STORY TIME: Not all stories are funny, the tale of the downward spiral [SERIOUS, LONG].

Sometimes in life you get to watch as someone else's life spirals out of control. This is such a story. Some of the grief in this dude's life was self-inflicted, but the really bad shit just added injury to insult.

A few years back I was part of a small flight (~20 total enlisted and officers) in an OSS. There was an A1C that will henceforth be known as McCoy. McCoy was a nice enough guy, funny, but a giant dirtbag. McCoy was selected to sponsor a new A1C coming out of Tech School (henceforth known as King).

Well, King ended up getting put in charge of the Snacko and he did a decent job. One of the nice things he did was set up a debt tracker where if you didn't have money on you at the time, you could put tally marks next to your name on an excel sheet hung on the wall and King would shoot you a 'debt collector' email at the start of every pay period letting you know how much you owed. Everyone was pretty cool about settling up, except McCoy. 1st pay period goes by and McCoy owes something like $5. He gets the debt collector email and blows it off. So King just rolls it into the next pay period. Sends out the email and now McCoy owes $8. McCoy blows off the next email...and the next. King talks to McCoy after each email and gets assurances of payment either after lunch or the next day, whatever. Payments that never come.

So after two months of non-payment by McCoy, King's next email goes to McCoy and McCoy's supervisor. McCoy's supervisor tells him to pay King by the end of the week. Guess what? No moulah. So King sends another email, this time to McCoy, McCoy's supervisor, and the flight superintendent (SMSgt type). SMSgt tells McCoy to pay King the $17.50 he owes by the end of the day and tells King to let him know if it doesn't happen.

Guess what?

McCoy promises King to get him the money. King, being a bro, waits late at work (read 1800 when everyone else went home at 1630) but McCoy never shows. So King pops off an email letting the SMSgt know about the no show and heads home. The next day King has an email from SMSgt letting him know to take McCoy's name off the debt tracker and that McCoy is no longer allowed to accrue debt. McCoy got an LOC for his inability to pay his debts.

A few months go by and King deploys. A new LT is given the Snacko duty, of course King did good changeover and let her know about the McCoy fiasco and his inability to use the debt tracker. It only takes a month or so before the LT goes walking in to the snackbar area to see McCoy marking debt on the tracker...which is strange because his name is no longer on the tracker sheet. Turns out McCoy, in his infinite wisdom, was marking debt under another SrA's name.

McCoy ties to quickly exit, but LT confronts him about it. McCoy claims he had the SrA's permission, but that lie fails quickly as the LT walks right over to the SrA who denies the claim. I guess McCoy thought it wouldn't be stealing if he made someone else pay for it.

Remember how McCoy is a dirtbag? We're talking constantly late, sloppy uniform, missed deadlines, etc. Well, stealing was the last straw and he ended up getting his clearance yanked and getting put into the CC's secretary's office to help with shredding or whatever other bitchwork needed to be done.

Around this same time him and his wife pop out a kid. For all things in life that McCoy sucked at, he was a devoted dad. Unfortunately, bad shit happened and we hear one day that McCoy's infant son suddenly died of SIDS. Our flight is shocked and show up en masse to show support for this guy. McCoy is devastated. Clearance gone, going through the process of getting separated, and now a dead son.

Some time goes by. I'm sitting at home doing homework, watching TV. and I look up during the nightly news and see a picture of McCoy's wife's face on the TV. The caption says, "Local woman arrested for capital murder."

WTF!!!

Story goes like this: McCoy, Wife, and another Airman were hanging out at McCoy's place. McCoy's wife goes and put's their son down for a nap. Turns out McCoy was a much better dad than he ever was a husband. Wife decides that the best way for her to get her husband's attention is if their son is out of the picture, so she decides to smother the boy. She then LEAVES THE CORPSE IN THE CRIB AND GOES BACK OUT TO HANG OUT FOR TWO HOURS! Dinner time rolls around, she goes to 'wake up the son' and acts shocked at the site of her own murder.

Well, the coroner wasn't convinced on the SIDS and there had been an investigation going on into Wife ever since the death. She either caught wind of it or just felt super guilty, because one day she decided to drive on base and turn herself into OSI. But wait, there's more...

She claims McCoy knew about it and helped her do it. That accusation doesn't make it very far and McCoy gets cleared, but is put on suicide watch for a time.

During the trial, Wife gets asked if she killed the baby because he was, 'in the way'. Wife just says, "yes". She got 15 yrs and McCoy got discharged shortly thereafter.

TL;DR: Dude life goes from meh, to bad, to oh shit. He steals from snackbar, loses clearance, has son, son dies, wife admits to murdering baby, 15yrs sentence, AF discharge.