Sailor admits gay murder

A US sailor pleaded guilty at a court martial to the savage killing of a homosexual seaman, Reuter reports from Yokosuka, Japan. Airman Apprentice Terry Helvey, 21, of the amphibious assault ship Belleau Wood, admitted murdering Seaman Allen Schindler last October in a public lavatory in a park outside the US naval base in Sasebo, southern Japan, where their ship was stationed.

Judge Commander David Holcombe, presiding over the court martial at the Yokosuka naval base south of Tokyo, struck out the word 'premeditated' from the main charge in accepting the plea from Helvey on the opening day of the trial. Helvey faces a maximum penalty of life imprisonment. He could have faced the death penalty if he had pleaded not guilty.