Opinion ID: 787298
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 8

Heading: AFIT Sponsorship

Text: 78 After his separation on January 31, 1989, Mr. Roth did not return to active duty until June 27, 1991, resulting in an approximately twenty-nine-month gap in his record. Mr. Roth sought to account for this gap with an AF Form 475 Training Report indicating that the graduate studies he had been pursuing while he was separated were sponsored by AFIT. The AFMPC recommended against the sponsorship, explaining that the gaps in Mr. Roth's record were accounted for by forms prescribed by, inter alia, Air Force Instruction (AFI) 36-2406, AFR 31-3, and AFR 31-11. 13 Memorandum from the AFMPC to the Board at 6. Because Air Force regulations do prescribe how the Air Force accounts for gaps in an officer's record, we find this decision to account for Mr. Roth's absence to be justiciable. 79 In 1991, the Board declined Mr. Roth's request for AFIT sponsorship because the Air Staff indicated there was no education quota in Mr. Roth's degree area during fiscal year 1991. In the Matter of Roth, slip op. at 2-3 (Jan. 30, 1991). The Board instead recommended that Mr. Roth's record be corrected to reflect that he was ordered Permanent Change of Station (PCS) to his home.... Id. at 3. An AF Form 77 was placed in Mr. Roth's record stating, No report available for the period 8 Mar 88 through 26 Jun 91. Member restored to active duty by Direction of the Secretary of the Air Force under AFR 31-3, Air Force Board for the Correction of Military Records. In 1999 the Board again declined to award Mr. Roth AFIT sponsorship for this gap because he was not actually in an AFIT training program during those twenty-nine months; therefore, to insert an AFIT Training Report would create an erroneous and misleading record. In the Matter of Roth, slip op. at 8 (June 2, 1999). 80 Mr. Roth explains that had he not been discharged as a result of the improperly prepared March 1984 OER, he would have received evaluations during these twenty-nine months, and that the Air Force's failure to account for this gap was prejudicial to his record. The Court of Federal Claims thus ordered the Board to issue the AFIT Training Report as part of its duty to Mr. Roth to take steps to grant thorough and fitting relief. Roth, 56 Fed.Cl. at 251 (citing Caddington, 147 Ct.Cl. at 634, 178 F.Supp. 604). Because the court did not identify any statute or regulation that had been violated, however, we disagree with its decision. We also disagree with the Board's decision to permit Mr. Roth's record to reflect his home as his place of active duty, however. This too fails to adequately remedy the gap in Mr. Roth's record, which directly resulted from the initial violation of AFR 36-10, paragraph 3-14(a). We thus modify the ruling of the Court of Federal Claims on this point by ordering that the AF Form 77 in Mr. Roth's record regarding his twenty-nine month absence from the service be corrected to properly explain that both the gap and the resultant lack of OERs for this period occurred through no fault on his part. We leave the exact wording of the correction to the discretion of the Board, with the caveat that the language must be nonprejudicial to Mr. Roth's future prospects for promotion selection. 81 We think this relief, coupled with the award of an AF Form 77 that explains in a nonprejudicial manner the lack of an OER for the eleven months from March 8, 1988, to January 31, 1989, will adequately substitute for the current AF Form 77 in Mr. Roth's record that reads, No report available for the period 8 Mar 88 through 26 Jun 1991. Member restored to active duty.... We agree with Mr. Roth that the language on this form, quoted above, erroneously implies that Mr. Roth was not on active duty for the entire forty months, when in fact, he served on active duty from March 8, 1988, to January 31, 1989, before he was separated — he simply failed to receive the OER he had earned for those eleven months. This error will be remedied by the separate AF Forms 77 we have ordered to be issued: one for the eleven months prior to his 1989 separation for which he should have received an OER by regulation, and one explaining the twenty-nine month gap in his service in a manner that is not prejudicial to him.