Amnesty Magazine
Spring 2004
Camouflaging Criminals: Sexual Violence Against Women in the Military
Sexual
assault and domestic violence are widespread in the armed services.
Military response has included flawed investigations, inadequate victim
services, and leniency for thousands of soldier sex offenders. BY AMY HERDY AND MILES MOFFEIT
Female troops serving in the Iraq war are reporting an insidious enemy in their own camps: fellow American soldiers who sexually assault them. At least 37 women service members have sought sexual-trauma counseling and other assistance from civilian rape crisis organizations after returning from war duty in Iraq, Afghanistan, Kuwait, and other overseas stations, according to victims’ advocates. The women, ranging from enlisted soldiers to officers, have reported poor medical treatment, lack of counseling, and incomplete criminal investigations by military officials. Some say they were threatened with punishment after reporting assaults. Others—fearing humiliation, ostracization, or official retaliation—have kept silent.
All soldiers who serve their country in combat zones are in harm’s way, but the risk is compounded for women, almost 60,000 of whom have been, or are currently, stationed in Iraq and Afghanistan. They serve in more combat-support roles than ever before: flying fighter jets, conducting patrols, and analyzing intelligence data, among other duties. But in recent months, as they have returned from duty overseas, some have been suffering from untreated wounds—not from bullets and shrapnel, but from sexual assault; and they are turning to civilian trauma centers and advocates. “We have concerns that victims are not getting forensic exams. Evidence is not being collected in some cases, and they are not getting medical care and other services,” said Christine Hansen, executive director of the Connecticut-based Miles Foundation, which has assisted dozens of such women.
At first, the Pentagon did not respond to repeated requests for information about the number of sexual assault reports during the conflicts; defense officials would say only that they do not tolerate sexual assault in their ranks. “Commanders at every level have a duty to take appropriate steps to prevent it, protect victims, and hold those who commit them accountable,” according to a written statement from the Pentagon.
Then in early February, Secretary of Defense Donald H. Rumsfeld ordered an investigation into the problem of sexual assault, with findings and recommendations to be delivered within 90 days. Pentagon officials announced at that time that at least 88 cases of sexual misconduct have been reported by troops in Iraq, Kuwait, and Afghanistan.
Rumsfeld’s order followed growing congressional pressure: In late January, Rep. Louise Slaughter, D-N.Y., citing an investigative series that ran in The Denver Post, and Rep. Shelley Moore Capito, R-W.Va., launched a bipartisan effort to persuade House leaders to hold full committee hearings to examine the military’s justice system and “root causes” of crimes against military women. “Recent reports have revealed a disturbing trend of sexual assault and abuse of women within the U.S. military,” a Jan. 27 letter from Slaughter and Capito to leaders of the House Armed Services Committee reads. “The problem is exacerbated when these attacks seem to be ignored by some within the military leadership, and when the perpetrators often go unpunished, sometimes at the discretion of their commanding officers.”
This is not the first time that Congress has addressed the problem. In 1994, it established a victim advocacy and support program within the military. And over the last three years the Defense Task Force on Domestic Violence has found that women in the military are vulnerable, in part, because there are not enough advocates to represent their interests and develop safety plans. Task force members say that a majority of military bases still lack even one advocate.
After Danielle was assaulted on Nov. 28 in Kuwait, she needed congressional help to return home. The 23-year-old officer, who asked that her full name not be used, was stationed with her Fort Lewis, Wash. unit at Camp Udairi, about 15 miles from the Iraqi border, for training before deployment to Iraq. She had just finished guard duty at 2:30 a.m. and was stepping into the latrine when she was hit on the back of her head and knocked unconscious, she said. She recalled waking up blindfolded to a man raping her. He had tied her hands with cord, stuffed her underwear in her mouth and wrapped cord around her head; he sliced off her clothes with a knife, cutting her in the process. When fought, she said he threatened to cut open her crotch; he then hit her between the eyes with an object, again knocking her unconscious. When she awoke, the man, who remains unidentified, had left. Danielle said that she ran, naked, bleeding, and gagging, into camp. A fellow soldier cut the cords and put his coat around her before waking her commanders. A rape examination was performed, but she received no treatment for the injuries to her head, back and knees, she said. After the exam, a commander drove her to another camp, where she was allowed to stay. She was interviewed for about three hours, she said.
For the first few days, Danielle said, a fellow woman soldier from her old camp remained with her. Then the woman had to leave to resume training, and Danielle was left alone. Her supervisors denied her requests to see the chaplain, and she was not given counseling for sexual trauma, she said.
An investigator scheduled a polygraph exam for her. “I was hysterical,” she recalled. “There I am, all bruised up and beaten, and somebody in my chain of command wanted me to take a test.” Because the examiner failed to follow through, no polygraph was done. Danielle does not know if investigators were able to gather any DNA during her rape examination. Photos were taken of her injuries hours after the rape, she said.
After several more days of isolation, the young officer overdosed on anxiety medication and was hospitalized. Involvement of family and lawmakers as well as media attention enabled her to return to the United States. Within days of her return, she said, her commanders at Fort Lewis ordered her back to work, even though she still suffered from migraines, blurred vision, and pain from back and leg injuries from the assault.
Susan Avila-Smith, a Washington state-based civilian advocate, intervened, and Danielle was granted leave, but was told that a medical discharge could take six months. Meanwhile, she has heard nothing about her case and fears her rapist will return to Fort Lewis. Her request for assignment to another base was refused. The military’s attitude, she said, has been to downplay her assault.
“Just because I came back with all four limbs intact, they’re treating me like I’m faking,” Danielle said. “I feel like my chain of command betrayed me. I gave four years to that unit, and I feel like it kicked me in the teeth when I was down.” A Fort Lewis spokesman, Jeff Young, said that her case is being investigated and that she has received proper health care. “Those who deploy are served well. She received medical treatment both in theater [overseas] and here.”
Maj. Shawn Phelps, one of Danielle’s commanders, said he could not comment on how her case was handled in Kuwait, but that, since her return to Fort Lewis she has received counseling and been given a military victim’s advocate.
W
hile the numbers of reported cases like Danielle’s mount, it could take months or even years before a more definitive picture of the current extent of sexual assault emerges. Surveys of past prevalence vary widely: In 1991, witnesses told Congress that between 60,000 and 200,000 female veterans had been sexually assaulted over time by servicemen. According to the Congressional Record, nearly 30 percent of 202 female Vietnam veterans surveyed in 1990 reported a sexual encounter “accompanied by force or threat of force.” In the past decade, two Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) surveys found 21 percent and 30 percent of women reporting rape or attempted rape. The last Department of Defense survey, in 1995, puts the percentage of women sexually assaulted in single digits.
But even without accurate numbers, throughout scandal after scandal, experts both inside and outside the military have pointed out shortcomings in how the armed forces handle cases of domestic violence and sexual assault. They have offered solutions and pleaded for changes. And, as the nine-month Denver Post investigation found, the military’s response has fallen short or fallen flat.
Many of the warning signs have been glaringly public. Last year’s sexual assault scandal at the Air Force Academy followed two decades of warning signs. In 1996 an academy official warned that “female cadets may be at high risk for physical or sexual abuse because of institutional culture.” The Air Force did not aggressively look into sexual assaults at the academy until 2002. After the 1991 Navy Tailhook Association convention in Las Vegas, where more than 100 officers sexually assaulted and harassed dozens of women, those officers and other members of the Navy undermined the investigations. No one was convicted. In 1997, after a sexual assault scandal at the Aberdeen Proving Ground, an investigative panel shelved findings linking sexual harassment to military culture, according to a panel adviser. Two years later, a National Academy of Public Administration panel said that problems were widespread in military criminal investigations into sex crimes.
Experts have repeatedly called for accountability and more aggressive
punishment of offenders. But today, leniency is still the rule, as military
leaders continue to choose administrative punishments twice as often
as criminal prosecution for those accused of sexual assault and domestic
violence, according to Defense Department records.
After a VA official warned a Pentagon panel six years ago that rape
cases were being mishandled throughout the military, the committee members
expressed concern. But they omitted the official’s warnings from
their formal report to the Pentagon. Despite calls for reform from within
and outside the military, the armed forces and Congress still grant
commanders disciplinary discretion, allowing them to be lenient with
criminals whom they also regard as good soldiers.
“The system is grossly tainted,” said Dorothy Mackey, a retired Air Force captain who now heads a rape-victim advocacy group in Ohio. “It’s a Trojan horse — it looks really good, but it’s not what it appears to be. And it’s done a great disservice to our military veterans.”
One of those vets is Sharon Mixon. As a young combat medic during Operation Desert Storm, she carried wounded soldiers on litters, wiped patients’ blood off her hands, ran at the shrill whistle of an incoming bomb, and saw children die.
None of it, says Mixon, now 33, was as devastating as when fellow American soldiers gang-raped her in June 1991, and a military police officer rebuffed her effort to report it, she said.
Mixon, a former member of the Colorado National Guard, has been in counseling for more than two years. Diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder, a mental illness caused by trauma, she receives VA disability benefits.
She presented a brave face to the world until 1999, when she began having flashbacks. The tears would not stop. She began cutting herself, not in a suicide attempt but to distract herself from the emotional pain. After a breakdown in 1999, Mixon enrolled in a residential treatment program at a VA hospital.“This program lifted the world off my shoulders,” she said, “because I was treated with respect.”
Like Mixon, many victims of sexual assault keep quiet until after they leave the military. In 1988, a Pentagon survey found that more than 90 percent of military sexual-harassment victims did not report their incidents.
The Defense Task Force on Domestic Violence in its third annual report in March 2003 noted that “victims wish they had never disclosed their abuse because the disclosure damaged their military careers.” The task force recommended dozens of ways to better handle domestic violence cases, such as providing advocates and reviewing how the system managed cases in which the victim died. Pentagon officials said they agree with 80 percent of those proposals, but missed their June 2003 deadline for responding to Congress. Military officials also said that they’ve implemented changes but have provided no specifics, and the National Academy of Public Administration says the Pentagon has taken no action. In 2001, the independent Cox Commission, which reviewed the military justice code on its 50th anniversary, found that commanders had too much discretion.
Additional military sexual-assault cases are now being reported to rape crisis centers as a growing number of deployed troops come home; more than 100,000 are expected to return during the next few months. According to a Department of Defense estimate, women represent 10.4 percent of the total forces who were “in theater” between October 2002 and November 2003. Of those who were rape and assault victims, many will face debilitating effects of post-traumatic stress disorder, unable to trust anyone or sustain relationships. The worst of these non-combat casualties may even contemplate suicide.
This article is adapted from The Denver Post series “Betrayal in the Ranks,” based on a nine-month investigation. www.denverpost.com
Amy Herdy is an investigative reporter for The Denver Post who covers criminal justice issues. Before starting at The Post in 2002, she worked for The St. Petersburg Times as a crime reporter. Miles Moffeit, an Oklahoma native, has been an investigative reporter for The Denver Post since 2002. He has worked as a staff writer for The Fort Worth Star-Telegram and The Dallas Times-Herald.
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