Mortuary supervisor resigns at Dover

“Dover Air Base mortuary supervisor resigns

By Craig Whitlock,

A mortuary supervisor at the heart of the Dover Air Force Base scandals has resigned, sparing the Pentagon from a decision on whether to fire him for allegedly lying to investigators, mutilating a corpse and retaliating against whistleblowers.

Quinton “Randy” Keel, 44, formerly the Dover mortuary’s division director, cleaned out his desk at the air base Monday after he tendered his resignation, according to officials familiar with the case. An Air Force spokesman, Lt. Col. John L. Dorrian, confirmed that Keel was no longer employed by the Air Force but declined to comment further.Loading...

Keel, of Felton, Del., did not respond to phone messages this week seeking comment.

He was one of three supervisors at Dover whom the Air Force in November accused of “gross mismanagement” at the military’s primary mortuary for handling America’s war dead. An 18-month investigation, spurred by whistleblowers who worked for Keel, documented instances of missing body parts and the sloppy handling of human remains, among other problems.

Investigators from an independent agency, the Office of Special Counsel, found that Keel had tried to fire two of the whistleblowers. In November, it accused him of “a pattern of negligence, misconduct and dishonesty.” The office, which handles federal whistleblower complaints, also accused the Air Force of a “failure to acknowledge culpability for wrongdoing relating to the treatment of remains.”

In response, senior Air Force officials stripped Keel of his title. They then transferred him to another management job at Dover created for him, angering the Office of Special Counsel, members of Congress and veterans groups who said he should have been fired.

At the time, senior Air Force leaders defended their actions. Gen. Norton A. Schwartz, the Air Force chief of staff, said the Dover supervisors did not intentionally commit wrongdoing. “This wasn’t a deliberate act, in my personal view,” he told reporters.

Investigators found that Keel ordered an embalmer to saw off the arm bone of Sgt. Daniel Angus, a Marine killed in Iraq, so he could fit in his dress uniform in a casket. Keel overruled objections from mortuary workers that such an act amounted to mutilation and that they lacked permission from the Marine’s family.

Frustrated parents

Angus’s parents, Kathy and William Angus of Thonotosassa, Fla., remain frustrated with the Air Force’s handling of the scandals at Dover, according to their attorney, Mark J. O’Brien of Tampa.

“They would have preferred that Mr. Keel have been fired months ago but they are certainly not upset at the news that he resigned,” O’Brien said in an e-mail. “However, if nothing else happens in this matter except for one of the major players involved in this cover-up being allowed to resign in lieu of being fired, then the Angus family will not be — nor will they ever be — satisfied.”

James G. Parsons, Sr., a mortuary technician who had objected to Keel’s orders to saw off the Marine’s arm, was subsequently fired by Keel after he filed a whistleblower complaint about that and other problems at Dover. Parsons was reinstated to his job after the Office of Special Counsel intervened.”