Giles v. Secretary of the Army

84 F.R.D. 374, 1979 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 8328
District Court, District of Columbia·Decided November 27, 1979·No. Civ. A. No. 77-0904·Published·Cited by 2 cases

Opinion

ORDER

BARRINGTON D. PARKER, District Judge.

Upon consideration of plaintiff’s motion for certification of this case as a class action, defendant’s opposition thereto, and the entire record herein, and the Court finding that this action meets all the requirements of Rule 23(a) and Rule 23(b)(2) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, in that

1. There are at least one thousand members of the class for which certification is sought and joinder of all members is impracticable;

2. There are questions of law common to the class regarding whether defendant’s issuance of a less than honorable discharge to each class member violates Article 31 of the Uniform Code of Military Justice (“UCMJ”), 10 U.S.C. § 831;

3. Plaintiff’s claim as to Article 31 is typical of the claim of the class;

4. Plaintiff has fairly and adequately represented the interests of the class in that plaintiff’s delay in amending the complaint to seek class status was not unreasonable and was caused by defendant’s failure to state the grounds upon which plaintiff’s discharge upgrade applications were denied until defendant filed his cross-motion for summary judgment; and

5. By issuing each class member a less than honorable discharge in an administrative proceeding in which the Army introduced evidence of urinalysis testing to which each class member was compelled to submit, defendant has acted on grounds generally applicable to the class; and the Court further finds that

6. Defendant, through use of the systems of records known as MILPERCEN and the Defense Manpower Data Center (“DMDC”) and the systems of records maintained by the Army Discharge Review Board in microfilm or automated data tapes, can compile, at reasonable cost, a list of former Army servicemembers who were separated with a less than honorable discharge by reason of drug abuse;

7. Such a list would contain approximately 10,000 former servicemembers identified through MILPERCEN and DMDC and a smaller number through the Army Discharge Review Board systems of records. A large percentage of the individuals so identified are members of the class certified herein;

8. By reviewing the military personnel records, maintained at the National Personnel Records Center in St. Louis, Missouri, of all those individuals on such list, defendant can determine, at reasonable cost, which of those individuals are members of the class certified herein;

9. Defendant can obtain, at reasonable cost, the last known address of each of these class members from the personnel records maintained at the National Personnel Records Center, the records maintained by the Army Discharge Review Board or Board for Correction of Military Records, or the records maintained by the Defense Manpower Data Center or the Veterans Administration;

10. Notification of their right to receive an honorable discharge certificate to those class members who cannot be identified through use of the procedures described in paragraphs 7 — 10 above can be reasonably achieved through Army press releases and through publication in the Federal Register and in the rules of the Army’s discharge review agencies; and

11. Most of the members of the class certified herein are unlikely to know either that there are agencies available by which [376]*376they can obtain an upgrade in their discharge or that they were unlawfully issued a less than honorable discharge and are legally entitled to an honorable discharge; and it is this 27th day of November, 1979, hereby

ORDERED that plaintiff’s motion to certify this case as a class action is granted and that the class represented by plaintiff, consisting of all former servicemembers of the United States Army who presently possess less than honorable administrative discharges which were characterized as less than honorable in an administrative proceeding in which the Army introduced evidence developed by or as a direct or indirect result of compelled urinalysis testing administered for the purpose of identifying drug abusers (either for purposes of entry into a treatment program or to monitor progress during rehabilitation or follow-up), is hereby certified under Rules 23(b)(2) and 23(c) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure; and it is further

ORDERED that this action may be maintained as a class action on behalf of all persons included in the class certified in this Order, pursuant to Rule 23(c)(1) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure; and it is further

DECLARED that defendant’s issuance of a less than honorable administrative discharge to the members of the class, and defendant’s refusal to recharacterize such discharges, violates Article 31 of the Uniform Code of Military Justice, 10 U.S.C. § 831; and it is further

ORDERED that by January 2, 1980,

defendant compile a list of all those former Army servicemembers who were separated with a less than honorable discharge by reason of drug abuse and who can be identified through the use of the system of records known as MILPERCEN, the systems of records maintained by the Army Discharge Review Board on microfilm or automated data tapes which contain information on past Board applicants, the system of records maintained by the Defense Manpower Data Center, or any other system of records that defendant has access to and which is automated, and that defendant file with the Court and serve plaintiff with a report that describes how this list was created and which, at minimum, separately states, for each such system of records, the number of individuals on the list who were identified through such system; and it is further

ORDERED that by May 15, 1980,

defendant review the personnel and medical records of those individuals on the list and determine which are members of the class certified herein and file with the Court and serve plaintiff with a report that describes the results of this review and which, at minimum, separately states (i) the number of individuals on the list who were determined to be class members, (ii) the various categories of reasons that individuals on the list were determined not to be class members, and (iii) the number of individuals who were determined not to be class members for each of the various categories of reasons; and it is further

ORDERED that by July 15, 1980,

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