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View Full Version : Major Effort to End Military Self-Policing on Sexual Assault



IMPress Polly
07-31-2013, 08:51 AM
Senator Kirsten Gillibrand of of New York has rapidly assembled a robust list of supporters for her proposal to remove the policing of sexual assault cases from the military's chain of command and to give that authority instead to an independent military prosecutor. Her coalition includes an unlikely alliance of many of my favorite Senators (e.g. Bernie Sanders of my native Vermont, Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts, Mazie Hirono of Hawaii, and Barbara Boxer of California) and some of those I like the least (e.g. Ted Cruz of Texas and David Vitter of Louisiana. Even Rand Paul of Kentucky, to one's great surprise, has gotten on board. The support of Cruz and Paul is particularly stunning considering that those two earlier this same year were part of a group of just four U.S. Senators who not only voted against reauthorizing the Violence Against Women Act, but also to propose that it was unconstitutional (http://thinkprogress.org/justice/2013/02/06/1548961/meet-the-four-republican-senators-who-think-the-violence-against-women-act-is-unconstitutional/). Why they've suddenly decided that they care about sexual abuse victims is beyond me unless it in some way relates to their urges to chip away at the military. Anyway, the number of Senators supporting the legislation has grown from 30 as of July 12th to 44 as of this date (out of 100, of course). It appears it may be possible to assemble a majoritarian, bi-partisan coalition to get this done. (The latter part is important to preventing a filibuster. A filibuster would effectively require that the bill have 60 votes to pass the Senate. Without a filibuster, only 51 would be required and it looks like we're nearly there.)

Anyone who has followed my posts for very long knows where I stand on this matter: I completely support this effort. Rape and sexual assault are epidemic and rapidly growing problems in the U.S. military at present. The number of sexual assaults in the military, for example, rose from 19,000 in 2011 to 26,000 in 2012, which means that over one-third of women in the military experience it, as compared with one-fifth of American women more broadly. Women in the military are more likely to be raped by one of their "comrades" than they are to be killed in combat despite the fact that we're (wrongly, IMO) at war. These large and rapidly growing numbers are consequential of a culture wherein rape is considered normal and acceptable and the victims are the ones who usually get punished: The military itself estimates that just a small, single-digit fraction of assailants get convicted, whereas 62% of those who report being sexually assaulted say they experience official retaliation for doing so. (So much for the "zero tolerance policy" myth!) No wonder the overwhelming majority of victims, so the military itself estimates, don't bother reporting what happened to them! The victims themselves are the ones demanding that the military's self-policing authority on this issue be removed because they don't trust the chain of command. As I've said before, in any area of social life, self-policing is non-policing. It doesn't happen. And in a self-policing institution built on a foundation of violence and almost exclusively composed of men, could we honestly expect that sexual abuse WOULDN'T be rampant? (You could probably sense my conceptual disdain for militaries in general just there.) This problem is only going to keep getting worse unless and until action is taken to separate these cases from the military's chain of command.

Senator Gillibrand, though not part of the advance guard of progressive Senators (duly note, for example, the extent of support her 2012 election campaign was given by Wall Street), has nonetheless earned a reputation for being the Senate's principal leader on women's issues, having gone as far as to form a feminist organization of her own -- Off the Sidelines (http://www.offthesidelines.org/home) -- aimed at electing women to governing positions and passing legislation advancing the cause of gender equality. I support her in these efforts. She was interviewed on the subject of her proposed legislation on military sexual assault cases last night on the PBS News Hour. (http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/politics/july-dec13/military_07-30.html) I'd recommend checking out what she had to say.

metheron
07-31-2013, 09:17 AM
I don't really understand why anyone would not support having an independent investigator. I would like to hear a good argument against it.

GrassrootsConservative
07-31-2013, 01:27 PM
Even Rand Paul of Kentucky, to one's great surprise, has gotten on board. The support of Cruz and Paul is particularly stunning considering that those two earlier this same year were part of a group of just four U.S. Senators who not only voted against reauthorizing the Violence Against Women Act, but also to propose that it was unconstitutional (http://thinkprogress.org/justice/2013/02/06/1548961/meet-the-four-republican-senators-who-think-the-violence-against-women-act-is-unconstitutional/). Why they've suddenly decided that they care about sexual abuse victims is beyond me unless it in some way relates to their urges to chip away at the military.

Only a Liberal could take something like rape and use it for political snipes at Republican politicians. Also, which part of the Violence Against Women Act has to do with sexual abuse? Violence and sexual abuse are not the same things, Polly.

IMPress Polly
07-31-2013, 03:10 PM
G-Con wrote:
Only a Liberal could take something like rape and use it for political snipes at Republican politicians.

Nonsense. I simply pointed out the apparent inconsistency of the way they've voted on the issue. Though I typically like Republicans the least, I'm not a partisan hack. Those who know much about me know that the topic of rape is the most personal one there is for me. I would not trivialize it for partisan purposes.


Also, which part of the Violence Against Women Act has to do with sexual abuse? Violence and sexual abuse are not the same things, Polly.

The Violence Against Women Act is a federal law aimed at addressing domestic violence. I don't know what the hell you're talking about when you say that sexual abuse isn't covered under that because it most certainly is. The VAWA has, in fact, been the most effective legislation on our books in terms of reducing the rate of rape in this country, the United Nations has found.

GrassrootsConservative
07-31-2013, 03:18 PM
I never said sexual abuse isn't covered under the VAWA. I had ASKED which part of it had to do with sexual abuse.

And I would consider you a partisan hack. Every post I've seen from you that had something noteworthy in it has pointed to that. I also think you're a feminazi, and a grungy OWSer.

Just saying.

Peter1469
07-31-2013, 04:17 PM
I don't really understand why anyone would not support having an independent investigator. I would like to hear a good argument against it.


The military justice system is run by commanders (at the lowest level practicable for the charges and rank of the people involved). I can understand Polly's position for removing sex crimes out of this structure. But I think that this cure would be worse than the disease. There are certainly abuses under the current system; there are commanders who may not take some complaints seriously; but there are also all of the typical problems with prosecuting sex crimes that are seen in the civilian world.

In my 22 months of prosecuting crimes in the Army, a majority were sex crimes. Only one was a violent rape (in the sense of attacking and overpowering the victim); all of the rest were date rapes (albeit some of those were pretty sick). And lost of sexual harrasment that was handled non-judicially.

I assume that the proposed plan would appoint a JAG command for each service that would do nothing but prosecute (and make the command decisions about) sex crimes. With the commanders out of the responsibility structure we will likely see victims and accused immediately transferred to some central base; basically sidelined until the investigation and trial is over. It will be a mess.

Have any of the proponents of this proposal explained how these sorts of problems would be solved? Has anyone with military legal or command experience come on board for this?

Peter1469
08-15-2013, 11:26 AM
This may not be the right thread for this story, but close enough. We were talking about this topic and Obama's remarks that have caused military judges to dismiss many sexual assault courts martial due to undue command influence. The Sec Def is trying to fix this problem. (http://www.nytimes.com/2013/08/15/us/politics/hagel-tries-to-blunt-effect-of-obama-words-on-sex-assault-cases.html?hp&_r=0) I suspect that this will be enough to end the dismissals for undue command influence.


In an effort to stop military lawyers from using comments by President Obama (http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/people/o/barack_obama/index.html?inline=nyt-per) to prevent sexual assault prosecutions, Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel (http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/people/h/chuck_hagel/index.html?inline=nyt-per) has sent out a directive ordering the military to exercise independent judgment in the cases and effectively ignore the president’s remarks.
“There are no expected or required dispositions, outcomes or sentences in any military justice case, other than what result from the individual facts and merits of a case and the application to the case of the fundamentals of due process of law,” Mr. Hagel wrote in a memorandum dated Aug. 6 that is to be disseminated throughout the military.

IMPress Polly
08-16-2013, 06:53 AM
The PBS News Hour yesterday featured another good segment dealing with topic. (http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/military/july-dec13/military_08-15.html) It includes a fairly extensive interviews on the subject with an attorney who supports Kirsten Gillibrand's bill to remove control of the prosecution of sexual assault cases from the military's chain of command on the one hand and a retired general who instead favors Chuck Hagel's recent tweaks to the military's existing system on the other. Believe what you will, but in my mind the attorney has the much stronger argument. The retired general uses a lot of specialized military lingo, but to roughly translate his line of argument, it's that things are basically cool as they are, the system works fine and just needs a few small tweaks. That doesn't add up to me when we're talking about a 36% increase in the number of sexual assaults in one year and a conviction rate of less than 1%. I particularly liked the former general's explanation toward the end that these are hard cases because there are often no witnesses except for the two people (presuming only two people were involved), etc. Well the thing there is that these same problems are encountered in civilian society as well, yet civilian does a substantially better job at prosecuting these cases. Don't get me wrong: the whole society has a problem in this area. What I'm highlighting though is that the military has a SPECIAL problem.

Peter1469
08-16-2013, 02:44 PM
The PBS News Hour yesterday featured another good segment dealing with topic. (http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/military/july-dec13/military_08-15.html) It includes a fairly extensive interviews on the subject with an attorney who supports Kirsten Gillibrand's bill to remove control of the prosecution of sexual assault cases from the military's chain of command on the one hand and a retired general who instead favors Chuck Hagel's recent tweaks to the military's existing system on the other. Believe what you will, but in my mind the attorney has the much stronger argument. The retired general uses a lot of specialized military lingo, but to roughly translate his line of argument, it's that things are basically cool as they are, the system works fine and just needs a few small tweaks. That doesn't add up to me when we're talking about a 36% increase in the number of sexual assaults in one year and a conviction rate of less than 1%. I particularly liked the former general's explanation toward the end that these are hard cases because there are often no witnesses except for the two people (presuming only two people were involved), etc. Well the thing there is that these same problems are encountered in civilian society as well, yet civilian does a substantially better job at prosecuting these cases. Don't get me wrong: the whole society has a problem in this area. What I'm highlighting though is that the military has a SPECIAL problem.

I believe that the 36% increase in one year with less than a 1% conviction rate was at the time policy changed to take all of these cases to court-martial. Prior to that weak cases were handled at lower levels.

Peter1469
08-16-2013, 08:02 PM
Here is an update on the Sinclair case. (http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/sordid-details-spill-out-in-rare-court-martial-of-a-general/2013/08/14/f6c89c68-008d-11e3-a661-06a2955a5531_story.html?hpid=z5)


FORT BRAGG, N.C. — It was an illicit and volatile love affair that spanned two war zones and four countries. The married general couldn’t stay away from a captain on his staff. She fell hard for her boss and called him “Poppa Panda Sexy Pants.” The three-year entanglement ended disastrously for both, at a time that could not be worse for the Army.



This is a crazy case.