Opinion ID: 405227
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: The Lingelbach Deposition

Text: 10 At the time Lingelbach was deposed, he had not recently reviewed all the documentation involved in the selection of Casson over Bunch. Lingelbach Deposition at 6. While he had a general recall of the selection, over five years had elapsed since the selection had been made. See id. at 5-6. During the deposition, Lingelbach gave the following responses to questions from Bunch's counsel: 11 Q In this particular case, as I understand it from Mr. Turner, the feeling was that both the applicants were well qualified or very well qualified in terms of their flying backgrounds and experience and so on; is that correct, to your recollection? 12 A To my recollection, their flying time and so forth was comparable, yes. 13 Q And their qualifications in the unit air craft? 14 A Yes. 15 Q So what we're left with is-there are three things that are listed: their age, education, and retainability. Is that an accurate statement: those are the three factors that distinguished the two candidates? 16 A Those would be three but there are others. I'm sure that in looking at all the factors involved, we decided the most important; certainly those three would be key factors. 17 Q There may have been some others that weren't as important as those three? 18 A Yes. 19 Id. at 11-12. 20 Q You indicated that your primary concern was with this whole-man concept. Isn't that really just another way of saying you want to get the best person you can for the job, taking into account all the factors that influence a person's performance? 21 A I think that's a succinct summary of the definition of that word. In other words, we're looking at the whole-man, and we are interested in getting the best qualified person, and when you think of this in terms of the fact that our defense posture depends very heavily on the reverse side of it, this is probably even more critical than would might appear. 22 Q And you also said, I think, that in this particular case that you were applying the whole-man concept, and there were no single factor(s) that was the primary factor in determining that Casson would be hired instead of Bunch, rather the big picture, I believe. 23 A Yes. There was no prejudice that relates to anyone of these factors that relates to either one of the individuals. We look at the total thing as we would do on an awful lot of these in the course of the year, and based upon personnel and technical judgments, decide which man fits best. 24 Q So, you're saying, I guess, that really education by itself would not have been a determining factor necessarily, and retainability by itself might not have, and age by itself might not have been, but taking all of these factors together, plus what other ones were mentioned in the letter, taking them all together as the determining factor; is that correct? 25 A That's right, taking all the factors and, of course, realizing that each one of those is a very general term that is very broad.... 26 Id. at 27-29. 27 Lingelbach also testified that Casson was chosen for the ART position because he was better qualified on an overall basis: 28 Q In this particular case, other than the letter of April 13, 1973, was there any one single factor that made Captain Casson more desirable to the ART program than Major Bunch, in AFRES' view? 29 A Looking at it in terms of what I have before me and my recollection, which, as you said, because of time is so far back, it was just the judgment of the staff activities involved in the determination that from an overall standpoint, using, again, the total man-concept which incorporates a big picture: today, as well as tomorrow, in terms of potential that the Captain (Casson) was better qualified. There was no single factor that singled it out. 30 Id. at 26.