me to type in “SEA KITTY.” I said, “Excuse me?” (On the arrival slip is a space for the submitting officer's name and title) I was upset because the use of “SEA KITTY” was a derogatory referral to a woman's sexual genitalia.
Then I said, “I’m going to get you for that." Captain Irvin said, “Who's going to get me? Should I leave my door unlocked?” as he proceeded to not walk but run off the bridge. This was to me a bold declaration of his sexual intentions and a clear statement of his male superior opinion concerning women in the workplace.
09 NOV [REDACTED] 12-16 WATCH. Navigating through the Dover Straits. Many ferries and busy traffic area. Captain Irvin comes up to show me the New NAV Software. I told him I was busy with navigation and there were numerous ferry boats. He ignored my request to put off the training and leave me to the safe navigation of the vessel. I had to stand by the computer and I couldn't even pay attention to the software program because I was trying to watch the radars. I then informed my AB to keep a good lookout especially for the crossing ferryboats. I HAVE NEVER BEEN INTERRUPTED BY A CAPTAIN WHEN I AM TRYING TO KEEP THE SHIP SAFE AND AM BUSY TRYING TO DO MY JOB. Again, Continuous, Non-stop Hostile, Harassing Environment. IT NEVER ENDED!
I asked the Chief Mate to come to the bridge and start checking on me because I could not handle this Captain on my own. Everyday on my watch, Captain Irvin would be on the Bridge, never allowing me to do my work. I was mentally and emotionally exhausted. Even when Chief Mate [REDACTED] told Captain Irvin in front of witnesses to stop harassing me, Captain Irvin ignored the warning and harassed me even more saying he was only “training” me.
12 NOV [REDACTED] 00-04 WATCH. About 1 hour into the watch, our visibility was reduced to zero. I called the Captain as per the standing watch orders. I let the phone ring over 20 times and could not reach him. I called again with the 20 rings and could not reach him a second time. After that, I sent the watch AB down to the Captain's room to wake him up. He did so and informed the Master that there was “zero” visibility. The Captain did not call me back. I guess he went back to sleep. I then called the CM and he gave me general instructions and to call him if a traffic situation were to develop. I took all necessary precautions to safely navigate the ship in reduced visibility.
16 NOV [REDACTED] AT ABOUT 10 AM. I was doing Pub Corrections in my room and made the mistake of having my door open. Captain Irvin saw me and wanted to show me some computer software in his office. I had several Publications in my hands and told him I had to get my corrections done. He had the nerve to mumble, “You have a problem with time management!” I did not comment but left his office. The fact is, Captain Irvin never left me alone on the bridge so I could get my work done. AB's [REDACTED] and [REDACTED] are witnesses to this and will testify to it. Also the CM witnessed his continual harassment and his frequent controlling to make sure he had “ALONE” time with me away from witnesses. On at least two occasions Capt Irvin countermanded CM instructions to me so he could, “keep the second mate with me because I want to show her something.” I have many witnesses to this besides the CM.
16 NOV [REDACTED] 00-04 WATCH. Captain Irvin blasted onto the bridge with his guitar reeking of alcohol and sat there for an hour playing his guitar and singing derogatory songs he had made up for the crew. It destroyed the professional night time watch that I maintain and I felt very uncomfortable that a Captain was behaving in this manner and saying cruel things about the different ships personnel. Very unprofessional behavior for anyone let alone the Master of the ship.
17 NOV [REDACTED]. I had the meal relief duty for the CM, Captain Irvin knew I was on the bridge because he came up and AB [REDACTED] was with me. Thank goodness. However, when the CM returned and I was showing him the traffic, the Captain held the bridge door open for me and would not leave until I left with him. This was after I told him a few times that I was going to be another few minutes with the CM. YET HE INSISTED AND WAITED. Finally, I could postpone no longer, I went down the ladder and quickly ducked into my room.
HOW COULD I WORK IN A STRESS FILLED, SEXUAL HARASSMENT, HOSTILE ENVIRONMENT CREATED BECAUSE I REFUSED TO GO TO THE CAPTAIN'S ROOM FOR MUSIC OR FOR NOT TAKING HIM UP ON HIS SEXUAL ADVANCES. I HAVE BEEN PROPOSITIONED BEFORE IN THIS CAREER AND WHEN I EXPLAINED THAT THE ANSWER WAS "NO," THE HARASSMENT STOPPED. BUT NOT IN THIS CASE. I KNEW I HAD NO CONTROL OVER THE SITUATION BECAUSE IRVIN WAS THE CAPTAIN OF THE SHIP.
I will be taking a trip off [REDACTED] in [REDACTED] and will return to work [REDACTED] in [REDACTED]. I will not sail with Captain Irvin again. A copy of this accounting is being sent to the USCG for future action. This man should not be in a position of power on a ship or in any place where he is a supervisor of people and women in particular. I have also spoken with the Chief Mate for two trips and she is in the process of notifying the USCG and Maersk Line, Limited of even WORSE SEXUAL HARASSMENT she suffered 4 years ago working with Irvin.
I swear that this is all true so help me God.
[REDACTED]
DATED: 23 December [REDACTED]
I Sailed As a Deck Cadet with Maersk Under Chief Mate Samuel Sullivan Irvin. After a Few Weeks of Sexual Harassment, Being Around Him Became Unbearable and I Began Having Nightmares About Him.
*(This Statement was submitted by the victim (a former student at the USMMA) to the U.S. Coast Guard in connection with the USCG’s S&R Investigation into sexual predator Captain Samuel Sullivan Irvin, III. The statement was obtained By MLAA through records requests).
Statement to U.S. Coast Guard Investigators Regarding Samuel Sullivan Irvin
I [REDACTED] state that the following events and occurrences are factual:
I met the chief mate, Samuel Irvin, on 24 July [REDACTED]. I was the Deck Cadet. At first he was very proper and helpful.
After about week 2 Irvin made the first improper comment when I came up to the bridge at 0350 for watch. I had just put on scented lotion and come up to the bridge. Irvin was outside smoking a cigarette, he comes up behind me and takes a deep breath followed by the statement, “Damn you smell good.”
For the remainder of the 35 day trip comments like this continued. On several occasions while working on deck in a boiler suit he would make comments like, “I didn't think a boiler suit could look that good on anyone.”
A few times he also tried to persuade me to “marry him” saying that he has two sweet dogs and a house by a lake, he smokes so I'll outlive him and will be able to collect on his life insurance money, and he'd buy me any sports car I wanted. And other things to try and convince me to be with him.
Upon getting grease in my eye, he was about to flush it and said, “just go and lay down on my settee. I've wanted to say that to you all trip."
I had met [REDACTED] on a couple of occasions when she was the Night Mate on the vessel: She told me that her and Chief Mate Irvin had a bad relationship and she told me of the time that he bet one of the male cadets $400 that he (the cadet) couldn't sleep with her. She found out about this and teamed-up with the cadet to turn it around on Irvin. This story was also hearsay on the vessel.
After the first two weeks and the beginning of his inappropriate comments, being around him became unbearable. I couldn't do any work with him without a comment like “But you wouldn't be interested in an old man like me, would you?” It got to the point where I just didn't feel comfortable around him any more.
After about the third week I switched to the 2nd Mate’s watch “to observe what happens during other watch hours,” but really it was just to get away from him.
I ended up having nightmares about Irvin and confided in my Sea Partner and the 2nd and 3rd Mates.
They offered to say something to him but I wouldn't allow it because my work schedule happiness was in his hands.
I am writing this statement because I am required to, not because I want to in any way, shape or form. I have a fear of being black-balled in the industry and don't want to be associated as a whistle blower. For all intents and purposes I would like to be considered a hostile witness.
Respectfully submitted,
[REDACTED]
U.S. Merchant Marine Academy Class of [REDACTED]
When I Was a Cadet Sailing With Maersk, Chief Mate Samuel Irvin Broke Into My Room and Tried to Get in Bed With Me. He Was Drunk and Supposed to Be on the Bridge Standing Watch at the Time.
*(This USCG investigation statement regarding shipboard sexual misconduct committed by Maersk Captain Samuel Sullivan Irvin, III was written by the victim, a former student at the U.S. Merchant Marine Academy. It was obtained by MLAA through records requests. Certain information has been redacted to protect the victim’s identity.)*
To: U.S. Coast Guard Investigators
Re: Statement regarding shipboard behavior of Mariner Samuel Sullivan Irvin
10 February [REDACTED]
From the period of late July through August of [REDACTED] I was sailing aboard the M/V [REDACTED] as the Engine Cadet and occupied the room directly across the hall from Mr. Irvin. Mr. Irvin started out treating both my sea partner and I very respectfully. We arrived on the ship in Charleston, SC as the ship started its domestic leg of the run. By the time the ship had started across to Northern Europe Mr. Irvin began making sexual passes and requests of me. On several occasions I spent time in the man's office being social, occasionally having a small glass of scotch with him.
I slowly began to stop spending time in his office when Mr. Irvin started drinking more, most evenings drinking 3-5 glasses of scotch between the hours of 2000 and 2200. As Mr. Irvin started drinking more he would begin to throw crude comments and sexual suggestions into the conversations. At the time I considered this the man's reaction to being drunk. As the comments continued to get worse I would remove myself with the excuse of needing sleep or to work on projects. Many of the comments and suggestions included asking me into his shower and telling me that he could show me things sexually no man my age could. When these comments came up I would tell him “no, you're old enough to be my father and that's just wrong.” He never seemed to get discouraged.
There is one incident that needs special attention in this investigation. I do not remember the exact date, but we were on the coastwise leg of the trip heading toward Houston. Chief Mate Irvin was standing the 0400 to 0800 watch on the bridge, and at 0430 he left my sea partner and an AB wheelman up on the bridge and proceeded to get the master key out of his suite, unlock my stateroom door, enter my stateroom while I was sleeping, and attempt to crawl into bed with me. I pushed him out of the bed and told him several times to get out of my room before he complied. He smelled heavily of alcohol at the time. The next morning he apologized profusely for his actions and told me that he had been drunk and should not have done such a thing. I responded that he was entirely out of line and should never even think about trying that again, drunk or not. He never again attempted to enter my stateroom at any point in time.
Some other points that can be brought up to show Mr. Irvin’s personality would be the way he spoke about his wife and kids. He would often tell me that his wife was not a nice person at all and that they were staying together for the kids. He would also ask me for advice on dealing with his 14 year old daughter being a rebellious kind of person, but he was obviously not close with her and did not readily accept my advice of being straightforward with her and treating her like an adult. He spoke most admirably about his son, for whom he wrote short children's stories as he grew up.
Mr. Irvin got off the ship at the second Charleston stop on my second coastwise section of my time on the ship. I did not hear from him again, but I did, however, hear from the third engineer, that was onboard when I got off the ship a few months later. He told me that when Mr. Irvin had returned to the ship he began to spread rumors about the ship that he had been sleeping with me through his last term onboard. I assured the third engineer that there had been no such activity onboard. I figured there was no way to stop the rumors at that point so I dropped it there.
I have heard nothing else about Mr. Irvin since. I hope this has been helpful to you. Please feel free to contact me at the information above if you have any further questions or need any further information.
Respectfully,
M/N [REDACTED] 1/C
U.S. Merchant Marine Academy
Every day Sailing with C/M Sam Irvin was extremely uncomfortable. I was scared & dreaded reporting to work. I chose to forget most of it, but these are the things that were not as easy to forget.
*(This Statement Was Written By The Victim and was submitted to the U.S. Coast Guard in connection with the Coast Guard’s S&R Investigation into Captain Samuel Sullivan Irvin, III. Irvin was charged with 11 counts of shipboard sexual misconduct, including multiple charges of shipboard rape and molestation, yet the Coast Guard allowed Irvin to walk away with only a suspension of his license after signing a secret settlement agreement. This Victim Statement Was Obtained By MLAA Through Records Requests. Certain Information Has Been Redacted To Protect the Victim’s Identity).
STATEMENT ON MY EXPERIENCE WITH CHIEF MATE SAMUEL SULLIVAN IRVIN
To Whom It May Concern:
During my first Sea Year, November [REDACTED] to March [REDACTED], I sailed as Deck Cadet aboard the [REDACTED]. For the first three months, I worked under the direction of C/M Samuel Sullivan Irvin.
I will preface this statement by saying: Every day aboard the ship with C/M Irvin was extremely uncomfortable; I chose to forget many of the situations. When I was contacted by Coast Guard Commander [REDACTED] because of an investigation into Irvin, these are the few situations I could recall since they were not as easy to forget.
When I first met C/M Irvin I was informed I was to work with him. He said "the Captain thinks you will cause trouble on deck." However, when the relief Chief Mate came in January/February, under the same Captain, I was allowed to work on deck. During the time with C/M Irvin I was to follow him around and was not allowed any time with the crew for anything. When we were crossing the Atlantic, C/M Irvin called me in my room. It was after hours and I was asleep. When I answered, he said, “Oh, I'm sorry you are sleeping.” He hung up.
However, he called right back. At this point he said, “Throw on your robe and come over. It is important.” Even though alarm bells were ringing in my head, I went because he was my boss. I did not don my robe, instead I dressed completely. When I got to his office, he invited me into his room. I hung close to the door. He told me to relax. He said this was a celebration for my first time crossing the Atlantic. He offered me corn alcohol. I told him I did not drink. He urged me to try it, saying that it was the best out there. Finally, I tasted a sip and then wrinkled up my nose and said I did not like it. He looked angry and said I could go back to my room.
Approaching port, I had requested permission from the Chief Mate to go on leave when we reached town, to see my fiance. Irvin approached me the day before and said the crew was concerned I would be making too loud of noises from my room if my boyfriend were to visit. I told him that I would like to go on leave from the ship on that day, if it would be allowed. That same evening, outside of his office, he warned me to the idea "if you touch yourself tonight you will ruin the sex tomorrow." I forget the way it was worded, but the meaning was abundantly clear. The day of port, when we were fishing up the arrival paperwork on the bridge, C/M Irvin slipped me $200 and suggested I purchase a hotel room so we would not need to come back to the ship.
I did not want to take it and declined. He put it in my pocket and said that he had promised the Second Mate there would be no noises from my room. He said the Second Mate was lonely and would be uncomfortable. Whether it is an important point or not, the Second Mate was a friend of mine and would have never said that.
While walking around on deck, he would discuss his wife and all the types of lingerie he would buy for her. He would describe the lingerie and the things she did when he bought them for her. He also discussed his daughter. At one time, on the bridge wing, he said female sexual exploration is normal. He said, in essence “my daughter was only 12 when she got a whistle stuck up inside her vagina and I had to take her to the hospital to have it removed.”
Constantly, he would tell me stories about women he would meet. Most of these conversations occurred in his office. He would talk about how they all wanted him. He told me his wife was okay with it. That at one time, a girl had called her to get permission and the wife said it was fine. I was scared on the boat. I made every possible excuse not to run into C/M Irvin and dreaded reporting to work. My door was locked continuously. Whether I was out of the room, in the room, or just stepped in to grab something. It was always locked.
However, one afternoon; exhausted, I was taking a nap. Apparently, I had left the keys in the door. When I woke up my keys were laying beside my pillow on the bed. I do not know who did this. But my room was directly across from C/M Irvin’s room and no one else paid me any mind on the vessel.
Finally, during the Senior/Alumni Awards Dinner in the Fall of [REDACTED], I saw C/M Irvin at Kings Point. He was there to receive an award from the Kings Point Alumni Association. When I left the dining room to go to the restroom, he found me in the hallway. He put his arm on my lower back and whispered in my ear, "You've grown up nicely."
I never reported any of this. I never told C/M Irvin that I was uncomfortable with the things he said. I always played the “dumb blonde card.” When he said something, I acted as though I did not understand. This always seemed to end the conversation quickly because he would just be annoyed. My sea partner, [REDACTED], was told everything as it happened. The rest of the boat seemed to know what was going on. While in port, the engineers would take me under their wing and they would make comments about C/M Irvin.
However, I never said anything. After getting off the ship, I felt stupid in that I never did anything to stand up for myself. I also felt that I was just as guilty because I had allowed him to say those things. This was my first sailing experience and I did not know any better. Experience and maturity allows me to realize my mistake and would like now to help in any way that I can. I hope this assists in the investigation.
Everything I have written is a true statement to the best of my knowledge.
Any questions, feel free to contact me at the below information.
Respectfully,
[REDACTED]
USMMA Class of [REDACTED]
Coast Guard Commandant: Please Investigate a Sexual Predator Captain. The response to Our Allegations by Maersk and MMP “has been chilling to say the least.”
*(This letter was written by the victim and obtained by MLAA through records requests.)
Commandant
USCG Headquarters
2703 Martin Luther King Ave SE
Washington, DC 20593
Dear Commandant,
This letter is to request that an investigation be made of Captain Samuel Sullivan Irvin III, a Chief Mate and Relieving Master with Maersk Lines Ltd of Norfolk, VA, Merchant Marine License Number [REDACTED] on charges of general harassment, sexual harassment, sexual abuse of a subordinate, dereliction of duty, and gross abuse of power.
Please allow me to introduce myself. My name is [REDACTED]. I am a licensed unlimited tonnage Master, currently sailing off the board with the Masters, Mates, and Pilots union, as [REDACTED] aboard the [REDACTED]. I started my career as a cadet at [REDACTED] Maritime Academy and over the years have established a reputation as being a respectable professional officer and shipmate.
[REDACTED]
I am writing this letter on the behalf of a female mariner who is currently sailing as 2nd mate aboard the [REDACTED], for myself, and for other women currently unknown. Attached are statements from 2nd mate [REDACTED], Captain [REDACTED] and myself.
My statement gives an account of the mental and sexual abuse I suffered at the hands of Captain Samuel Sullivan Irvin when he was serving as Chief Mate aboard the [REDACTED] and I was sailing as Second Mate. I explain why I did not report his abuse at the time, while not trying to excuse myself for this very grave error. I also detail the toll these events took on my personal life, my mental stability, and my career.
2nd Mate [REDACTED]’s statement dated between 26 October and 17 November [REDACTED], being more contemporary, is more detailed in the exact events of the general and sexual harassment. The abuse she suffered fits the pattern of the abuse I suffered four years ago. I was shocked when I read her statement that not only was Captain Irvin mentally and emotionally abusing her, he was putting the vessel and crew in danger while he was engaging in this obsessive abuse.
Our combined statements demonstrate a pattern of behavior which can not be condoned in a master of a vessel. Our vessels are too large and our crews too small for women aboard the vessels to avoid being alone and exposed most of the time. I fully believe that had 2nd Mate [REDACTED] not reached out and asked for help from Captain [REDACTED] who sailed in the position of chief mate last voyage, and decided that she had to make a formal complaint to the company that the abuse would have become as grievous as the abuse I suffered at Captain Irvin’s hands.
When I joined the [REDACTED] I had no prior acquaintance with the 2nd Mate. Upon finding out that 2nd Mate [REDACTED] was filing charges against Captain Irvin and that her charges so closely mirrored my unfortunate experiences I knew that I had to abandon my privacy and file charges as well. The [REDACTED] is operated by Maersk Line, Limited, so we contacted the company's designated person and he came to the vessel in Norfolk to interview us, and four other witnesses.
Since that time Masters, Mates, and Pilots has become involved. The response we have had from both the company and the union has been chilling to say the least.
2nd Mate [REDACTED] and I both feel that Maersk Line, Limited and Masters, Mates, and Pilots have vested interests in this case and cannot be expected to conduct an even-handed investigation. We are not interested in filing damages against either the union or the company. Our only goal is to make sure that Captain Irvin is taken from his position of power that allows him to inflict such damage on his officers and crew.
We respectfully request that the Coast Guard once more fulfill their traditional role of protecting the mariner and conduct an exhaustive investigation of Captain Irvin’s past interactions with female cadets, apprentices, officers, and crew, to ascertain if he is the predator we firmly believe he is. We further hope that Captain Irvin’s license will be suspended while the investigation is being conducted to ensure that he has no access to vulnerable women.
I am sending copies of this request to the Pacific and Atlantic commanders in hopes of uncovering previously unconnected allegations that may have been made against Captain Irvin in the past. We would greatly appreciate it if you could forward our plea to the appropriate office(s) of the Coast Guard for action.
I will be available to you investigators at any time the [REDACTED] is in port. I will be leaving the vessel at the end of January to return to my home in [REDACTED]. I will make myself available at your [REDACTED] office at any time when I return home [REDACTED].
2ndMate [REDACTED] is taking a voyage off starting [REDACTED] and will make herself available at any time until she returns to the ship on or about [REDACTED]. Enclosed is contact Information for the involved parties, witnesses, and character references for 2nd mate and myself.
With Best Regards,
[REDACTED]
Enclosed:
-Statements of Captain [REDACTED]
-Statement of Captain [REDACTED]
-Statement of 2nd Officer [REDACTED]
-Contact information
My Boyfriend Attends SUNY Maritime College. He Has Been Shamed and Rejected From Friendships Because He Stood Up to Injustices and Inequality on Campus. He Feels Alone, & Something Must Change.
* This account was submitted to MLAA by the author, the girlfriend of a current student at the SUNY Maritime College *
Hi, I see a lot of posts about the Merchant Marine Industry and I just wanted to reach out. My boyfriend attends college at SUNY Maritime College and he has told me how uncomfortable it is to make friends with his peers due to the majority of the male student population sexualizing women and displaying racial injustices.
He has lost friends due to standing up to his peers for making degrading comments about any public announcements made about real issues, and he consistently feels alone. So many people put these maritime universities on a pedestal because of how many high-end career opportunities are available to graduates, but it’s clear to me that SUNY Maritime College doesn’t care about their students well being at all.
They seem to care much more about their image than whether or not their students are genuinely okay (mentally, physically, emotionally). My boyfriend has literally heard his peers say things like, “if girls don’t want to be sexualized then they should’ve picked a different school,” and “they act like those sexual assault assemblies are going to stop us.”
On top of this, there have even been incidents where condoms have been put on female dorm room doorknobs. And in addition to the current Capt. Hanft situation that’s in the news, my boyfriend was telling me about how Hanft even sent out an email to the school telling female students what to do to avoid being sexually harassed, instead of punishing the male actors for doing the actual sexual harassment.
As a woman and a human with morals, I constantly bring up the question of, “what can actually be done?” Because it isn’t just about altering the system that’s in place, but raising our children to be a well-rounded and meaningful contributors to our society.
But being at SUNY Maritime, it seems as though if you do have those human morals to stick up for inequalities and injustices, you are shamed and rejected from friendships.
Do you know if there are any legal measures that are able to be taken to ensure the alteration of these schools? Something needs to be done. Things need to change.
Bait and Catch: For Dozens of Young Women Recruited Online, Dreams of Sailing Adventures Turned to Nightmares at Sea.
New York, NY
By: MLAA
* This article is the first in a series. Some Accounts Have Been Translated From French.*
They found the opportunities via Facebook groups and websites like CrewBay.com and Findacrew.net. They were all looking for the same thing: an unforgettable adventure as a volunteer crew member on a cruising sailboat, sailing from island to island or crossing an ocean, hoisting sails, catching fish, and living a dream.
The terms of the gigs varied, but generally the berths were unpaid. The crew members were expected to help the Captain sail and maintain the boat, and to share food expenses in exchange for a place to sleep on a sailboat traveling the world.
But for dozens of young women from around the globe who were recruited by captains of cruising sailboats via these online platforms, their dreams of adventure turned into horrific nightmares when they found themselves trapped at sea with sexually predatory captains whose criminal objectives seemed premeditated.
Some of the women MLAA has spoken with were raped aboard the sailboats. Some were raped multiple times. Others found themselves trapped aboard a boat, in a living hell with a man who they later found out was a convicted rapist and serial sexual predator.
After being lured halfway across the world by a sailboat Captain she met online, Ella Zahav was sexually assaulted by the Captain on her first night aboard the boat. After escaping, she decided to start a Facebook group to warn other women about the man who assaulted her, and about the potential dangers they faced when seeking to volunteer aboard sailboats.
Ella Zahav's Facebook group now has thousands of members, and has collected dozens of written accounts of sexual abuse from women who were sexually harassed, assaulted, and abused after being lured aboard sailboats as crew members. While all of the testimonials so far collected by her group are from women, it is a danger that young men also likely face.
Ella Zahav and the authors of some of those collected testimonials have agreed to allow MLAA to publish their stories in order to help spread awareness of the dangers facing women and men seeking to become volunteer crew members aboard cruising sailboats.
In the future we will publish more of these testimonies, and we will also publish stories on the role played by online platforms in facilitating this maritime sexual abuse.
1) Never Sail Alone. I Learned the Hard Way.
“A,” 21 years old: I am a 21-year-old young woman, very jovial and sometimes a little naive. Via the Facebook group “Entraide equipiers Polynésie,” which is a group where people can find opportunities to crew on cruising sailboats, I found a boat that was going to be sailing to the Leeward Islands for 3 weeks.
The Captain was almost 70 years old, and had been recommended by two of my relatives as well as by a crew member who had sailed with him a few months earlier. Before boarding the sailboat as a crew member, I felt that I had taken the necessary precautions and that I knew the risks.
This first week aboard the sailboat was extraordinary. The crew member who had recommended the Captain to me was still aboard, and the three of us got along very well. But once that crew member left, things started to get complicated.
The Captain always remained nice and was never verbally aggressive. But on the contrary, he was too nice. Too many compliments, too many innuendos on my “perfection,” which he said would have made him fall in love with me if he had been younger. He also began to talk to me about his sexual conquests and adventures. So far it was nothing too mean, although it began to make me more than uncomfortable.
And then one morning he arrived at my cabin with a sex toy. It was a gift for me, he said. “I offer one to all of my friends,” the Captain told me. But to me, it was deeply weird.
But I said to myself, “hey, despite everything, in a few days another crew member will come aboard, so everything will be fine.”
Indeed another crew member did arrive and she stayed 5 days with us. During that time everything returned to normal. Then one morning she left the boat, and from the moment I was again alone with the Captain, his inappropriate behavior started again.
During the afternoon, while we were on the dinghy, he said to me, “I love you, I want you, I want to caress you, to do you good, to make you happy, at least let me give you a massage, or else give you a toy again, knowing that you're having fun gives me pleasure too. Don't worry, your boyfriend won't know. And please stop hiding your buttocks all day. Stay in your swimsuit, I like to see your ass.” He then began to caress my buttocks while I was driving the dinghy back to the boat.
I was so shocked and scared, but back on the sailboat I managed to have a calm discussion with him about his behavior. But even after an apology from him, I had a lump in my stomach, a tight heart, and the urge to cry in his presence. I managed to ask him to disembark me as soon as possible, and I spent the rest of my time aboard the boat locked in my cabin while staying in touch with other girls in Ella Zahav's Facebook group. That Facebook group is dedicated to women who wish to sail safely in French Polynesia.
Eventually I was able to leave the sailboat. I know that much worse could have happened to me on that boat, and that many other women have been through much worse while crewing on sailboats. My message to women who want to crew on a sailboat is this: NEVER think that you are safe onboard a sailboat.
Even if the Captain has been recommended, do not sail alone, please. Before my experience, I had been advised to avoid it myself. I only half listened and did not heed the advice. I hope my testimony will convince you not to make the same mistake I made. And above all, if something like this happens to you, or has happened to you, remember that it is NOT your fault.
Thanks for reading.
2) Going Alone Was A Big Mistake
“V,” 35 years old: I had an experience in June 2020 with a French captain, L, skipper from mainland France who was spending a year in the West Indies and then returning to the South of France by crossing the Atlantic.
I found the opportunity to sail on his boat through a Facebook group that matches volunteer crew members with Captains who have sailboats and are looking for crew. He was looking for crew members to cross the Atlantic with him.
I left alone with him on the crossing, and things went very badly. He had an extremely problematic personality that clearly resulted in dangerousness.
Before I joined his sailboat, I had some sailing experience, possessed skills, and I wanted to learn more and to share the experience of crossing the Atlantic Ocean.
L gave me sailing lessons, but he had a very extreme way of expressing things. He acted all the time in a very authoritarian, rigid, maniacal, and nearly paranoid manner. He was constantly yelling at me for ridiculous things, like not putting a spoon in the right place, or about the toilet seat. Every day I had a little less freedom regarding my life on the boat.
After a while, I was no longer allowed to listen to music or allowed to charge my computer. He yelled at me every day at the same time. After a while, I could no longer take his abuse, and I withdrew completely. I spent four days not talking and I stopped eating. In response, he threw things on the ground, yelled at himself, yelled at me. After a while I had to yell back at him, which required me to leave my comfort zone. Luckily, I had an Iridium satellite phone that allowed me to contact my family.
He began exposing himself to me, walking around naked, even though he had explicitly agreed he would not do that before I boarded the boat. One day it suddenly occurred to me that we were in the middle of the ocean, and that at any moment he could knock me down and rape me. So I began walking around with a knife in my pocket at all times.
It was a horrible experience. But fortunately, I was neither sexually assaulted nor raped. But I had to endure his violence, hide my personality, give up having an opinion, give up sharing, talking, and eating too. I was forced to constantly dodge the moments of yelling, rejecting his abusive judgments, and trying to laugh at his despotic reactions.
Afterwards, I thought about suing him for what he put me through. But alone, I didn't have the strength.
It is very important for us girls to have some kind of « safety code of conduct » for these arrangements, because it happens too quickly.
Going alone with him was a big mistake.]
3) I Spent 3 Weeks Aboard a Catamaran and I Never Felt Safe.
“T,” 24 years old: I spent several weeks in French Polynesia aboard P.'s sailing catamaran when I was 24, and I never felt safe. I found the opportunity via a local sailing Facebook group, “Équipiers et Entraide voiles de Polynésie,” which matches crew members with Captains who have sailboats.
There are several different factors that help to explain the discomfort and unease that I felt, but they all have to do with the behavior of the Captain.
First, I never met the Captain before boarding the boat and did not have a chance to get to know him, because he wanted a very quick departure after I arrived. We only talked on the phone. And I would later learn that on the phone he lied to me about his age. On the phone he told me that he was 48 years old (“twice my age”). But he was really 65.
His behavior towards me would eventually leave me in tears and panicking, and begging him to let me off the boat early.
He began to talk about sex a lot, and made it clear to me that he had a lot of sexual experience and that it was a shame that I did not take advantage his experience. He told me that he sometimes got naked “just to swim,” which he did. But by the end, he was often naked on the boat as well.
Once, he crept up behind me and kissed me on my neck. I hadn't seen him approaching. After he kissed me, I told him never to do that again. His only response was “you're the only girl who doesn't like my kisses.”
I was afraid he would attack me in my sleep, and he seemed to sense this fear. So he decided to reassure me that he didn't intend to attack me by telling me, “come and take a nap next to me naked. You'll see I won't do anything to you. Well, unless you jump on me!”
His behavior was outrageous, and made me very uncomfortable and afraid. Because of this, I told him that I wanted us to finish the trip earlier than planned. In response he told me that was not possible, because that was not what was planned and because it doesn't happen like that on a sailboat. This was despite the fact that I was in tears and obviously panicking when I asked him to let me off the boat early.
It was a very scary situation. After I got off the boat I did not file a complaint with the police, because I really just wanted to leave the experience behind me. But if there are people who have had similar experiences with the same Captain, then I am ready to file a complaint against him to support them.
4) I am a Victim of a Narcissistic, Perverted Sailboat Captain
“E,” 22 years old: I recently spent over a month on a boat in Tahiti with a man in his 60s. This man owns a trimaran and recruits girls to come sail and live with him via the Workaway site, which thankfully banned him after I reported him.
This man calls himself seductive and he plays on his charm. He talks about sexuality very easily–too easily. One thing he doesn’t tell you before you get to the boat is that he is a nudist, and lives naked on his boat, and sometimes wearing only a small sarong.
He knows how to highlight you, how to make you feel good about yourself, and he compliments you every day. This way of being speaks to girls, it makes you dream, he’s very talkative, leaving no room for the other person's words. He’s sure of himself, very imbued with his own person. You don't know why, but you somehow become attached to him and enjoy his company. It is the typical profile of a narcissistic pervert.
His approach technique: One evening on his boat, he put on an act for me. He served me dinner and then an aperitif. Before this night, he had not even moved the shadow of a finger towards me, but after several drinks he offered me a massage, which I foolishly accepted.
As a result, I fell asleep in my chair. And a question that remains in my mind is, “did he put something in my drink?
In a little bit of a daze, I got up and decided to go to sleep on the trampoline. He accompanied me and stayed with me. I sank fast into Morpheus' arms. And again, I can't rule out that something was put into my drink. When I woke up in the middle of the night I felt a hand caressing my private parts. I changed position and pretended not to have seen or felt anything.
Foolishly, we accept these kinds of things, and we tell ourselves that it does not matter.
There would be two more attempts after that one. You say to yourself now, “Why didn’t she just leave?”
Because girls, when you're with this kind of person you don't even have the time or the energy to think for yourself. He does everything to make you depend on him, and while I was with him, I didn't even realize that I was under his control, or that I was a victim of him.
There was no rape, other than this sexual touching. We generally lived in his house with his family and he was very busy and had little time to give. But now that he lives on his boat, he is a dangerous man. And that is why I took the personal risk of denouncing him on Ella Zahav's Facebook Group as a precaution and to ensure that he doesn't do worse to other women.
Now that I'm no longer with him and have taken the necessary step back, I realize that I had literally been manipulated by him. So I decided to tell him how I felt, and what did he say to me?
First, he pretended not to UNDERSTAND what I wanted to talk about, which is typical. But then the jackpot: “You told me you liked it,” he said.
False! I did not like it. Narcissistic perverts never take responsibility and will always try to turn the situation around on you. They are very good at it, so don't let yourself get carried away!
And above all, do not doubt yourself. If you think you are in this kind of situation, first FLEE . And second DENOUNCE them.
If you don’t, they will start again with someone else.
5) It almost happened to me, too.
“M,” 33 years old: I was working on a small sailing yacht in the south Pacific that did charters. The customers had just left the day before, and we were waiting on our next group.
There were only three of us onboard, and I was the only woman.
One of the men was the new skipper, who had only arrived that morning. He spent the day drinking, and I could tell he was trouble. That night I trusted my intuition and double-locked myself inside of the guests’ cabin, because I did not trust him.
Drunk, he spent the whole night knocking on doors and trying to find me. I didn’t sleep the entire night. I was supposed to sail with them to Fiji, New Zealand, Asia and then Europe. At that time in my life it was the dream trip. But after that night of terror I cancelled everything, left the boat in the morning, and flew back to Papeete, Tahiti, in French Polynesia.
That was in 2011. 10 years ago, now. And I haven’t chartered since.
Some people I see online don’t believe that these things happen. But before saying that it's rare, or that it “doesn't happen here”, open your eyes and ears wide.
Look around you. Ask questions.
Silences often carry messages.
Other messages end in deafening howls.
6) Flabbergasted at the extent of sexual assault harassment in the world of co-cruising
“L,” 28 years old:
(Context: The other crew member is 24 years old. The captain (X), 62 years old.)
I contacted X following his post on a crewing website where he published his ad looking for a crew to charter a Catamaran from France to Belgium.
We exchanged a few messages and then proceeded to a phone call before confirming our respective wish to navigate together. My main concern was to make sure that other crew would be present, to ensure my safety as a young woman traveling alone. He confirmed that another crew member (a young Frenchman like me) would be boarding at the same time: I was reassured. I also had a good feeling with the captain.
We agreed to meet on the boat the following Tuesday, for a departure on Wednesday. I was very excited about this experience. On D-Day, the meeting goes well. The captain seems relaxed and the other crew is very nice.
The captain tells us that our neighbours from the boat next door, whom he met a little earlier, are coming for a drink. He tells us that we are free to drink alcohol as long as we are moored. A good evening ahead!
However, very quickly, I noticed that our captain drinks one glass of wine after the other at a steady pace. His bottle of rosé is quickly finished, he then starts the wine bag-in-box. He quickly gets tipsy. He talks and laughs loudly, monopolizes the discussion, enters into long monologues about the care he takes of the safety of his crew members (speech which clashes a little with his blood alcohol level at that time).
As the evening progresses, he is also very emboldened with the other captain (a female). He is getting closer physically. He grabs her face and kisses her heavily on the cheek multiple times. As she prepares to sit down, he spanks her. He runs his hands behind her back.
On her side, she does not make such gestures towards him, but does not reject any of his. She is a priori ok with what is happening. All well and good.
The vibe on the boat makes me feel uneasy. My captain has installed a ribald atmosphere there that makes me uncomfortable. We, the crew of the 2 boats, are also embarrassed by the explicit physical rapprochement that takes place in front of us. Finally, the game I am watching tells me about the fact that his marital status (he had told us that he was married) does not prevent him from seeking rapprochement with other women. I take note of that.
The next day, we cast off. Our captain has recovered his sobriety. His normal attitude back, on the whole pleasant. I regain my enthusiasm.
At the end of the afternoon, as soon as we are moored in the port and the stewardship has been taken care of, our captain takes out his wine Bag-in-Box.
Quickly, his attitude changes again. He is now getting heated when he hears of certain subjects, such as when I mention the fact that my father asks me about the non-updating of our GPS location (normally consultable in real time via a system provided by the company of the captain) since 11 am. I then undergo a 20-minute sermon on the fact that he is not accountable to our parents, and that he does not want them to interfere with our life on board. I am shocked by this sudden and disproportionate vehemence.
As the aperitif progresses, the saucy remarks and jokes are back. He makes more and more comments of a sexual nature.
He tells us, for example, that his wife no longer wants to have sex with him. That he has a mistress in a nearby port, and that she keeps sending him messages so that they can see each other, because she wants to be "fucked tonight". He laughs as he tells us this, ignoring our barely hidden embarrassment.
He also returns to his rapprochement the day before with the female captain. He wants to share his analysis with us: according to him, given her attitude, this woman is “thirsty for sex”. He will repeat it to us several times in the evening.
His words make me more and more uncomfortable. I let him know, several times.
This makes him angry. He tells me that he has already had problems with other young women (here you go), and that he must clear up any doubts about the problems that I could create for him.
He wants to make it clear that there is no "sexual tension" between us. He has 2 main arguments: if his words make me uncomfortable, it's because I don't have a sense of humor. Besides, I am "the age of his daughters", which makes it quite obvious that he has no sexual thoughts against me.
His justifications do not reassure me at all. And this monologue, which will last for a good 20 minutes, and during which the expression "sexual tension" will be used every 3 sentences or so, by a stranger of my father's age, only increases my anxiety.
During this evening, he also begins to impose a certain physical closeness on me. When we are standing, and he is talking to me, he stands much closer to me than normal. When hilariously phrasing his "saucy jokes", he puts his hand on my shoulders. When he wants to pass behind me, he does not hesitate to put his hands on my hips as if to shift me. At some point in the evening when a song he particularly likes is playing, he takes my hand and leads me into a forced dance.
As he talks about his sex life again, it is my teammate who this time asks him to stop. It is his turn to find himself castigated: he is referred to as a "pussy".
The atmosphere is more than heavy. The attitude of our captain is increasingly hostile and intimidating. My teammate and I are deploying considerable energy to take it upon ourselves and prevent the situation from degenerating.
I am in such a state of nervousness, that I find it difficult to look at him now, for fear of letting my thoughts show through and provoking his anger. I have my nose in my plate. He notices this and aggressively demands that I look him in the eyes. I find myself forced, for the rest of the evening, to stare into his, otherwise I will be violently reprimanded.
I have to look him in the eye even when he wants to come back for the umpteenth time on the misunderstanding that there could be about a potential "sexual tension" between us. He tells me that given the problems he has had in the past, he will have me sign a document in which I agree not to take legal action against him.
At 9 p.m., we pretended to be very tired from our first day of sailing, to express the wish to go to bed. Unexpectedly, he is not holding us back. We each disappear into our respective cabins. 5 minutes later, he informs us, in a playful and amused voice, that his mistress will pick him up.
He descends into our hull and approaches my cabin: he offers to leave me his hot water bottle, as I was cold last night. I thank him, and wish him a good evening. Unfortunately, he does not go upstairs. But approaches and stops in the frame of my cabin. He launches a small-talk conversation, which clashes with his outbursts of the evening. With his imposing stature, his hands resting on the top of the door, I can no longer see the hallway. Nor my teammate's cabin, which faces mine. My heart is beating fast. I feel oppressed. I am scared.
After 5 minutes of what he probably experienced, blinded by alcohol, as a "cheerful chat", he decides to go back upstairs.
I meet my teammate's gaze across the hall. I burst into tears. But of course in silence, so as not to be overheard by the captain.
Once the captain has left, I tell my teammate that I want to leave. Just as disgusted by the course of the evening, he tells me that he is leaving with me.
The first train from this town is at 5.45am. The captain must return in the early morning. Our cabins are locked. So we decide to stay on the boat, but set an alarm clock at 4:30 a.m. to head for the station.
Our captain finally returns at midnight. I'll spare you the details, but I'll let you imagine the almost sleepless night, then the escape from the boat at 4:30 a.m., fear in your stomach at the idea of waking up the captain.
It's been 5 days since I came back from this experience.
A police officer with whom I have spoken since confirmed to me that these facts “constitute harassment and sexual assault”. That these facts "are punishable" and that I am "legitimate to file a complaint".
I am still partly flabbergasted.
Stunned by the behaviour of this captain, and the fact that he sincerely seems not to understand how his words and his attitude are abnormal and serious.
Finally, flabbergasted to discover the extent of the phenomenon in the world of co-cruising, and the little means to fight and prevent it put in place by most crewing sites until today to deal with it.
Based on my experience, I would advise young women the following:
-Do not embark alone with a captain.
-Whatever the configuration of the crew (my experience shows that captains can get tough even in the presence of third parties), seek opinions/feedback from former teammates on the captain with whom you plan to embark.
-Ask to plan a few days ashore or a few stopovers before leaving for the open sea.
-Do not hesitate to disembark the ship at the first signs of discomfort.
7) The risk of onboard abuse is far more threatening than the risks associated with sailing
“R,” 52 years old: I find the risks of crewing and the potential abuse far more threatening than the risks associated with actually sailing on the ocean! (…) To be honest, so many men/captains in the sailing community are so sexually inappropriate.. . I don’t think I’ve ever been offered so much sex. I have even been told by one captain that if I didn’t have sex with him within so many weeks onboard, I would have to get off the boat...
8) Distraught by the number of men who will try anything to get you on a sailboat for reasons other than sailing
“C,” 21 years old: Last summer when looking for sailing opportunities on a facebook group called "Voileux du Québec", I was a bit distraught by the amount of men that will try anything to get you on a sailboat for reasons other than sailing, so I’m really happy this female crew supporting facebook group exists to help us look out for each other.
9) The only thing on his mind was convincing me to sleep with him
“V,” 45 years old: Found via the website workaway (which banned him immediately after another female crew member of the collective sent them a report about him), this captain came to pick me up at the airport in French Polynesia.
We then went to his sailboat, a very nice one. The boat is docked far away from the pier and the marina, and the only way to get in or out of it, is to use a kayak or a canoe that is located on the boat, precisely, on a net, very high from the water level. So in order to use it to leave the boat, you have to be a strong and fit person!
The first thing he told when we were on the catamaran, was that he normally stays naked onboard, but because I was here he would put on a mini pareo-skirt with lots of holes in it: you could basically see everything through!! Not exactly what I wanted to see from my host of 65 years of age!!!
So from day 1, the whole situation, being on the boat with him, far away from the shore, was already unpleasant for me, not what I had hoped for, and I soon had the feeling of being trapped on a boat with someone potentially "dangerous", expecting or wanting something from me!
So from day 1, I started to think about my way out of there! We went for a swim, and he asked me if I wanted to go naked, obviously I said no, but I had the impression he was really watching me, like analyzing my body figure and mentally judging my physical appearance! In fact that day, over a conversation, he told that my breasts were small and that he did not like me with my hair tied up in a ponytail!
He also told me a lot about all the different women he had had in his life, sometimes even personal sexual details: his various relationship with women from all over the world, all younger than him, some of them could have been his daughters! He told me that he liked to dance Latin music, and that he often met women at dance clubs also, younger than him, he would show me photos of his girlfriends, and tell me how he approached them.
Every now and then he would approach me and give me a kiss on the cheek, or give me a hug, and one day he danced Latin music with me on the deck, which was ok, except that he was always wearing almost nothing, it was unpleasant for me!
He hugged me once, while we were watching something on his phone, in his cabin, but nothing more than this, probably because I gave no signs of any interest towards him. I'm telling all this because I had the impression, since my arrival, that he was trying to show me how charming he was with women, how knowledgeable he was while talking about different subjects, trying to show how interesting a man he was, so that I would get more appreciative and in the end, closer to him. One evening, he made cocktails with rum, maybe that his idea was to get me drunk, but it didn’t work out.
There is no wifi on his boat, therefore there was no way for me to contact anybody, or to check things online. When I asked for it, he gave me the password, but only for a very short time because it was too expensive he said.
After 3 days, when he realized I was not going to surrender, that I was mentally strong, not easy to convince, and that it was impossible to impress me, and that probably he didn't like me much anyway, since I'm not young and pretty like the others, he stopped talking to me, being nice or smiling, but instead he just told me what I had to do on the boat: cleaning etc…
I was looking forward to leaving his boat, I did not feel comfortable being with him since my arrival, and when I told him that I wanted to leave and go to another island, after only 3 days, he was not happy but he said ok, that he would take me ashore.
Once we came ashore, with the canoe, he said goodbye and left me there, 4km away from the nearest Port, with my backpack and a strong sun, telling me to walk or to hitchhike! The truth is that I felt trapped on his boat. As I said, it is not easy at all to go ashore alone, so in the end I found myself confined in a small space, with a man almost naked, that I did not like at all, of 65 years of age, whose only thing in mind was to convince me to sleep with him. Maybe I was also "lucky", in a way, because I was not his type or not young enough for him.
10) After a Bad Experience I wanted to Report the Captain, but I Decided it was Pointless.
(*Names have been changed)
“V”, 35 years old: In October 2019, I find myself on a small island looking to crew on a new sailboat for the rest of my adventures.
I log on to “findacrew.net” and come across an interesting ad. The captain and his girlfriend are on the island, after a few messages exchanged we agree to meet. And so I meet this couple, Tania* and Gary*. They are enthusiastic and pleasant. Their boat is finally ready after months in the shipyard. I also meet their teammate who has just arrived. The energy is good, so I embark for a small crossing of 3-4 days for the next islands.
The crossing is going pretty well (despite the terrible seasickness that overwhelms Tania and our teammate). Once arrived, I spend a few days on board, and then I leave the boat. Gary and Tania already have a complete crew for the rest of their adventures. I continue mine on my side. However, some time later, Gary calls me. He tells me that the agreement went south with their new partner and suggests that I join them for the rest of the journey. There will be two team members until the next archipelago, then one of the two will leave. We will be 4 for “the big crossing”, I will have a single cabin for the whole journey. I take time to reflect upon this proposal. I got along very well with Tania, she's a good travel companion with whom I really like to "chat", laugh, talk (when she's not seasick). Gary is sometimes rigid like a “control freak”, but most captains are (it seems to me at the time).
I accept and embark on this next step, which is going well overall. Tania is not in great shape, she suffers again from seasickness during the almost 5 days of navigation. She is also sad because she left the island where she is from and her family, for the floating adventure. She confesses to me that she does not like the boat. But she loves Gary and she decided to follow him in his dream (beginning to understand the man, she really had no choice).
Christmas passes, we eventually have a last minute team change (which turns out to be a lucky one, because we get along very quickly). After a “collision” with the captain (because I refuse to let him dictate my life when we are at the dock, “control freak” I told you!) we are ready for the big departure! The first few days are going pretty well. Tania is not “too” sick, a steady wind is blowing in our sails, and after a few days we have picked up the pace of long sailings. Gary “relaxes”, begins to trust Pascal* the new teammate.
Then we face a few days of heavy weather. Tania is struck down again. She does not get up anymore, feeds with difficulty and we have to insist that she gets enough hydration. We are all 3 concerned about her. Night shifts are modified. I am now replaced by Gary in the middle of the night. One night, Gary comes on deck complaining of a stiff neck. I inform him that I have oils that could relieve him. He replaces me at the helm and I go get them. I suggest that he take the helm again, while he takes care of his neck. We don't have an autopilot. He asks me if I would agree to apply the mixture to him, it will be faster. No worries, no ambiguities on my part, I comply without a second thought. He thanks me and I go to bed.
A few days later, Tania is a little better. She resumes her night shifts. She replaces Gary. I am in a deep sleep when I am awakened by a hand which caresses my forearm, the head, the nape of the neck. I quickly open my eyes and push away the stranger. Gary is sitting on the edge of my bunk. I do not understand. I ask him if there is a change of wind, if he needs us for a maneuver. He answers me in the negative. He claims to still have a sore neck, and wants me to massage him. I tell him to take the bottle in my toiletry bag, and to manage by himself. I don't understand his request, I'm still in a sleepy limbo. He caresses my face and whispers in my ear that he would like a massage without oil, so that Tania doesn't feel it. I understand. I physically push him away and tell him it's out of the question. I firmly ask him to leave my cabin. He runs. Some time later, here he is again. I sit down and ask him what he's still doing there. He tells me that he does not understand what is happening to him. He tells me he likes me. That he wants me. That I remind him of his ex. That he needs sex because Tania is so sick. That he feels a sexual energy that emanates from me. And plunges his head in my neck, clings to me, tries to kiss me. I push him away again and try to reason with him. He is wrong. He loves Tania and shouldn't project his desires and frustrations onto me. I firmly ask him to leave my cabin and to never come back. He apologizes and leaves. I am disgusted, challenged! I didn't expect this kind of behavior from him. I'm mad. How dare he jeopardize this harmony that we have achieved? Why does he break the bond of trust in the middle of the ocean? I feel trapped. I want to yell at him but I dare not. I'm afraid of Tania's reaction if she found out. She is already in so much pain that I dare not imagine her reaction if she knew of his actions. I don't want Pascal to know either. I'm afraid of creating a crisis that could put all four of us in danger. I only fall asleep at the next shift change. Pascal is awake, at the helm, Tania joins Gary, he can't try anything more.
The following night, when he comes to replace me, I am very cold towards him. He wants to talk. I tell him that I don't want to. He apologizes for his actions and thanks me for my “wise words”. I'm going to bed. I imagine this story is behind us. I avoid Gary as much as possible without it being too obvious. I want nothing to show through until we reach land. Tania again experiences a period of intense seasickness. She lies down day and night. Our shifts are getting longer. I regained some confidence. Gary tries to spend more time with me. He joins me shortly before his shift, sits down beside me and confides in me. I keep a very neutral tone and try to make him aware of “his stupidity”.
He extends my presence at the helm, claiming he has “tasks” as captain. He comes back, asks me if I'm still in good enough shape to stay at the helm, while he recovers a little before replacing me. I accept. I'm doing my part so that the 3-people shift isn't too heavy for Gary or Pascal. He sits next to me, we exchange a few words about the sea conditions and the wind. And like nothing, he runs his hand behind my back, sneaks under my clothes. I ask him to remove his hand. He does. He apologizes. I am very upset! I ask him if he is joking, I thought he understood that his actions were inappropriate. He makes excuses. Puts the blame on me. I am too “sexy” in certain situations. He cites a lot of mundane occasions when I felt safe to act without feeling like my body was being watched, sexualized. I'm disgusted. I leave him at the helm and I go to bed.
The rest of the crossing goes smoothly. The euphoria of the arrival is spoiled by a violent dispute between the couple. Gary was despicable with Tania, we tried anchoring 4 times because he was dissatisfied (anchor dropped too quickly, not enough, not quickly enough…).
In the following days, I leave the boat. I can't wait to discover this beautiful island and I'm relieved to be away from Gary. I wanted to report him to “findacrew.net”, but when I discovered their policy of comments and report of bad experiences, I abandoned the idea. Indeed, the site announces that it does not want to take sides in conflicts between users and that they will not judge the actions problematic on the basis of the testimony of a single person. “What good is it if my word is questioned? ” I say to myself. I give up on the idea and learn to live with what happened.
11) The Crewing Platforms are Dangerous. They Should be Investigated by the Authorities.
“C”, 38 years old: I was assaulted by a captain and afterwards I reported him to Crewbay.com, the site where he found me. The reaction I received from Crewbay.com was very problematic, and they refused to do any prevention to curb those assaults despite me and other victims asking repeatedly for a year. By their behavior I believe they became de facto enablers of these crimes. Then, a few months after I reported the man who assaulted me to Crewbay, a female crew friend told me that the Captain was still recruiting women on Findacrew.net, a competing crewing platform.
I tried to alert Findacrew.net, but they kept on being very aggressive towards me, forcing me without any empathy to disclose intimate details of my ordeal, while being obsessed with Crewbay, somehow.
I spoke to a woman who was very poorly trained on how to handle traumatized survivors, insisting constantly on the need to be suspicious of any reports because of the rights of the captains. At the end, it was such a horrible experience for me that I decided to give up, and I put an end to the exchange.
I know the collective of victims also tried to contact them to kindly know what was their Sexual assault/Sexual harassment (SASH) prevention policy. They sent, I believe, 4 emails in total. Findacrew.net never cared to answer. So the collective tried to reach their CEO on Facebook, as they do a lot of outreach on social networks, and what was his reaction? He blocked them without even a word.
To learn about this reaction was very traumatizing for me, because there are many young women on this website, and they are put at risk. Also, I can’t understand how someone can react in such a mean, sadistic manner, to a collective of victims. Women and girls whose sailing dreams were shattered, bodies were violated, and who live with ptsd. It’s horrible. And Crewbay.com is not better, not doing any prevention either, while it would be so easy to avoid more victims. To understand the dangerosity of Crewbay.com: they hosted the profile of a Swiss convicted rapist who assaulted at least 3 young women he recruited via Crewbay in one year (2021). Shame on them. The authorities should look into those platforms and force them to stop endangering and traumatizing the women and girls. Or simply close them until they learn that female crew safety from SASH is a priority.
12) "I had no Idea I was Embarking with a Convicted Rapist. I was Trusting Crewbay.com to be a Safe Platform: It is Not. This Man Assaulted Me."
“A”, 24 years old: In January 2021, on the advice of a friend, I registered on Crewbay.com and Bourse aux Équipiers to familiarise myself with the sailing world as I was considering hitchhiking across the Atlantic, mostly because I care about the environment and I want to avoid flying.
I indicated that I was Novice Crew, wanted to learn to sail and was offering voluntary work. Hans Klaar (note from the facebook group admins: we name him because he was already convicted for rape in South Africa. See the Mail and Guardian article: “Who is Hans Klaar?”) contacted me the same day via Crewbay.com and said: Hey I'm at Port Louis now, come visit my boat and we can see if we can help each other out (something like that).
Very enthusiastically I was happy to be able to visit a sailboat, especially one made of wood with such a cool story! We got in touch via whats app in German, I told him I would drop by for a day, and then see if I could imagine a longer time on his boat. On 29.01. I left in the morning, my flatmate M. spontaneously joined me because he was also thinking of sailing across the Atlantic. I informed Klaar about it, there was a short okay.
On the boat was B., who stayed with Klaar for a few weeks via airbnb, Klaar's sister with her two children and later a female backpacker who wanted to look at his boat joined too. M. and I were both very excited about the boat, which was made of recycled materials, all the artefacts and bizarre items he collected in the boat, his stories fascinated us. The atmosphere was very relaxed, there was a lot of laughter, I think I was a bit enchanted to be on an authentic wooden sailing boat in the Caribbean and Klaar came across as very likeable. His socially critical nature, the values he seemed to have, his philosophies of life resonated with mine.
We agreed that I would come to the boat in a few days for 4 nights and help him with tourists who would stay at the boat for one night. He listed some more work that we should do together sometime in the next few months. But as I said, I wanted to stay with him for a few days first. When I asked him what I should pay him, he said it would be fine. I insisted that I would at least like to pay for the food. He then said that I would also be working, and that would be fine.
On 3 February, I set off for Klaar's boat, already feeling a bit queasy, "I'm going alone on an older man's boat, I hope he's not a creep or something.” But I quickly shooed those thoughts away because I don't always want to think like that, I don't want to suspect the worst and I believe in the good in people and don't want to accuse him of something he's not. Besides, I was already so looking forward to the experience, so I didn't want to hold myself back from it. After I asked what I could bring, he said apples and red wine.
I arrived at his boat, B. was also present. The atmosphere between the two was a bit charged at times, but always in an amused way, both got on each other's nerves sometimes but knew how to deal with it and also found it entertaining, or so it seemed to me. Klaar showed me my bunk, it was on the same side of the catamaran as his, B. had her bunk on the other side. For a moment I was puzzled but convinced myself that she wanted her privacy since she was on the boat for a month and that the tourists would be coming the next day and they would be sleeping on the other side in the double bed, so I had no worries.
I was full of energy and driven to learn as much as I could about sailing and life on the boat. I talked a lot with Klaar, read the book "sailing for dummies" and practiced knots, I helped B. with the cooking, did the dishes and wanted to be as helpful as possible, asked Klaar many things and was in general very curious. In the course of the day I noticed that Klaar was watching me more often, occasionally stroking my back or touching me on the arm, but I took that as a friendly gesture, attributed it to his seaman-like manner, that he is simply open and talks and does a lot with his hands.
Besides, I wanted to please him in a way that he would see that I was serious about sailing, that I was striving to be hard working and that he would find me interesting as crew, so that he might actually take me across the Atlantic. Klaar tells me about his 23-year-old girlfriend, which surprised me at first because he said he's 47 and there's already a big age difference, but I'm an open-minded person and thought that it must be right for the two of them and that I shouldn't interfere if they're happy.
Besides, it put to rest my doubts that he would find me interesting in a sexual way, because I thought he was in a monogamous closed relationship. I later read in an article about him that he was actually 57, so he lied about his age. (Facebook group admins: Many captains do, alas, and since Crewbay doesn't verify their identities, they are free to do so. Some also lie on their real names, which is even more serious). After dinner with Klaar's sister and her family he and I talked by his bunk, I leaned on the opposite side, then he asked me to lie down with him. I firmly but kindly declined, finding it strange and inappropriate, but figuring it was even more awkward for him to have been turned down, so I quickly filled the brief silence with another question about sailing or something. We gossiped on for a while longer, he asked me again, I declined again and soon said that I was tired and would go to sleep.
The next day (04.02.2021) I devoted myself again to my reading and the tasks on the boat. Around noon, a young couple that had booked themselves a night on the boat arrived. Then we sailed off, it's my first time on the sailboat and I execute out all his commands, he's a good captain and we sailed for a few hours before anchoring again off a small island.
At one point during the sail I'm standing around enjoying the ride when he comes and hugs me from behind, I was totally taken aback and didn't know how to react. I was embarrassed, especially in front of the couple and in front of B.. In my overwhelm I just smiled and didn't know how to get out of this situation. Later he sat down behind me as if we were really already good friends or a couple, but in any case we were not at all ready for such physical closeness. In principle, I am a very warm and cuddly person, but I hardly knew him and found it strange to cuddle with a strange man who was almost 30 years older than me. On the other hand, I also try to think outside the box, not always believing that older men want something sexual from younger women, but that maybe they just want an unconventional friendship that has nothing to do with romance or sexual needs. But the moment was still very uncomfortable and I somehow managed to free myself from it.
I found Klaar very unsympathetic towards the guy, they were going to fish but it didn't work out very well and he blamed the guy's lack of fishing skills. So we anchored, all the boats around were watching us, there is something unique about sailing on Ontong Java, I was so happy and proud to be there. We went snorkelling, I swam around different places, he often sought my proximity, that's when I became more aware that it's not just a gut feeling that he's interested in me, but that it's really a fact. But that doesn't necessarily mean that he's going to throw himself at me.
The day passed quickly with cooking and washing up and talking, I tried to avoid him a bit, specially when I was in my swimsuit. Sitting around the campfire, he and I talk and drink wine, then I address his privacy-intrusive behavior and explained that I'm an open and outgoing person, and if he needs a bit of physical closeness, I understand because that's a human need, but I can only offer him hugs and if he's hoping for more there, I find that uncool and inappropriate. I thought that would avert the danger and awkwardness right away. Then he said dryly: "What did you think? You're a pretty young woman and I'm a man, of course I want a sexual exchange with you, that's only natural". I wasn't prepared for that, I thought he would feel caught and pretend he wasn't interested at all and that he was sorry if he conveyed that feeling. But on the contrary.
He was more self-fulfilled than ever and said that sex is fun and that these traditional thought patterns of monogamy and the age difference are just a social construct. We discussed it at length, and I agreed with the saying that his view of sexual exchange was not reprehensible, but that I was just not interested in it. With this disagreement, I thought the subject was settled. He showed me a few more constellations and then we went down to the bunks.
He was still looking for something to show me, so I stand in front of his bunk as I did the night before and we still talk while he lies on his bed. Then he asked me if I would please lie down with him. I said no and that I'd rather stay where I was for reasons we discussed before. Then he became more insistent, asking me in various ways and urging me to just lie down in bed with him. Very embarrassed, I tried to find excuses; to this day, I don't understand why I didn't just leave. I was not under the influence of alcohol and he gave very little indication that he was about to get violent. But he made me feel so guilty and that I had to get into his bed with him.
He said things like: do you think you can just profit from my boat and my experience here without giving me anything in return? This life doesn't come for free. We don't have to make out either, just a little cuddling, don't be like that. No one will know. What? You have a boyfriend? He doesn't have to know, nothing's happening. Come on, don't make me beg you. You get everything you want from me, so I'm allowed to have a little fun" and so on, but my "no's" didn't help, he wouldn't let go. "Come on, just 15 minutes and then you can sleep" he said, I made excuses a few more times and said I’m not the kind of person who’s into that, but he manipulated me and talked at me until I figured it would be over quicker if I just lay with him for a bit. So, I lie there like a stick and he starts groping me, first my breasts, my stomach, then my hips, my butt. I try to make it as uncomfortable as possible for him, turning away. I’m so glad to be wearing sturdy skater pants that make it virtually impossible for him to touch my intimate area from the outside. He takes off my light grey woollen jumper, I'm wearing a grey top and bra underneath, he gropes my breasts very hard. I said "okay that's enough of that, I'm tired and want to go to sleep".
He starts kissing me, I turn away, trying to get away from him. I think that if I make it so difficult for him, he will soon lose his desire. He has very strong hands as he lived on a boat since he was a child, he is about 2m tall and I am beginning to respect his strength. He makes a comment about my pants, that it’s so hard to “get there” with the robust fabric and that it would be better if I took them off. I tried to laugh it off and said “no thanks, it’s okay if they stay on”. There's so much going on in my head, I'm totally overwhelmed by the situation, I'm so disgusted by him, I just want to get away, I ask myself how I could ever get into something like this, how do I get out of it, what do I say to my boyfriend, who is really not my boyfriend yet, our romantic relationship, for which we have put so much on the line, has only just begun and may it be doomed to end right away because of this event. My living situation is so tense right now because of this relationship with M. that I'm not welcome in the house. I thought I could spend the first four nights with Klaar on the boat to give myself time to find something new. Where am I supposed to go now? I can't get off the boat at the moment and even if I demand to get off the boat tomorrow morning, I don't know where to go, where I'll find a place to sleep. Besides, I'm so embarrassed, what if the tourists or Claudia find out that I was in his bunk? I didn't want that at all! And now he wants to kiss me again, he holds my face with his hand and says "don't be so uptight, I don't want to fuck yet anyway, just a little grabbing and smooching, have a little fun".
I'm so confused and overwhelmed and return the kiss, maybe I can resolve the situation faster that way if I give him what he wants. It also occurs to me that it's so unfair that I'm being taken advantage of for my body right now. Where is the feminist I usually thought I was who would not accept such behavior and stand up for herself? This can’t be true that I’m being sexually harassed right now, I have to do something! What can I do? All the sisters who fought for justice should be really disappointed in me now, I am definitely disappointed by myself. How could I not have seen the signs earlier and prevented this? It is so unfair how women are always and everywhere exploited. But I can also turn the tables, if he is allowed to have his pleasure here, then I can too. With this approach, I wanted to try not to be the victim of the situation, but to be able to profit a little from the circumstances that I dislike but am unable to end. I try to have fun and let him grope me, but after a few minutes I realize that I find it totally unpleasant and that I'm just not into old men, even if I've try to set my mind to it.
So, I lay there like a stone again and let him paw me until he said: "Well, if you don't feel like it, then it's no fun for me, it has to be mutual and if you don't want it, then I won't force you". And that was the end of the action. He falls asleep quite quickly, I lie awake for a long time wondering what just happened and why I can't move. Eventually I fall asleep too.
The next morning (5.02.2021) I notice that Klaar gets up, I think he kisses me, I am still sleepy and only half awake. He goes into the kitchen but comes back again. He stands in front of me with a cloth wrapped around his hips and takes my hand to guide it under his cloth to his penis: "I've got a boner, give me a hand job, I can't get up like this". I am totally perplexed, I don't understand what is happening, he holds my hand on his penis and rubs it around. I think he let go after half a minute or so and I felt like I had to keep going, but then I also let go after 30 seconds or so and realized what was happening. I turned away and felt ashamed.
The day passed much like the previous day, I didn't want to show any signs, didn't want to tell B., stayed out of Klaar's way and thought about what to do. The tourists got off the boat around noon. Klaar said he knew a spot in the forest where magic mushrooms grow that we could eat and have fun. As I am still so lost as to what to do anyway, I agree and we go in search of the shrooms, luckily we don't find any and it was just a nice walk.
We are back at the boat, a friend of B's comes for dinner, afterwards they both go ashore. I am alone with Klaar, he wants to cuddle and make out again, I say I don't want that and that the action the night before was not okay. We discuss the way he manipulates women and lures them onto his boat, he is so confident and thinks that he is the best thing that can happen to a woman, to learn so much from him and have such non-committal sex. That I'm so much better off with him than with my lousy boyfriend who is a child and has only aroused my mother instincts but has nothing to offer me. Anyway, he can show me the Caribbean with his boat, I'll work under the sun every day, I'll get strong and lose weight and be tanned. We would make a good team, sail in the Caribbean, sell various products from one island to another, collect salt, fish, hunt goats, watch the stars, etc. He tried to tell me the fantastic life I would have with him, with no money to spend, just my sexual quid pro quo, living like a princess for months, I could wear his pearl necklace and I would have everything I needed.
Sounded nice in itself, except I found the idea of having any sexual exchange with him repulsive and definitely didn't want to be involved with a sexual predator. I said "no thanks, I want to get off the boat in the morning". I didn't know where to go yet, but M. said he'd come and we'd sleep on the beach for the next 2 nights until he had to go back to his internship and I would hopefully find a place to stay. Klaar couldn't understand that, I'm making a mistake to think that another life will make me happier, that I'm intelligent enough after all not to need the studies and conventional life because I already know everything worth knowing and would fit in well with a life with him on the sailboat. After saying no several times, he still wanted to show me something special. We got into the dinghy, I wasn't afraid of him doing anything to me. And so for the first time I saw the fish swimming around in the glow of the fluorescent algae, a breathtaking picture. Back on the boat I want to go to sleep, he says I should lie down with him, this time I manage to say very firmly that I don't want that and will spend the night alone in my bunk.
After a few attempts to persuade me, he understood and let me go. The next day B. came back to the boat. I packed my things and quickly tell her that Klaar expected a sexual payment from me. She wasn't surprised, said that's what happens in the sailing world. She told me she made it clear right from the start that she was going to live on his boat by means of financial payment and did not want any sexual exchange. She already had the feeling that Klaar wanted something from me, but didn't think it had really come to an assault. We said goodbye and Klaar took me ashore. I think I thanked him anyway for the time, because there were really beautiful moments and I found out I want to get into sailing. He said that I could come back any time if I changed my mind, he would be very happy.
In March I noticed that I had left some personally valuable socks on Klaars boat. Since we were still in touch from time to time (he sent me photos of sunsets and such) I wrote to him so I could drop by to get them sometime. He was happy about the message, said he would be sailing off in a few days and that I could spend a few days with him before that. I only came for one afternoon. A young lady, N., was at the boat, flown in from Europe to sail with Klaar for 2 months.
She was very sweet and the two got on well, I wasn't sure if there was anything going on between them and was unsure if I should warn her. In the event that she was consensually involved with him, I would be totally uncomfortable accusing her that he only hired her for her looks. We went surfing and had dinner. Klaar hugged me and tried to convince me again that I should sail with him, that I can learn so much from him and that he will take care of me. As nice as it was on the boat again and as exciting as I find his lifestyle and thoughts, his side as a creep and abuser and manipulator is just repulsive. I get off the boat and we stay in Whats app contact again for a bit. Unfortunately I changed mobile phones and lost all conversations with him.
On 20 April I write him the following message:
"Hi Hans, hope the trip is going well
Something crossed my mind the other day that I would like to share with you.
The fact that you like to bring young ladies on board and want a sexual exchange isn’t reprehensible in principle, but only if this is discussed in advance. In my case, I think it was manipulation and exploitation, because even after saying no several times, I was still forced to give you "something". I didn't think it was cool, we talked about it again the following evening. But yes, I think it's unfair that on a website that's about sailing, women are once again sexualized and possibly exploited. I don't find it traumatizing for me personally, but I don't want other women to be surprised like that. That's why I would like to ask you to consider this next time. There's nothing wrong with wanting sex, but it's nicer when it's not creeping, isn't it?
So that's it, happy to hear back on this and otherwise have a good trip!
Greetings"
A very kind text because I figured that way I'll get his understanding and he'll appreciate that I didn't report him to Crewbay right away, but want to warn him personally first and he'll take this as a joyful prompt and stop his creep games. He didn't reply at all to the text at first, just sent videos of sunsets. Until this message came:
"Dear A, I find your write up totally interesting - I see a lot of material for an explosive and sensitive discussion.
I am back in Port Louis until the beginning of May and hope you will please come and visit me and stay a few days.
Best regards Hans"
He didn't respond to the content of my message and wanted me to come back on his boat, so he really missed the point. I didn't answer, he wanted to phone, I didn't pick up and so our contact broke off.
On 3 July, he writes to me that he saw a note from M. and me in a bar on the Azores looking for a crossing to mainland Europe and whether we still need a boat. We get into a conversation, he admits he really enjoys the attention I give him. I ask myself every time why I still answer him, he fascinates me and at the same time I loathe him. The last contact was then in August.
In October, he tried to sexually harass two young women on board. They left the ship. A little later I found an article about Klaar's arrest on rape charges and sent it to Crewbay.com. They already received it and had banned Klaar from the website. I tried to find the old conversations with him, however I couldn't find them, as if he had blocked me on whats app, as if maybe he thought that I had reported him to Crewbay.com and that he now wants to block me so that I don't have anything against him. On 17 October he surprisingly texted me again, which allowed me to see messages from April.
13) “This Captain Lied to me About other Crew coming to Sail with Us. In fact he had Arranged for Me to be Alone with Him.”
“J”, 32 years old: "I met this Russian captain on a facebook group and also saw him on Findacrew.net. He was living on an island in the Mediterranean region and was looking for crew members to sail during Summer 2020 (when Greece opened its borders). He told me that he will need a least 4 people plus him but that sometimes it may be less people.So I told him I was flying to an island nearby and that we will be in touch to plan where I can board. Once he knew I was there, he told me that he was on his way to Greece, first stopping on some island. At the same time, he started to text me a lot, telling me how much he was fishing and then insisting that I move to that island where he was, in order to sail with him. I told him that no, that as we discussed, I will wait where I am.
I felt that it was not normal his behavior, but after leaving in Eastern Europe for 5 years, I got used to Eastern guys... they do not know how to interact with new people, especially women.
Once I met him, he was quite shy and strange, but sounded like a nice Russian man. The boat was new but when I went inside, I saw it was dirty as hell. We agreed to leave during the next days as he had to fix something. When I asked about the rest of the crew he told me that he will join in the next few days. The day after I cleaned the boat a bit (I did not want to sail on the messy boat), I prepared something to eat and suddenly around 3pm he arrived and told me "we are leaving now".
He started the engine. I told him that we have to prepare the boat first... but no time, he had already started to move! I would like to add that I have a skipper license, so even if I do not have built miles, I know how to prepare a boat, safety and so on.
So he left the spot, and of course his anchor was stuck with another one and well... the boat ended up crashing (not too hard) with other boat. It was a show. Finally we left the Marina, he set up the sails automatically and sat there. As he did not know how to sail properly, the boat was rolling a lot and of course everything inside start to fall. He suddenly started yelling at me: "it is your fault, you did not close everything, go down and take care of everything". I was scared he will do something against me if I replied him, so I just went down and quickly I closed and made everything safe.
I was calm after all, because it would be just 3 hours sailing to another island. Once we were close, he was insisting to stay on a bay but I was sure that I wont have signal there, so I convinced him that we should go closer to the village because of the wind (luckily he was not good at using Windy). Once anchoring near the village, I felt better, as from there I could jump into the water if needed and almost walk to the beach and nearest house.It was night, I took my lunch that I had not been able to eat during the day because he did not let me, and he started to eat as well... of course he took out a bottle of wine and filled both glasses but I did wait for him to drink all his, just be sure nothing was added.
I tried a bit wine, and he insisted to fill my glass again, but I said no, and of course he continued drinking. That was the moment he told me he was divorced, he had a teenage child, and he just want to sail with one person. I asked him "when will the other crew join?" and he told me that "no other crew is joining for now, depending how we get along". He had another Spanish girl interested but he preferred just one.
I was in shock, because he had completely lied.
I went to sleep and closed my door, but I checked after that, and he left his door open where I could see him almost naked. Totally disgusting.The next day, I left with the dingy to the village in order to ask for the next ferries and it seemed that I had to wait for the next day. I was too scared to tell him that I will stay on land because I knew there was no ferry that day, so I just pretended that everything was fine. At night I packed everything and the next day in the morning, I told him I was leaving to get the ferry. I put all my stuff at the dingy and he did not have choice but to give me a ride.He was insisting on me staying until the evening when the ferry departed and I told him that I was moving to the main town to visit it.
Once I got tho the small beach, I just ran to some Greek sailors and ask them to stay with me until the bus arrived. I managed to jump into the bus, moved to the main village and well, I started to cry... I felt finally free. Once I catched the ferry I realized something... a month before, I had received a request on instagram from SV/X that I did not follow back... X was the name of his boat and he had been stalking me for a long time. I blocked him.
I continued my journey in Greece and a few weeks after, I was with another captain from South America, and other crew, one of them a girl from the Baltic States. We added each other on instagram. Using a second Instagram account (a travel one I have), I checked that deceiving man, checking again who he was following, I saw my crewmate. I quickly asked her and she told me: he contacted me on Findacrew.net and I may join him after this boat. I told her please do not do it. He is crazy, he wont sail with more people even if he told you that.
She was in shock.
I blocked him on whatsapp and instagram and well, a few months later, on a Facebook sailing group, he posted that he was looking for a crew on his way to the Canaries (my home region and where I am currently living). I got really scared and I blocked him and I tracked his boat on Marinetraffick to avoid meeting him anywhere there, especially in the town marina where I am going almost everyday.
I wanted to report him to findacrew.net but I was too scared. I am so happy with this group and that we can share our experiences. Now I will report him to Findacrew.net and keep the collective in copy of my exchanges with them. I know they are not cooperative at all on this issue, quite the opposite.
14) “After a Few Days at Sea, this Captain Turned into a Demonic Psychopath. So Much so that we Were Afraid for our Lives.”
Admin of the facebook group: this testimony doesn’t describe a sexual assault or harassment occurrence. But it does describe a phenomenon that we have encountered countless times with victims: the captain of the vessel becoming a dangerous tyrant on his sailboat after a few days at sea, displaying clear psychopathic tendencies. Indeed, alas, it is far from being rare. A female crew almost died recently in one such case.
“M”, 28 years old. So here are some facts about the Atlantic crossing we did with J. We were 3 with him (me, female crew and 2 male crew), one of them met him trough Crewbay.com, me and the other one met him trough the website labourseauxequipiers.
Our first days were very very good, the vibe was nice and everything was fine. But slowly things started to be weird. One day he got into a huuuge argument with one of the male crew M. in the middle of a manoeuver (it was in Portuguese so I don't know exactly what happened) but he shouted on him for a long time, and at dinner time he didn't want to allow him outside to eat, starting another fight. Because of that, M. was excluded from every single task on the boat, and was just waiting in his cabin for time to pass.
Because of that J. decided that him and I would do all the watches (the other male crew, L., was with me still) so I got very very tired, having to stay awake 8 hours a night. One or two days after that, J. called for a meeting, telling us that we would have to pay more for the crossing because things could break. I was so tired, that I would have said yes to everything, but the two other crew said, with reason, that it was not the initial deal. J. got so mad because of that, saying stupid stuff like " if you don't wanna do what I want, you can just leave the boat" which is hard considering we were in the middle of the Atlantic.
Then he was putting weird rules that were not necessary, making me feel like it was more about asserting dominance. Things like: we could eat pasta or rice only once every two days. Not that we were missing gas, just because "it is not reasonable to use it too much". Or we should ask him to charge our devices, and he would always say no. Again, not a problem of quantity of electricity on the boat. And when we would trespass this rule, he would angrily rip of the cables from the plug.
But well, I was exhausted because of the bad task repartition, he was angry because he couldn't assert enough dominance, M. was hidden in his cabin... but it was just a bad vibe we thought it was not so bad, you know, could be worse...
Until that night. He was in better relation with M., but now hating L., being mean to him. It was like he didn't want to see his face. Anyhow, we are on a boat so it's impossible. So, that night, J. was doing his watch outside when L. got out to see the sunrise. But J. didn't want him here and started to shout to him to go inside, insulting him and all.
At one point I got awaken by the noise, hearing some "boom" above my head, and screaming in Portuguese and L. just saying "Calma tee, calma te !". So I went to see, because at this point I was worried someone would fall off the boat or something.
There I see J. holding this metal stick we call a 'gaffe' in French, threatening L. with it, hitting around. So, afraid he would see me, and very scared in general actually, I hid downstairs, recording the moment on my phone and being ready to do something if necessary.
It was feeling like an horror pirate movie. Heart fast beating and all. L. told me then that he also put him a rope around the neck to threaten him that he could get hurt if he didn't go inside. And to show further his delusional way of being, in the morning, J. called over the radio a boat that was around, to tell them that he had "a very bad element on his boat, that he was afraid for safety and wanted to know if they could take him". In the middle of the ocean with 3m waves! And when I asked him if I could go with L., he didn't seem to understand that for me, he was the one who was dangerous.
From that moment on, we were all very afraid that this shit could happen again and, this time, really escalate badly. Like we were unsure of our own safety. Which is pretty shitty in the middle of the ocean when you have no control over nothing and no way to call for help.
M. was always with his knife in his pocket and we had a plan, in case needed, to tie J. up, and call help with the satellite phone. There was an awful hypocrite vibe on the boat where we would all try to play it smart to avoid awaking the demon again. And J. was always trying to make life harder for everyone, forbidding topless on the deck (for the boys!), forbidding us to sit in a lot of places, always having something to say about every tiny thing happening, always watching us closely.
Also nobody could do anything to help on the boat anymore so it was a shit show. And the last night, I just found J. deeply asleep on the deck, alarm beeping, to warn about a close boat: he wasn't reacting.
Also he was really bad at putting sails in the right way, constantly causing the autopilot to crash. Upon approaching land, he was like "I want you all out of my boat at 8 tomorrow!" and we were like "hell yes dude, we not gonna stay long" and as we were waiting for a place to stop the boat in Martinique, I was hungry, I ate a sardina box and it was enough for him to shout at me a good last time. Anyway, we reached the Coast, and ran like freed prisoners. To never see him again.
I hope it says enough, but if not, I can go on and on again about a lot of others incidents occurring in the crossing. I was writing everything down in a note book (a way to evacuate the pain during the crossing) and we also have, if necessary, the police complaint L. made when arriving in Martinique.
It should be added that this captain has a fancy Youtube channel and Instagram, and many followers.
15) “ It was my first job for a charter company. When the skipper started to assault me after I had rejected him several times, I feared for my position, and gave him what he wanted.”
“Y”, 32 years old. During my very first charter experience with a charter company in July 2021, I found myself alone with a skipper, without having first met the people from the office in order to be explained in detail what were the missions I was supposed to carry out.
So I met C., a 48-year-old French skipper, who explained everything to me, and offered to “train” me. I didn't know anything about this professional environment, and I had no trusted contacts or similar around. I immediately felt that he had a temperamental, even authoritarian side, but I didn’t pay more attention to it.
The first days of the charter, he started to proposition me for sex, which I did not respond to. One evening, the customers had left for the restaurant, I went to eat with him outside, and upon returning to the empty boat, he began to try to approach me, insisting, despite of the fact that I was pushing him away, saying that I wasn't interested. I ended up leaving the boat to get some fresh air. I feared he might come back.
After an altercation with him, the charter customers disembarked after 3 days. So we found ourselves alone to bring the boat back to port. Once the customers had left, he got naked immediately, telling me that if it bothered me, I just shouldn't look. He continued to make advances, saying for example “I will teach you if you are nicer”, among other things. I explained to him that I was very uncomfortable with this, and he got angry, shouting at me and turning the blame on me, saying he was offended by my words.
I want to point out that this type of personality is very manipulative. He constantly turned what I had said against me, to hit my sensitive spots. That same evening, he invited some friends if his (a very nice family) on the boat, as the customers had left. We drank alcohol, because I felt more confident with them being present. So I let myself go and I drank too.
That was my mistake. I found myself very drunk when his friends left. I don't know exactly how but I find myself with him smoking a cigarette on the deck of the boat, I was sitting next to him and he pulled me against him.
I started to panic in my head, knowing very well what he was going to do but I remained paralyzed, wondering what to do: if I got angry, he might have gotten even more angry, as had been the case earlier this afternoon, and/or become violent. Shouting to alert the neighboring boats, but I wasn’t sure I could trust them either. He might have said bad things about me in the office if I was not giving him what he wanted. I feared for my job, (as he had explained to me several times that it was the “chief on board, it was (him) who was in command”).
I remained being totally blocked, in addition to being drunk with fuzzy memories, and I did nothing. I just let him do it, trying to persuade myself that, maybe all things considered, I was okay , when I had explicitly told him earlier that I was almost disgusted by the fact that a man 20 years my senior was propositioning me.
So I let him do, when he started running his hand under my clothes, taking them off, touching me. The memories are hazy, but it got to sexual intercourse. During it, I spent all the time trying to convince myself that I was okay with it. It's kind of weird to explain. I felt like hazy completely after that, and I kind of got into this game of his until the end of the charter experience.
Then he managed to do another 14 days charter with me, imagining a romance, promising me wonders, telling me about a dream job he wanted to take me to in order to make a lot of money .
I tried to put stops to him, but I understood that, how can I say, his vision of reality was not very rational. During this second charter, I don't even know why I got into his game, I had surely felt the manipulation and I was afraid of him for fear that he would shoot me down with the charter agency.
The two weeks were hell, as he came to me, I let him at first, still not quite understanding what was going on, and how I had managed to convince myself that it was a good idea. I started to understand how he was functioning. He was giving me contradictory instructions in terms of cooking, absolutely controlling everything I was doing, criticizing everything, forbidding me to take naps, to move around at night in the boat, getting angry as soon as I made a remark, or else not answering me when I stood up to him.
I managed to put stops and push him away after a few days, and from then on he was even more obnoxious and constantly talking to me like a dog among, other things. Some examples: I slept in the forward cabin connected to the cabin where he was sleeping. While I was sleeping, around 2/3am, he entered my cabin in order to grab his bag brutally and closed the door by slamming it.
Once, I had gone to sleep on deck to be quiet, he came to wake me up and told me “you better be in good shape tomorrow”. He ordered me to be careful with what I said, telling me that "he too had things to say", telling me "shut up now". While I was in the living room in the evening making the menus, he passed by and turned off the light without saying anything to me. Asking him what was going on, he said to me: "I'm the captain, if you're not happy you can leave”.
Once, he yelled at me while I was preparing the desserts: "learn to do simple things first, instead of trying to do complicated things". When I broke down in tears, it was the client who came to comfort me. The list of anecdotes of this type is too long to tell.
After that, because I had contacted mechanic friends I had met in the meantime to ask them for advice, so the word about his behavior started to spread. The clients, I believe, mentioned it in the office, but it is impossible to get a clear version from anybody. He was blacklisted by the charter company, apparently for a badly managed accident (rudder broken due to hitting rocks).
He was recruiting on several crewing facebook groups in recent weeks.
16) “ This Captain Continuously Sexually Harassed and Assaulted me While we Were on his Boat. He later Confessed that he was Trying to “Convince” each Woman who was Crewing with Him to “Be with” Him.”
“V”, 30 years old. Me and my friend were on Captain S. boat, we found him via the website WorkAway in April 2022 in Fort de France, Martinique. He seemed nice, we had a tea with him and talked about everything.
Then after a few days on his boat, I noticed him watching me a lot, taking pictures, always sitting on my bed (it's a small boat, so at first I thought it was ok) or touching me inappropriately.
When my friend left the boat for the afternoon, after a week on his boat, he talked to me about his feelings, that he fell in love with me and cannot stop touching me. I said kindly, "hey thanks for talking about it, I noticed but I am sorry not interested,but glad we spoke about it, nothing wrong with that". So I thought that's that then.
In the following days He then continued to grab my butt more aggressively every time I was in front of him, or when I was trying to move from one place to another on the boat, also grabbing my breast and hip, every chance he got. Also, one evening he masturbated just 5 seconds after we said good night. There are no doors, and as I said it's a very small boat, so he intended to make me hear it.
I continuously had to say that I don't want him touching me. The last time I said it very fiercely, that he had "to fuck off or else", He got angry and said I was the one who provoked it, so after that, he ignored me for two days, but still kept watching me when I was taking a shower or change.
The second day before last, he got very drunk and I had to carry him back to the boat, while he was kissing my legs while I was driving the dinghy. We found another boat and left after 14 days total on S boat. My Romanian friends on whose boat he got so drunk that night told me just now that he came by their boat when me and my friend had left, to ask their female crew if they'd rather join his boat.
We saw him after a few days in the marina of Riviere sense, Guadeloupe. He then followed us to the next islands and anchorages (Guadeloupe-Dominica-Martinique). He was always around, when he heard from our friends what were the next plans he would appear at the same spot he knew we'd be the next day. We left Portsmouth for Roseau and he saw us leave and left also. In Martinique he had a flight booked to England beginning of June.
So I thought about telling you, first my thoughts were: well nothing really bad happened and he is also very nice, so I don't want to cause any trouble, but still he made us feel very uncomfortable and who knows what could have happened.
I asked him after he confessed that he's into me, if he feels lonely and is looking for a partner. He said yes, he always tries to get female crew and then “convince them to be with (him)” (exact words, not kidding).
I now realized it was very serious abuse and that I should stop feeling sorry for him. I have started the process to report him.
17) “While I was sleeping, the captain entered my cabin, stepped naked in my bed, and I woke up because a very hard penis was poking against my back. I could not go anywhere. I reported him, but Findacrew.net did nothing about it.”
“J”, 45 years old. I sailed with a lot of captains and was always treated with courtesy. A very unpleasant surprise when I stepped on board with him. I reported his behavior to findacrew.net, but they did not do anything about it.
While I was sleeping he entered my cabin, stepped naked in my bed and I woke up because a very hard penis was poking against my back, it will be over in a few minutes he whispered in my ear. I could not go anywhere.
The captain had my passport and quite a bit of cash that belonged to me, which he had hidden on the boat so that I did not have to walk around with it. I wanted that back, so I had to be nice to him. He acted as if sex was part of the deal. “Crew has to keep the skipper happy”, he said. I am a professional skipper: for me that’s not part of the deal. I finally left with my passport only.
It was a long time ago, 7 years, and I just want to forget everything about it.
I’m a Current Marine Engineering Student at Kings Point. Not Every Woman Will Be Assaulted When She Goes Out to Sea, But Every Woman Will Face Some Sort of Unequal Treatment
* This account was submitted to MLAA through our website’s anonymous contact form by the author, who claims to be a current marine engineering student at the USMMA. MLAA does not know the author’s identity. *
I am a current marine engineering midshipman at USMMA. I was not assaulted during my Sea Year, but I was sexually harassed, and it has taken me a lot of time and discussions with friends and my significant other to even realize that it was harassment.
The harassment happened when I was a cadet on an ARC ship and we were at a layberth for nearly a month, which left plenty of time for shore leave. The night before we left the layberth, my sea partner, and I decided to go out with the 2nd Assistant Engineer.
We were all drinking more than we should have been, and my sea partner completely blacked out. She remembers nothing from that night, but I remember everything that happened.
At some point the 3 A/E and one of the Oilers came to the bar where we were drinking and came over to our table. They were both already extremely drunk. The 3 A/E kept putting his arm around me and trying to talk to me. I ignored him, hoping that he would stop. But he kept getting angry because I wouldn’t talk to him.
By 2200, I was ready to leave and get back to the ship so I could recover before the maneuver in the morning. When I told my sea partner that I wanted to leave, she ignored me. Then I told the 2 A/E that I wanted to leave, and he ignored me. Nobody else even thought about leaving until midnight.
Finally, the Uber was arrived, but there were only four seats for the five of us. The 3 A/E kept saying that I should just sit on his lap, and I kept saying “no.” Even while completely wasted, I knew that I would never say yes to him, in this situation or any other. After a while of arguing with the 3A/E, my sea partner decided that she would just sit on the 2 A/E’s lap since it was a short ride to the ship.
We got back to the ship, all went to our rooms, and the night was never discussed again. But I truly believe that if the 2 A/E hadn’t been with me and my sea partner that night, the 3A/E would have tried to assault us, and I never felt comfortable around the 3A/E after that.
I told my sea partner that, and she said I should tell the 1A/E. But I never did end up telling anybody else on the ship, because I didn't want to create any drama. I figured that telling anybody wouldn't do any good because there was no proof that he was harassing me, and it never escalated past that point.
Not every woman will be assaulted when she goes out to sea, but every woman will face some sort of unequal treatment. I am one of the lucky women who only had to face harassment, but that shouldn't be kept quiet either. By keeping quiet about this sort of common harassment, it only enables these predators to become more confident and eventually escalate to assault.
I feel guilt about not reporting my harassment because it might mean that he'll do worse to another cadet. If my story is published, I just want other cadets to have the confidence to report when these incidents happen even if they think it doesn't matter right now.
I Was on a Ship Where the 2nd Engineer Had the Nickname “The Rapist,” and Let Me Tell You, It Was for A Good Reason
This anonymous submission was originally posted as a public comment to the account submitted by Mishipman-X. MLAA does not know the author’s identity.
I was on a ship where the 2nd Engineer had the nickname “the Rapist,” and let me tell you that it was for a reason: 4 girls that I know of.
When I went to report him to the captain and chief engineer for harassing me, I was told that he was probably just joking around, or that it was just his nature as a person, and it was suggested that I wouldn't want it reported because it would cause me trouble.
Waking up to find him standing over my bed, and being told I couldn't lock my cabin door, made me too afraid to sleep at night. So much so that I would sleep in public areas like a smoke room so I would never be in an area alone with him. And never eating any plates of food left to the side for me because he threatened to “roofie” my food.
Every single female I've ever met in the industry has experienced Sexual Harassment or Sexual Assault. And when I tell fellow workers what had happened to me in the past, they say that “it would never happen on this ship,” that “they would stand up and fight for me,” etc.
But in reality, they just stand around and watch as us females are obviously uncomfortable. I really hope this gets talked about more, and that we see a change to the culture in the maritime industry.
I Was Sailing as Master When the Chief Mate Entered My Day Room On a Sunday Afternoon and Raped Me
This anonymous submission was originally posted as a public comment to the account submitted by Mishipman-X. MLAA does not know the author’s identity.
I have only told my best friend that I was raped while serving as master of a vessel. My rapist was the Chief Mate, who entered my day room on a Sunday afternoon, the day before we were to disembark. He closed the door and then demonstrated to me who was the master of my life. After suffering years of discrimination (that has never ended), sexual and verbal harassment and underhanded physical approaches, this happened to me when I finally thought I was safe.
I fought against this bastard and I shouted. I was not impaired by alcohol, but it was not enough. On the vessel the crew can hear every breath, but nobody heard my shouts. The consequences for me and for my self-esteem, and even part of my sentimental life, are still visible to me.
At that time, what I was able to do was only to warn the Company, without any official reporting, that they should not place any of the young female cadets on their small fleet to serve below him.
After this happened, I continued sailing as Captain for a few more years. But there was a breach in the heart and in my shell. For sure I have been vigilant, even more than before. Over the years I have had woman cadets and engineer officers on board, and I always tried my best to keep all under control.
Once, I kicked a drunk 2nd engineer off the vessel, even against paradoxical male solidarity, but it was the best opportunity to save the woman engine cadet from his attention that was not genuine. And I noted he dragged behind him another younger person, and this need to be stopped immediately.
I never wrote anything about this, thank you for giving me this opportunity on this Sunday morning.
THANKS
Laura
It Doesn’t Matter What We Say or Wear or Do. Women Will Never Be Fully Accepted at Sea.
This anonymous submission was originally posted as a public comment to the account submitted by Mishipman-X. The author claims to be a cadet, but MLAA does not know the author’s identity.
I’ve always felt like all the sexual comments and attempts I got onboard was all my fault. Yes, I wore tops that showed my shoulders sometimes because it was hot- sue me. I wore a dress when I signed off- how scandalous!
A lot of women at sea have this pressure to “fit in” because we are already hated before we even speak. So, if we end up on their good sides, they won’t hurt us right? If we show them we can be “one of the guys “ we’ll be accepted, right? Wrong. It doesn’t matter what you wear, say or do. You can never fully avoid it.
I didn’t speak up because I felt like the blame would go towards me. Why did I wear that? Why was I “friendly”? Why did you try to “fit in”? Well, you would think that working with a bunch of married old men with kids would be safe right? Like, why would they even try anything? Don’t they already have a partner and children to worry about?
Why do us women, have to assume the worst and just stay silent? Even towards men that are husbands and fathers at work!!! Why does the first time cadet who is still a young girl expected to act more maturely than them?!
All I can say is this: the men working at sea are more dramatic than high school girls. And I wish I could’ve seen this before making such a huge decision.
When I Was 3rd Mate on a Maersk Pre-Positioned Ship My AB Harassed Me And Eventually Threatened to Kill Me. When I Reported Him to Maersk, They Moved Him To A Sister Ship & Promoted Him to Bosun.
* This anonymous submission was originally posted as a public comment to the Mishipman-X story. MLAA does not know the author’s identity. *
I was sailing as a 3rd Mate standing an in port watch 00-08. It was a pre-positioning ship operated by Maersk. I kept a log of everything the AB was doing to me at all hours throughout the watch. Keep in mind this man was 6’3 nothing but muscle and weighed 300 pounds, we were the only ones awake during these hours.
He would threaten me verbally, even going as far as saying he would kill me and that he knew my home address. It started off with small stuff at first, like throwing out my night food. I would go down to the galley seeing him scrape my plate into the garbage, seeing the cling wrap that said “3M.” And he would purposely not call in the anchor calls every hour and would even sleep on watch in his room.
I tried talking to him saying he needs to do his duties and that’s when it got worse. On multiple times throughout the trip he made romantic passes at me, and I denied him and said I was not interested. He then went a different route by trying to scare me into wanting him. I let this go on for a few weeks because I didn’t want to be like “every other girl in the industry” who cries harassment and never gets another job. Which is another problem is that people feel this way.
It got to the point where not only was he threatening me but also the bosun, CM, and other mates. That’s where I became comfortable in knowing it wasn’t just me and I reported it straight to the CM. Multiple statements were written, verbal warnings along with written warnings. Eventually the company removed him from the ship and sent him to the sister ship.
He is now on another Maersk ship with a promotion to Bosun doing this to other people. He has not only threatened females but males as well. He tried to use the intimidation factor. The fact that harassment and sexual harassment wasn’t taken serious and it’s all on record is shocking to me and this same man is still sailing and was promoted by the EXACT company that removed him from the ship thinking that was a good enough punishment.
While Sailing as Bosun on a Maersk Ship, a Female Cadet Told Me the 1st Engineer Had Sexually Abused Her. I Reported It to the Captain, But He Just Covered It All Up.
This anonymous submission was originally posted as a public comment to the account submitted by Mishipman-X. MLAA does not know the author’s identity.
I sailed as a Bosun on tankers and container ships until leaving 30 years ago. On a lark I decided to reactivate my status and sail once again. I was Bosun on a Maersk ship, I know that run well.
I had always found the Officers in the US Merchant Marine much more impressed with themselves than my experience in the Navy or even foreign flag ships I’d often visited in desolate ports or while out on the hook waiting for berths.
But something happened during those 30 years I was away and what I experienced on my return. The “officer arrogance” had alarmingly deepened. Worse yet, deck and engine officer’s recognition of this very obvious problem was conspicuously absent. It affects academy officers worse than hawsepipers but still, a deep culture of superiority has become predominant.
I have two grown daughters. I know when they are afraid of something. So when I saw that “look” on the face of a young female cadet on the Maersk ship I was on, I knew I had to do something. I knocked on the door to her cabin and asked her to visit me where my door was always open except when I slept. She showed up and with almost no prompting from me she broke down and shared her devastating account of abuse at the hands of the 1st AE, who was now Chief on this particular trip.
Knowing this was a one time trip at sea for me (UN-retiring is not for the faint-hearted) I had no qualms marching right up to the Captain to share her similar story of being pressured to drink and then being violated. He knew I would not go away without an answer.
After telling me how things are “these days” he proceeded to go through a well-rehearsed list of deflections, excuses, obfuscations, re-direction of blame and other verbal manipulations. He knew I wasn’t buying any of his baloney. I told him that a crime was committed on HIS ship and if he failed to report it, then I would. Not for the sake of that particular young lady but for the my own sense of duty. That cadet could’ve easily been one of the two female ABs that reported to me…or a daughter.
He promised he would report it to HQ in Virginia. He took statements and acted as if he were following an HR department script. The cadet was reassigned to work directly for the 2AE and other measures to ensure her safety. I took her into the crew mess to dine with us and helped her whenever I could.
Two weeks passed and the Captain called me to his office to inform me that the “Company is going to demote the Engineer by taking him off the relieving Chief rotation.” In conversation with the Captain it became obvious that he had concocted the whole story. He had not reported anything to anyone. Now I was pissed and he knew it.
In fact, when we got to Europe the cadet was escorted off the vessel and provided no explanation of what was happening to her. I took her to the airport, got permission to go to the gate with her and see her off. I gave her my contact information and assured her I would stand up for what happened to her.
She only called me once to tell me she left school and went home to her family. She needed to move on. I never heard from her again because she obviously needed to deal with her pain and build a new future...
This is what has happened to the United States Merchant Marine. This is an illustration of how such a proud institution with an honorable tradition has eroded over time to a mockery of drunken male-dominated thugs so afraid of losing their company standing, their union seniority or their Coast Guard papers that they will tolerate any injustice no matter how violent and infuriating.
If any cadets are reading this I encourage you to reach out to the Bosun or the Steward. We may not be officers but I believe any one is as leaders of our departments will keep you safe and stand up for you.
Go with God to you all.
I Was a 19 Year Old California Maritime Deck Cadet Alone on a Container Ship. He Was 15 or 20 Years Older and an Officer. I’m Not Sure if It Was Rape, but It Was Definitely Not Consensual.
*This account was submitted to MLAA by Maggie Williams, a graduate of the California Maritime Academy*
At the end of my freshman year at California Maritime Academy (CMA), I went out for the required summer training cruise on the Training Ship Golden Bear (TSGB) with hundreds of other Cal Maritime students. That first cadet cruise on the TSGB went pretty much as planned. I learned a lot, and by the end of the cruise I felt pretty confident about the path I had chosen to become a professional mariner.
At the end of my sophomore year, instead of going on the training ship, I went out on a 60 day “commercial cruise” aboard a container ship. Doing a commercial cruise after sophomore year and a training ship cruise two other summers is the standard path at CMA for accruing the sea time required to sit for your 3rd Mate’s or 3rd Assistant Engineer’s license.
On my freshman cruise aboard the TSGB there had been what I would call a “normal level” of harassment for the late 1990’s. It was terrible, typical of the times, and all of the young women on the training ship experienced it to some extent. There was sexual harassment and, of course, the general “hazing” kind of harassment. But at least after that first cruise I felt like I was prepared for whatever might happen on the commercial ship.
As the day to join the container ship arrived, I was excited to get aboard a “real ship.” It was the summer of 1999, and I was a 19 year old deck cadet as I made my way to the Port of LA-Long Beach to join the M/V Mokihana. The Port was massive. There were huge gantry cranes overhead, top-pick loaders zooming around, and longshoremen dodging trucks. As I climbed up the gangway up to the M/V Mokihana with my sea bag slung over my shoulder, it was all a bit overwhelming.
The ship itself was a hodgepodge design and fairly confusing, but I found my room and was then left to figure out the rest of the ship on my own. We didn’t have “sea partners” back then (maybe they do now?), and I was the only cadet from CMA aboard the ship. For part of my time aboard the vessel there was an engine cadet from either Maine or Mass Maritime, but I had very little interaction with him and certainly didn’t consider him to be a friend or an ally.
The 3rd mates, 2nd mates, 3rd assistant engineers, and 2nd assistant engineers all obtained their jobs via union hiring halls. The senior officers were all permanent employees and generally worked on 35 day rotations. One of the captains was a CMA grad and one was a hawsepiper. Both chief mates were CMA grads. I don’t remember how the chief engineers and 1st assistant engineers obtained their licenses, but I remember there was generally a lot of discussion about maritime academies and which ones produced better mariners, and about whether it was better to be a hawsepiper or an academy grad.
It seemed like everyone onboard wanted to assign you to a “team,” or tell you how much better their own experience was. It was all weirdly hostile and confrontational. There was also a lot of tension between the deck department and the engine department. The engineers seemed to have chips on their shoulders. I had to spend time in the engine room completing a rotation for my shipboard independent study from CMA, and the engineers were fairly hostile to the presence of a young female deck cadet in their engine room.
The Chief Engineer was just a jerk. He made several comments to me about how women didn’t belong on ships, and he went out of his way to make me feel very uncomfortable in his engine room. Overall, it was a very lonely time for me. It was nothing like being on the TSGB training cruise with hundreds of other students. The training ship experience had its own problems, but on the M/V Mokihana I was alone and didn’t have any friends or anyone I could even relate to. I wanted to make friends and I wanted to talk to my shipmates, but there just weren’t many to choose from.
It wasn’t long before I found myself feeling desperate to fit in, and desperate to just feel safe on a ship where I was the only female crewmember. One day the 2nd Engineer invited me to play cribbage with him. He was 15 to 20 years older than me and married, but we got along well and he became the friend I had been searching for. Whenever I had some downtime, I began playing cribbage with him.
The game provided some much needed relaxation. We talked about life on the ship, he told me about what it was like to attend Maine Maritime Academy, and through my friendship with him I finally began to feel welcomed. He deflected criticism and meanness from the other engineers away from me, and my engine room rotation improved with his guidance and help.
With more than half of my time aboard the ship still to go, he began to flirt with me. It started small, but then he became more touchy-feely. His advances surprised me, and I felt very confused and was unsure of how to respond. I had a boyfriend and was not trying to cheat on him, and since the 2nd Engineer was married, I had thought that being friends with him would be a safe relationship. It seemed like we both simply wanted some friendship and companionship, and someone to play cards with. But it became clear that he wanted more than that.
At the same I was still struggling with loneliness, and he was really my only friend aboard the ship. He had helped make my life in the engine room and aboard the ship much better, and I didn’t want to jeopardize that. I was afraid that if I did not give in to his advances, or at least flirt back with him, I would lose my only friend. At the extreme, I worried that refusing his advances might lead to me being ostracized or harassed.
Telling the Captain of Chief Mate about my predicament never even entered my mind. I just assumed that if I told them I felt uncomfortable about the 2nd Engineer’s advances I would be blamed for getting myself into the situation in the first place. Or worse, I thought they might ask me to leave the ship, which would result in not obtaining the sea time I needed to graduate.
Because I so desperately wanted to fit in and maintain this human connection, I gave in to the 2nd Engineer’s advances and had sex with him, albeit as a reluctant participant. I wished I had the courage to tell him I didn’t want to be intimate with him, that I just wanted to play cards and chat, but I didn’t. I gave in to him, and it never felt right.
I’ve struggled with that decision ever since. For years afterwards, I told myself that because I was over 18 and because he didn’t pin me down, that it was consensual and there was nothing I could complain about. But I still beat myself up, and felt horribly bad about giving in to him. I told myself that it was my fault. I told myself that I was weak, that I was not cut out for a life at sea, and that I should work in a shoreside position. So that’s what I did when I graduated.
It took me over 20 years to realize that he had abused his power, and that the sexual relationship was not consensual. It took me over 20 years to realize that, because of the vast difference in power that existed between us, I was not able to consent to having sex with him. According to Planned Parenthood, consent must be “freely given” and without any pressure or manipulation.
I didn’t have sex with this much older man who was my superior on the ship because I was attracted to him, or because I wanted to have sex with him. I had sex with him because I was afraid of what would happen if I turned him down, because it seemed easier to go along with it than to fight it, and because I wanted to feel safe and protected.
When a licensed officer of a ship expresses sexual interest in a cadet, it’s nice to think that she can easily and politely decline. But the reality is that there can be a lot of pressure in these situations. There is pressure to fit in, pressure to be liked and feel part of the crew, and pressure to feel protected. I believe this pressure is called “sexual coercion,” and because there is no way for that cadet to walk away or go home in the middle of the ocean, these inherently coercive sexual relationships should not be tolerated on ships.
I’m not sure if I should call what happened to me on that ship “rape.” Maybe that’s too extreme. Maybe it’s not. But I can definitely say that it was not consensual.
At this point my story is over 20 years old, and I am no longer working in the maritime industry. I don’t feel like I need to be anonymous, and I’m not ashamed to have my name attached to this.
If I remembered the name of the perpetrator I would tell you, but I can’t. I tried to forget his name, and I did.