The U.S. Navy said Wednesday that it will drop charges against two former USS Fitzgerald officers accused of criminal negligence in the warship's deadly 2017 collision south of Tokyo Bay.
Former Fitzgerald commanding officer Cmdr. Bryce Benson and the destroyer's former tactical action officer Lt. Natalie Combs will instead receive secretarial letters of censure from Navy Secretary Richard Spencer, the navy said in a statement. The two were previously dismissed from their jobs and received nonjudicial punishments, the navy said.
Benson and Combs had been charged with dereliction in the performance of duties through negligence resulting in death and improper hazarding of a vessel.