The Navy announced Wednesday that Chief Petty Officer Michael Toussaint also will receive a letter of censure and be subject to a retirement pay-grade determination, which could significantly affect his retirement pay.

The move came after the Navy decided last month to review its investigation of more than 90 hazing incidents that took place between 2004 and 2006 in the Military Working Dog Division at Naval Security Force, Bahrain.

One of the victims of the hazing, Joseph Rocha, said he decided to leave the Navy in 2007 by telling his commander he was gay, in violation of the military’s “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy.

Rocha said he was tied to a chair and left in a dog kennel, hosed down while in uniform and forced to simulate oral sex on another sailor. He said he first came under suspicion for not sleeping with prostitutes when other men in the unit did. A Veterans Affairs doctor has diagnosed him with post-traumatic stress disorder from the constant hazing.

The case got the attention of Rep. Joe Sestak, D-Pa., a retired three-star admiral, who wrote a letter to Navy Secretary Raymond Mabus asking for an explanation why Toussaint was later promoted to senior chief after the incidents in the unit he led.

Rocha, who is now a student at the University of San Diego, said his only regret was that Toussaint would not be court-martialed, but he said the actions would send a message that “this kind of leadership is not acceptable in our military.”

“I think it’s a phenomenal step in the right direction,” Rocha said in a telephone interview. “I think that it will have lasting implications, for sure, especially as we approach a vote on don’t ask, don’t tell.”

Toussaint, who has been on deployment and not reachable for comment, has been reassigned to Naval Special Warfare Group 2 in Norfolk, Va., where he will perform administrative duties and will not be in a position of leadership. Commander Greg Giesen, a Navy spokesman, said Toussaint has declined all interview requests.

The Chief of Naval Operations, Adm. Gary Roughead, also has directed the Naval Criminal Investigative Service to conduct additional interviews with Navy personnel who were in Bahrain.

After reviewing the Navy’s original investigation, Roughead “found that the incidents were not in keeping with Navy values and standards and violated the Navy’s long-standing prohibition against hazing,” said Cmdr. Elissa Smith, a Navy spokeswoman.

Opponents of the “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy have cited the case as an example of why it should be ended. Rocha couldn’t report the abuse because that could have revealed his sexual orientation. Others in the unit repeatedly asked Rocha if he was gay — a violation of the “don’t ask” provision — because he would not avail himself of prostitutes who visited their quarters.

After his experience in Bahrain, Rocha went to the U.S. Naval Academy’s prep school in 2007, where Rocha said depression resulting from his experience in Bahrain made him decide to tell school officials he was gay. He was isolated from other students for two months, then honorably discharged in October 2007.

Aaron Belkin, who studies the “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy as director of the Palm Center at the University of California at Santa Barbara, said the Navy was sending an important message.

“I just think it’s really important that this shows the Navy is not going to tolerate anti-gay abuse and how the reaction is a professional one and it signals the new day that’s coming on gays in the military,” Belkin said.