Editor’s note: “The flying fraternity: Chaplain’s female assistant claims coercion” is the sixth in a series of stories about allegations that male officials have mistreated women, have abused alcohol and have been given preferential treatment by superiors. Read Part 1: “Top Gun Culture Pervades National Guard” here, Part 2: “Guard commander’s wings clipped after secret rendezvous” here, Part 3: “Africa, alcohol and the Afterburner Club” here, Part 4: “The Ghost Soldiers of the Vermont National Guard” here, Part 5: “Female Guard members claim barrage of harassment” here, and Part 7: “Whistleblower says Guard retaliated against him” here.
[F]rom an early age, Heather King understood the challenges of being a woman in the military. Decades later, she said she faced the perils of working while female in the Vermont Air National Guard.
King comes from a long line of military members. Her father was a flight simulator mechanic; her mother was a radar plotter in the U.S. Air Force. King’s mother enlisted in 1954, just six years after Congress first permitted women to serve as permanent military members with passage of the Women’s Armed Services Integration Act.
As a radar plotter, King’s mother jotted coordinates and commands on a glass panel. The information was written backwards so that the crew on the other side of the glass could read her words. While her work at the Air Defense Command at New York’s Stewart Air Force Base was highly sensitive, there were also lighthearted tasks. She was part of the first crew that plotted the path of Santa Claus on Christmas Eve, which has since became an annual tradition by the North American Aerospace Defense Command.
King’s mother loved her work, but was forced to leave her job in 1956, after she became pregnant with King’s older sister. The message to her from the military was clear: “You are no longer useful to us.”
Her father remained in the service until his retirement in 1973. The family then moved to Essex, Vermont, when King was 12 or 13. Her father’s various assignments took the family to England, Indiana, South Carolina, Michigan and Virginia. When her family moved to Essex, it was the first time King spent four consecutive years in the same school.
King felt out of place in the civilian world. She loved growing up on military bases, where the community was strong, her classmates shared experiences and similar viewpoints, and the base’s movie theater played the National Anthem before each film started rolling.
’A lot of things haven’t changed’
Two years after she graduated from Essex High School, at age 19, King excitedly enlisted in the active duty Air Force, along with her younger brother. One of her sisters also served in the Air Guard.
While King was aware of the gender discrimination her mother had faced, King thought that in the 30 or so intervening years, the organization would have tamped down sexism.
“I was pretty naive,” she said in an interview with VTDigger. “It was the 1980s, I figured by then there would be more respect for women in the workplace. It never crossed my mind that I would have to deal with the kind of garbage that my mom dealt with. The military puts on a good face, but when you dig down, a lot of things haven’t changed.”
While in basic training, King was given the Defense Language Aptitude Battery exam, and passed with flying colors. Shortly thereafter, she trained to be a Korean linguist at the Defense Language Institute in Monterey, California. In 1983, after training and a tour at Osan Air Force Base in South Korea, King joined the National Security Agency at Fort Meade, Maryland.
She spent much of the time at NSA listening to and interpreting audio recordings. To this day she remains tight-lipped about what she heard, joking that her unit’s unofficial motto was “In God we trust, in all others we monitor.”
Like her mother, King believed her work with the military was meaningful, and she felt ostracized once she started a family.
By 1986, King had a young daughter, and was pregnant with a second child, a boy. She left the military that year, after an explicit statement from her commander that “women with children have no business in the military.”
“I made some significant contributions as a linguist, all of which were ignored — all of which men took credit for,” she recalled. “They didn’t like females there, they didn’t want females there unless they were to be playthings. That was the way the military was.”
King then paused, before correcting herself. “That’s the way some in the military still are.”
After leaving the NSA, King worked a series of civilian jobs, from baker to McDonald’s employee, to administrative assistant. She moved back to Vermont in 1994 as a single mother of three. King’s parents and two sisters still called the Green Mountain State home and helped care for her children, including her son who was diagnosed with Asperger’s Syndrome at an early age.
King yearned to return to the military, but believed she wouldn’t be able to as a single mother. When she learned that the Vermont Air National Guard welcomed single parents, she re-enlisted in April 2001. Her new position: chaplain’s assistant.
Hazard in a new job
Almost immediately after re-enlisting, she said she faced sexist behavior. During a six-week training course to prepare her for her new role, conducted at Maxwell Air Force Base in Montgomery, Alabama, she said a Vermont airman made inappropriate jokes and played raunchy songs on the radio.
When King returned to Vermont, she brought the boorish behavior to the attention of her new boss, Chaplain Calvin Kemp. She said Kemp, a fighter pilot turned pastor, brushed off her concerns as trivial. Kemp flew F-15’s for the Air Force stationed in Germany and Arizona before promising to join the ministry during a mid-air mechanical problem.
“Kemp kinda blew it off,” King recalled in an interview. “He told me he would talk to them, and that we should handle things in house.” Soon after, King said Kemp made similarly crude comments on the job.
Kemp left active duty in 1992 to become a minister. He went to the seminary in 1996 and became the pastor at the Williamstown Lutheran Church, LCMS, where he serves today.
The modest white church sits on Graniteville Road, just south of the Barre Rock of Ages quarry. On a recent Sunday, about 20 people attended the service where Kemp delivered a sermon on a passage from the Old Testament that foretells the end of the world.
“The earth will wear out like a garment, and they who dwell in it will die in like manner,” Kemp told the congregants. “But My salvation will be forever, and My righteousness will never be dismayed.”
Kemp joined the Guard in 2000 as a part-time chaplain at the Air National Guard base in South Burlington, then later became a full-time chaplain, offering spiritual services to both Vermont Army Guard soldiers and Air Guard airmen who served overseas after 9/11.
In her first few years, King enjoyed her work at the chaplain’s office, and developed a good working relationship with Kemp. The two had collaborated on a number of major initiatives, including establishment of a chapel and offices at the Green Mountain Armory at Camp Johnson. As Kemp traveled to check in on army units across the state and brief leaders, King often traveled with him in a support role.
After one such meeting with Kemp — King told a judge it occurred in 2005 — she said the chaplain stopped at a convenience store in Waterbury off Route 100 and picked up a six-pack of beer. She said he then suggested the two discuss the meeting over a beer on the banks of the Winooski River.
In an account she told VTDigger and also described in detail to a Vermont judge, King said felt apprehension.
“At this point I was starting to feel a little funny, but I wasn’t quite sure what to do,” King said in an interview. “He’s the chaplain, you know, we’ve been through a lot together. I had met his wife, I’d started going to his church. I trusted this guy.” King said that casual alcohol consumption at the Guard wasn’t a big deal at the time, saying “having a beer with lunch would not be considered an issue.” According to the church website, Kemp has been married 38 years.
Once the two arrived at the edge of the river, alarm bells began to go off, King recalled. But the conversation never veered from work issues and remained appropriate. And although she felt uncomfortable, King thought, “He’s my boss, he must know what he’s doing.”
But after the two got back to the car, King said Kemp did not return to the highway, and instead drove onto a back road that led to a rural area. King said she was not familiar with Vermont’s back roads and her feeling of panic returned. Kemp said he wanted to show her something and King, suppressing her fear, voiced no objection.
After several minutes driving, Kemp parked his car near a path in the woods, King recalled. “All this time he was talking about the great things we’d do if I got the full-time position, which of course he was the selecting person for that.”
The two walked the path for a short time, before sitting together on a bench. Kemp cracked another beer, and began drinking, King said. Then after a few minutes, Kemp told King to turn around. When she did, she said in court testimony and in an interview, that she saw that Kemp had unzipped his pants and was displaying his genitals in front of her face.
King took this behavior as an implicit, if crude, demand for oral sex. Sitting in an unfamiliar forest, King saw no way out and flashed back to an incident years back when her first husband had made a similar demand on a remote Texas highway. When she refused her husband’s demand, “he left me on the road and took off,” King recalled.
Now with the chaplain, “those fears compounded with my total disbelief as to what was going on,” King told a Vermont judge in 2013. “I just didn’t want to be left there, and I complied,” a decision she said took years to forgive herself for.
After the incident, King felt as if Kemp was remorseful, though she said he never apologized. Sometime later, while at work, Kemp invited her to his camp, on Daniels Pond in Glover. She thought they would discuss what had happened away from the base.
“It started fine enough, we were fishing — he knew I loved to fish. It started off as a good conversation, too,” she said. “But then he gave me a drink. I don’t remember a lot after that, but the next thing I know I’m on the floor. And he was on top of me.”
King recalled rushing off in her car after the incident, already late to pick up her youngest son from school. Shame poured over her as she lied to him about why she was late.
Coercive relationship alleged
In retelling both of these stories, King vividly remembered key details, but couldn’t recall others. She couldn’t remember, for instance, how she got home after the incident in the woods. (Trauma can often fog memory according to the writings of Dr. James Hopper, Ph.D., a Psychology professor at Harvard Medical School.)
King said the two events marked the start of what she considered a years-long sexually coercive relationship between her and Kemp that ended around 2008.
In an August 2013 Vermont Superior Court hearing in Chelsea, during which King sought a no-contact order against Kemp, she testified that although the chaplain never physically coerced her or threatened her with loss of her job, “I felt it was implied. You do this for me, I will make sure you have a job.”
Regarding the events between her and Kemp, King told the court “they all blend in. Basically it was a nightmare that I chose to ignore. I was afraid reporting that no one would believe me. So I chose not to report. I did not want to lose my job.”
When the judge asked if Kemp had threatened to fire her, King said: “I felt that it was implied. Those exact words were never used.”
In her interview with VTDigger, King choked back tears as she said, “At work, he kept saying how easy it was to fire a chaplain assistant. He made this point lots of times, at random times, reminding me that my job was hinging on him. I knew I couldn’t report it; I thought nothing would happen and I’d lose my job and I loved my job.”
King said she found it virtually impossible to extricate herself from Kemp. As the chaplain’s assistant, she was almost always by his side, including on deployments and at Strong Bonds couples retreats. King said she passed on various temporary duty assignments in order to avoid what she considered Kemp’s offensive social behavior.
King said Kemp also insisted that she read pornographic literature and even tasked her to draft her own sexually explicit stories. VTDigger reviewed text messages between Kemp and King from 2012, after King said the toxic relationship had ended. In one exchange from May 2012, Kemp texted King that he was enjoying a breeze on his porch after mowing the lawn. After King responded that it was “hot in Building 70,” Kemp replied “Sorry to hear that … who needs clothes?”
Later that day, Kemp wrote “Porch time reminds me of good times. Yes?”
King said this was a reference to a previous sexual encounter at Kemp’s home while his wife was out of town. Her response to Kemp: “Long time ago.”
“Yup,” Kemp wrote. “Should we share again?”
“I think not,” she replied. “I am still paying the price for it.”
In another thread, from November 2012, Kemp told King that he disliked getting medical care “unless you’re playing doctor.”
King’s estranged husband declined to comment on how he viewed the relationship between Kemp and King, but said King was being truthful in her account. King’s estranged husband acknowledged joining the relationship as a third party, a relationship Kemp’s lawyer raised while arguing against the no-contact order and the judge referenced in his ruling.
Under questioning from Kemp’s lawyer at the court hearing, King said her husband was “very unhappy” that the encounters were “with my supervisor.”
“I like to think that he did it to protect me,” King said. “He was very protective.”
Unsatisfying results from proceedings
On her last day in the Guard as a full-time technician, on June 30, 2013, King filed an unrestricted report of sexual assault against Kemp. (An unrestricted report in the military — unlike a restricted report — triggers an official investigation and command notification of the allegations.)
Efforts to interview Kemp for this story were unsuccessful, including attempts to reach Kemp by telephone.
Kemp also would not discuss the allegations following a recent Sunday service in Williamstown. He declined to answer multiple questions. When asked why he had retired from the Guard, Kemp said “I’m all done” and walked away.
Military regulations prohibit relationships between members under a variety of circumstances, including when they include “the improper use of grade or position for personal gain or demonstrate the abandonment of organizational goals for personal interests” or “is reasonably perceived to be, exploitive or coercive in nature.”
As part of the investigation, King was interviewed by the base’s sexual assault response coordinator (SARC), Jeffrey Rector, as well as Lt. Angela Lakey, the Vermont National Guard SARC. She was also interviewed by Vermont State Police at the Williston Barracks, but the authorities concluded there was not enough physical evidence to continue with a civilian investigation, King said.
King said that after the Guard began investigating Kemp, it issued a no-contact order between the two. As the investigation continued, King said she was worried Kemp could retaliate if the investigation hurt him professionally, and she sought a permanent relief order from Kemp at the Vermont Superior Court in Chelsea. She was granted a temporary relief order on August 9, 2013. Later that month, King and Kemp appeared in civil court for a hearing over the merits of the order, and whether it should be extended.
Asked by the judge why she had requested the relief order, King said that Kemp had shown up at her house unannounced in the past, after the relationship had ended, under the influence of alcohol. (King’s husband confirmed this behavior.) King said Kemp can be “erratic” while drinking, and she was concerned that he might visit her again if the results of the military investigation damaged Kemp’s career or public image.
Kemp was in the courtroom, but chose not to take the stand. His lawyer argued against King’s request, in part contending that there was no ongoing concern that Kemp was going to harm King because she had left the Guard.
In his decision, the judge told King that while Kemp hadn’t explicitly threatened her job, “the military structure lends credibility to that feeling.” He said King’s behavior appeared “participatory, if not fully consensual,” but did not issue a no-contact order. He noted King had retired and that there was “no ongoing fear of contact.”
“If only the relationship was based on work coercion — that is your testimony — I think that threat has been removed by the circumstance of [your] retirement,” said the judge, who was not identified on the recording.
King’s victim advocate, Lt. Col. Jeffrey Rector, attended the hearing in a supportive role. He told VTDigger that he has heard King’s story multiple times over five years, and that the details have remained consistent.
As the military investigation continued, Rector said he warned Guard leadership that Kemp was nearing the end of his required commissioned service as a colonel, when he would be required to leave the Guard, a policy known in the military as his Mandatory Separation Date. Rector, the SARC, said he advised leadership to put a hold on Kemp, so that the investigation could be completed and a decision issued before Kemp could separate.
In August, King submitted a public records request with Richard Dupuis — the FOIA manager for the Vermont Army National Guard —- asking for records relating to her investigation. In an email, Dupuis referred the request to the Air National Guard. Even though King sought an expedited process, and requested help from the office of Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., her request was denied in a Nov. 13 letter written the Department of Defense’s Brigadier Counsel, Christian Rofrano.
Near the end of 2014, the results of the investigation were presented to the Vermont Guard’s Administrative Discharge Board during a hearing in which King and her victim advocate were present. They both said that Kemp did not show up at the hearing to defend himself. According to documents obtained by VTDigger, the board decided to administratively discharge Kemp. However, as the decision went up the military chain, it was deemed “legally insufficient” by the Air Force’s Judge Advocate, and sent back to Vermont headquarters. With the case stalled, Kemp was able to retire with full benefits and the rank of colonel, according to two sources with knowledge of the investigation.
“Guard leadership allowed Kemp to ride off into the sunset even though command had the authority and ability to stop his separation and finish the investigation,” Rector said. “They just chose not to.”
In a letter addressed to King on Feb. 18, 2015, Brig. Gen. (Ret.) Richard Harris notified King that the case against Kemp had been closed.
“I know this has been a very difficult process for you and your family,” Harris wrote. “I wish you the best in retirement and I thank you for your years of service to the Vermont Air National Guard.”
’The best job I ever had’
While King was traumatized during her time at the Guard, she remains deeply proud of her military heritage and her service in the Vermont Air National Guard. “The overwhelming majority of those who serve in the Guard are good people who embody the core values of integrity first, service before self, and excellence in all we do,” she said. “We can’t let a few be the image for the rest.”
Four years ago, King helped dedicate a park in Williamstown to veterans, and she now organizes the town’s Veterans Day activities each year. This past year’s events included a flag ceremony, music from the middle and high school bands and chorus, and oral essays from students thanking veterans for their service. King is now studying to get a master’s degree in social work from the University of Vermont. Asked what motivated her to forge a new career path at age 57, King didn’t hesitate with an answer.
“Social work is the closest thing in the civilian world to being a chaplain’s assistant,” she said.
“And that was the best job I ever had.”
During Kemp’s service last Sunday, he warned that “the world is falling apart” and predicted an approaching “Judgement Day.”
“As we gather together in the Lord’s house, let us consider our failure to live according to His Holiness,” Kemp said. The congregation chanted “we have fallen asleep in the comfort of our sins,” then they asked for forgiveness, after which Kemp offered atonement.
Help us investigate: Do you know what’s going on at the Vermont National Guard? Contact Jasper Craven at 802-274-0365 or jclarkcraven@gmail.com
