Military.com reports that a federal judge in Florida has ruled that the US Navy cannot do anything to remove a commander of a destroyer, despite testimony that he has flouted the service’s rules for COVID-19 mitigation while seeking a religious exemption from receiving the vaccine for the virus. Navy officers said they cannot deploy the Norfolk, Va.-based Arleigh Burke-class destroyer after the judge’s ruling.

The officer at the heart of this dispute is an unnamed commander who joined the Navy in 2004 according to the lawsuit. Other documents filed by the Navy show that the destroyer he commands belongs to Destroyer Squadron 26.

According to the complaint, the commander filed his religious accommodation request on Sept. 13, 2021. It was denied in late October, and he appealed in November.

On Feb. 2, for the sake of “preservation of the status quo” while the case is being decided, Judge Steven Merryday forbade the Navy from reassigning or demoting the commander. A second order, reaffirming and lengthening the term of the injunction, followed Feb. 18.

According to Capt. Frank Brandon, commodore of the destroyer squadron, however, the Navy’s objection to keeping the vaccine-refusing skipper in place is not about the exemption request but rather his disregard for policies designed to protect his own crew.

Stars and Stripes reports that Capt. Brandon, said in written testimony that he lost faith in the commander’s leadership after he showed up to work Nov. 9 and Nov. 10 while exhibiting coronavirus symptoms, violating a Navy order for symptomatic personnel to get tested.

The commander “could barely speak” and had a sore throat, yet still attended a navigational meeting with 50 to 60 other people. After the meeting, Brandon ordered the commander to take a coronavirus test, which resulted in a positive diagnosis.

Two months later, the commander reportedly lied to Brandon about a leave request, promising he would stay in the local area while off duty to spend time with family. However, Brandon later learned the commander instead took a flight to testify in his Florida court case.

“I consider [the commander’s] failure to notify me that he was traveling out of area to be an egregious breach of trust,” Brandon wrote in his testimony. “I believe that [he] intentionally misled me. This is cause alone for removal.”

The commander also failed to fill out a risk assessment of his travel before his leave, which the Navy requires prior to any travel and “in most cases” requires unvaccinated sailors to quarantine upon their return, according to the testimony.

“If I cannot trust the commanding officer of a guided-missile destroyer to honestly apprise me of his whereabouts, I cannot trust him with command of the ship or [its] crew,” Brandon said.

“In my professional judgment, I cannot leave him in command of a Navy warship, regardless of his vaccination status or religious exemption request,” Brandon said. “[The commander] put his crew at risk due to his personal actions and failed to comply with the Navy’s [coronavirus] policies.”

Though the judge denied the service’s request to issue an immediate pause in the temporary injunction, he will hold a hearing this week to further review the Navy’s appeal.

Thanks to Larry Witmer for contributing to this post.