[House Hearing, 111 Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
SEXUAL ASSAULT IN THE MILITARY PART IV: ARE WE MAKING PROGRESS?
=======================================================================
HEARING
before the
SUBCOMMITTEE ON NATIONAL SECURITY
AND FOREIGN AFFAIRS
of the
COMMITTEE ON OVERSIGHT
AND GOVERNMENT REFORM
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
ONE HUNDRED ELEVENTH CONGRESS
SECOND SESSION
__________
FEBRUARY 24, 2010
__________
Serial No. 111-73
__________
Printed for the use of the Committee on Oversight and Government Reform
Available via the World Wide Web: http://www.gpoaccess.gov/congress/
index.html
http://www.house.gov/reform
U.S. GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE
58-134 PDF WASHINGTON : 2010
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
For sale by the Superintendent of Documents, U.S. Government Printing
Office Internet: bookstore.gpo.gov Phone: toll free (866) 512-1800; DC
area (202) 512-1800 Fax: (202) 512-2104 Mail: Stop IDCC, Washington, DC
20402-0001
COMMITTEE ON OVERSIGHT AND GOVERNMENT REFORM
EDOLPHUS TOWNS, New York, Chairman
PAUL E. KANJORSKI, Pennsylvania DARRELL E. ISSA, California
CAROLYN B. MALONEY, New York DAN BURTON, Indiana
ELIJAH E. CUMMINGS, Maryland JOHN L. MICA, Florida
DENNIS J. KUCINICH, Ohio MARK E. SOUDER, Indiana
JOHN F. TIERNEY, Massachusetts JOHN J. DUNCAN, Jr., Tennessee
WM. LACY CLAY, Missouri MICHAEL R. TURNER, Ohio
DIANE E. WATSON, California LYNN A. WESTMORELAND, Georgia
STEPHEN F. LYNCH, Massachusetts PATRICK T. McHENRY, North Carolina
JIM COOPER, Tennessee BRIAN P. BILBRAY, California
GERALD E. CONNOLLY, Virginia JIM JORDAN, Ohio
MIKE QUIGLEY, Illinois JEFF FLAKE, Arizona
MARCY KAPTUR, Ohio JEFF FORTENBERRY, Nebraska
ELEANOR HOLMES NORTON, District of JASON CHAFFETZ, Utah
Columbia AARON SCHOCK, Illinois
PATRICK J. KENNEDY, Rhode Island BLAINE LEUTKEMEYER, Missouri
DANNY K. DAVIS, Illinois ANH ``JOSPEH'' CAO, Louisiana
CHRIS VAN HOLLEN, Maryland
HENRY CUELLAR, Texas
PAUL W. HODES, New Hampshire
CHRISTOPHER S. MURPHY, Connecticut
PETER WELCH, Vermont
BILL FOSTER, Illinois
JACKIE SPEIER, California
STEVE DRIEHAUS, Ohio
JUDY CHU, California
Ron Stroman, Staff Director
Michael McCarthy, Deputy Staff Director
Carla Hultberg, Chief Clerk
Larry Brady, Minority Staff Director
Subcommittee on National Security and Foreign Affairs
JOHN F. TIERNEY, Massachusetts, Chairman
CAROLYN B. MALONEY, New York JEFF FLAKE, Arizona
PATRICK J. KENNEDY, Rhode Island DAN BURTON, Indiana
CHRIS VAN HOLLEN, Maryland JOHN L. MICA, Florida
PAUL W. HODES, New Hampshire JOHN J. DUNCAN, Jr., Tennessee
CHRISTOPHER S. MURPHY, Connecticut MICHAEL R. TURNER, Ohio
PETER WELCH, Vermont LYNN A. WESTMORELAND, Georgia
BILL FOSTER, Illinois PATRICK T. McHENRY, North Carolina
STEVE DRIEHAUS, Ohio JIM JORDAN, Ohio
STEPHEN F. LYNCH, Massachusetts JEFF FORTENBERRY, Nebraska
HENRY CUELLAR, Texas BLAINE LUETKEMEYER, Missouri
MIKE QUIGLEY, Illinois
Andrew Wright, Staff Director
C O N T E N T S
----------
Page
Hearing held on February 24, 2010................................ 1
Statement of:
Farrell, Brenda S., Director, Defense Capacilibites and
Management, Government Accountability Office, accompanied
by Randolph Hite, Director, Information Technology and
Architecture Systems, Government Accountability Office;
Louis Iasiello, Co-Chairman, Defense Task Force on Sexual
Assault in the Military Servcies, accompanyied by Brigadier
General Sharon K.G. Dunbar, USAF, member, Defense Task
Force on Sexual Assault in the Military Services; Kaye
Whitley, Director, Sexual Assault Prevention and Response
Office, Office of the Secretary of Defense; and Gail
McGinn, Deputy Under Secretary--Plans, Department of
Defense.................................................... 5
Farrell, Brenda S........................................ 5
Iasiello, Louis, and Sharon K.G. Dunbar.................. 20
McGinn, Gail............................................. 41
Whitley, Kaye............................................ 31
Wilberding, Merle F., attorney, Coolidge Wall................ 79
Letters, statements, etc., submitted for the record by:
Farrell, Brenda S., Director, Defense Capacilibites and
Management, Government Accountability Office, prepared
statement of............................................... 8
Iasiello, Louis, Co-Chairman, Defense Task Force on Sexual
Assault in the Military Servcies, and Brigadier General
Sharon K.G. Dunbar, USAF, member, Defense Task Force on
Sexual Assault in the Military Services, prepared statement
of......................................................... 23
McGinn, Gail, Deputy Under Secretary--Plans, Department of
Defense, prepared statement of............................. 43
Turner, Hon. Michael R., a Representative in Congress from
the State of Ohio:
Op-ed piece dated August 4, 2008......................... 91
Prepared statement of.................................... 64
Whitley, Kaye, Director, Sexual Assault Prevention and
Response Office, Office of the Secretary of Defense,
prepared statement of...................................... 33
Wilberding, Merle F., attorney, Coolidge Wall, prepared
statement of............................................... 82
SEXUAL ASSAULT IN THE MILITARY PART IV: ARE WE MAKING PROGRESS?
----------
WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 24, 2010
House of Representatives,
Subcommittee on National Security and Foreign
Affairs,
Committee on Oversight and Government Reform,
Washington, DC.
The subcommittee met, pursuant to notice, at 3 p.m., in
room 2247, Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. John F. Tierney
(chairman of the subcommittee) presiding.
Present: Representatives Tierney, Flake, Turner, and
Luetkemeyer.
Also present: Representatives Harman and Speier.
Staff present: Andy Wright, staff director; Elliot
Gillerman, clerk; Talia Dubovi, counsel; Steven Gale, fellow;
Aaron Blacksberg and Bronwen De Sena, interns; Tom Alexander,
minority senior counsel; Christopher Bright, minority
professional staff member.
Mr. Tierney. Good afternoon, everybody. I want to thank you
all for being here. A quorum is present, so the Subcommittee on
National Security and Foreign Affairs' hearing entitled,
``Sexual Assault in the Military Part IV: Are We Making
Progress,'' will come to order.
I ask unanimous consent that only the chairman, the ranking
member and Mr. Turner of the subcommittee be allowed to make
opening statements. Without objection, that is so ordered.
Also, I ask unanimous consent that various Members,
Representatives Harmon, Slaughter, Davis, Chu and Speier,
should they be able on their schedules to come and participate,
they be allowed to participate, but in accordance with
committee rules, they will only be allowed to question the
witnesses after all official members of the subcommittee have
had their turn. Without objection, so ordered.
I ask unanimous consent that the hearing record be kept
open for 5 business days, so that all members of the
subcommittee and invited participants be allowed to submit a
written statement for the record. Without objection, so
ordered. And I also ask unanimous consent that Ms. Slaughter be
allowed to submit for the record that statement now, where we
have it on record. Without objection, so ordered.
So with that business out of the way, again, I welcome
everybody to the subcommittee. As you know, it provides
continued oversight of the Department of Defense's response to
sexual assault in the military. I think it is an important
topic and I regret if I sound like I am rushing through this,
it is only because I understand we are going to have votes in a
few minutes, a 15-minute vote and two 5-minute votes, which may
take about a half hour out of us. So we will get as far along
as we can, then we will break for a half hour, with our
apologies. We will come back as soon as we can and then
proceed.
The reason we have everybody on one panel is that we tried
to keep it at two panels, not three to get done this afternoon,
because the main committee went over with Mr. Toyoda and
company. So we will try to be considerate of the fact that you
all have schedules that are busy as well. We want to take
advantage of your time here.
It is clear that in any context, sexual assault destroys
lives. But sexual assault in the military has additional facets
that make it particularly of concern to this subcommittee.
First, it is the unquestioned duty of this body and the U.S.
Government as a whole to protect our military service members.
And as I have said many times, the last thing that our men and
women in uniform should fear when they put their lives on the
line to defend the country is being attacked by one of their
own.
Second, sexual assaults in the military threaten military
readiness in an acute way. When bonds of trust are broken, when
unit cohesion is threatened, when our soldiers are forced to
cope with the heavy emotional and psychological burden of a
sexual attack, our armed forces are weakened. It is not only
individual service members who are hurt by these crimes, but
our military as a whole.
This is our fourth hearing on this subject over the last 2
years. We don't really want to make this a career, but we do
think it is an important area and that there is work to be
done, and that there was some lag between statutory work that
was done in the completion of setting up some of the entities
that were going to do oversight. The focus on oversight has
been on the Department of Defense's Sexual Assault Response
Prevention Office [SAPRO]. It was created to be the single
point of accountability and oversight for sexual assault policy
within the Department. So we have been carefully monitoring its
progress, or in the beginning, the lack thereof. But I am happy
to say that it is moving now.
In our first hearing in July 2008, we heard from two
victims of sexual assault. Ms. Ingrid Torres, a manager for the
American Red Cross who was raped while working in Kunsan Air
Base in South Korea told us that the process of investigating
and prosecuting the crime was just as traumatizing as the crime
itself. Ms. Mary Lauterbach, whose daughter, Lance Corporal
Maria Lauterbach, was murdered at Camp Lejeune after reporting
a rape, testified about the warning signs indicating Maria
needed protection after reporting the crime that had been
missed by the Marines, and how her daughter regretted reporting
the rape.
I note that today we will be hearing testimony from Ms.
Lauterbach's attorney, who is going to provide us with further
insight into the experience he has had with working with the
military in the aftermath of the Lance Corporal's death.
The traumatic experiences of victims and their first-hand
experiences with the military's sexual assault response
programs provide invaluable insight and oversight into the
challenges facing SAPRO, and they highlight the areas that the
office needs to better address. During our earlier hearings, we
also heard from the Government Accountability Office on its
findings and recommendations for SAPRO to improve the training,
response, accountability and oversight of the programs. GAO
reported that despite some DOD progress on sexual assault
response, significant problems remain that could discourage or
prevent some service members from using the program when
needed.
Today we welcome GAO back to give us the details of their
newest report that is being released today. It follows up on
the original recommendations. Today we will also hear from a
distinguished panel of other experts who will answer the
fundamental question of this hearing: are we making the
progress necessary to effectively address the problem of sexual
assault in the military?
Along with the GAO, we welcome representatives of the
Defense Task Force on Sexual Assault in the Military Services.
This congressionally mandated Task Force just completed a 16-
month review of all matters related to sexual assault in the
military. The Task Force report contains extensive
recommendations for the Secretary of Defense, the Service
Secretaries, SAPRO, Congress and others. Representatives of the
Department of Defense will be on hand to report on related
efforts over the last several years, as well as plans for
continued efforts to eliminate sexual assaults from our
military. Our society must assure that we do a better job of
preventing these terrible crimes, providing care for victims
and assuring that perpetrators are brought to justice. The
military context, where we consciously create a separate
society designed to ensure our national defense only magnifies
our obligation to prevent sexual assault. We hope to hear today
that the Department of Defense has made significant progress in
correcting the problems that we have heard about the last 2
years.
It should be crystal clear to the Department by now that
Congress is conducting oversight and watching this. We are
going to continue to monitor the progress that is being made,
although I hope, as I said, not to make this a career. We are
hoping at that point we will be able to turn this over with the
guidance of all the entities that are set up for this, be able
to continue on, have the proper oversight, and maybe just by
reports back in we may obviate the need for any more hearings
on this.
We all share responsibility to our men and women in uniform
to do everything that is necessary to protect them from these
crimes. So we continue that work today, we will continue it as
necessary for the future. Again, I want to thank all of you for
being here to offer us assistance on that.
At this point in time, I would defer to Mr. Flake for his
opening comments.
Mr. Flake. I thank the chairman. Because of votes, I won't
take long. I will submit this statement for the record, but
just welcome you all here. I joined the subcommittee after the
first series of hearings were held, so this is my first
exposure to it. I look forward to learning from all of you on
both panels.
I thank the chairman.
Mr. Tierney. I don't see Mr. Turner here just yet, so we
will wait for his statement when he arrives.
This is a longstanding practice of this committee, to swear
in witnesses, so I ask that all of the people who will be
testifying to stand please and raise your hands.
[Witnesses sworn.]
Mr. Tierney. Thank you very much. Let the record please
reflect that all of the witnesses answered in the affirmative.
I will just identify the members of the panel before we get
started, so we will get that done, at least, before the
interruption here.
Ms. Brenda Farrell is the Director of Defense Capabilities
and Management in the Government Accountability Office. In that
capacity, she is responsible for military and civilian
personnel issues, including related medical readiness issues.
She previously served as an Acting Director for the GAO's
Strategic Issues team and holds a B.A. from the University of
Louisville and an M.S. from the Industrial College of the Armed
Forces.
Mr. Randolph Hite is the Director of Information Technology
Architecture and Systems Issues in the Government
Accountability Office. In that capacity, he is responsible for
auditing GAO's IT work at the Departments of Defense, State,
Homeland Security and Justice. Mr. Hite has also examined the
work that the Department of Defense has done on the
congressionally mandated Defense Sexual Assault database. He
holds a B.B.A. from James Madison University.
My understanding is that Ms. Farrell will do the testimony
for both, but both are available for questioning on that.
Dr. Louis Iasiello currently serves as co-chairman of the
Defense Task Force on Sexual Assault in the Military Services.
He is a retired Rear Admiral in the U.S. Navy, having served
for 25 years in a number of distinguished positions. From 2003
until his retirement in 2006, Dr. Iasiello served as the Chief
of Naval Chaplains. He holds a Ph.D. from Salve Regina
University.
Brigadier General Sharon Dunbar serves in the U.S. Air
Force and also is a member of the Defense Task Force on Sexual
Assault in the Military Services. She currently serves as the
Director of Force Management Policy, and is the Deputy Chief of
Staff of Manpower, Personnel and Services at the U.S. Air Force
headquarters. General Dunbar previously served as a member of
the Defense Task Force on Sexual Harassment and Violence at the
Military Service Academies. She holds a B.S. from the U.S. Air
Force Academy. My understanding is that you will be splitting
your testimony half and half, is that correct?
Admiral Iasiello. Right.
Mr. Tierney. Dr. Kaye Whitley currently serves as the
Director of Sexual Assault Prevention and Response Office
[SAPRO]. In that capacity, she develops policy and programs to
improve sexual assault prevention efforts, enhance victim
support and increase offender accountability. Dr. Whitley
previously served as the Senior Director of Communication in
DOD's Defense Prisoner of War and Missing Personnel Office. She
holds a Ph.D. from the George Washington University and,
Doctor, this is a return visit for you. Thank you for joining
us.
Ms. Gail McGinn is the Deputy Under Secretary of Defense
for Plans, a position that she has held since 2002. In that
capacity, she is responsible for developing integrated
evaluation processes to measure the success of personnel
programs. Ms. McGinn previously served as the Principal Deputy
Assistant Secretary of Defense for Force Management Policy and
as the Principal Director for Personnel Support, Families and
Education. Ms. McGinn holds a B.A. from William Smith College,
and a Master's in Education from Boston University.
We again thank all of you for joining us here this morning.
Having sworn in everybody, we will start our testimony and go
as far as we can. Usually, when the sounds goes off, as most of
you know, we still have about 15 minutes before we have to
vote. So we will let it go a little bit over on that and then
break.
Ms. Farrell, if you would be kind enough?
STATEMENTS OF BRENDA S. FARRELL, DIRECTOR, DEFENSE
CAPACILIBITES AND MANAGEMENT, GOVERNMENT ACCOUNTABILITY OFFICE,
ACCOMPANIED BY RANDOLPH HITE, DIRECTOR, INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY
AND ARCHITECTURE SYSTEMS, GOVERNMENT ACCOUNTABILITY OFFICE;
LOUIS IASIELLO, CO-CHAIRMAN, DEFENSE TASK FORCE ON SEXUAL
ASSAULT IN THE MILITARY SERVCIES, ACCOMPANIED BY BRIGADIER
GENERAL SHARON K.G. DUNBAR, USAF, MEMBER, DEFENSE TASK FORCE ON
SEXUAL ASSAULT IN THE MILITARY SERVICES; KAYE WHITLEY,
DIRECTOR, SEXUAL ASSAULT PREVENTION AND RESPONSE OFFICE, OFFICE
OF THE SECRETARY OF DEFENSE; AND GAIL MCGINN, DEPUTY UNDER
SECRETARY--PLANS, DEPARTMENT OF DEFENSE
STATEMENT OF BRENDA S. FARRELL
Ms. Farrell. Mr. Chairman, members of the subcommittee,
thank you for the opportunity for Mr. Hite and me to be here
today to discuss our work to evaluate DOD and the Coast Guard's
oversight and implementation of their respective sexual assault
prevention and response programs. Our written statement
summarizes the findings of a report that we are issuing
concurrently with today's hearing. It builds upon our previous
work related to sexual assault in the military services.
This is the third time you have asked GAO to testify on
this important subject. And your ongoing attention to this
subject has significantly contributed to the broader
congressional efforts to raise the awareness of and
accountability for sexual assault in the military services.
Our main message today is that DOD and the Coast guard have
taken a number of positive steps to increase program awareness
and to improve their prevention and response to occurrences of
sexual assault. But additional actions are needed to strengthen
the programs.
Sexual assault is a crime with far-reaching negative
impacts on the military services, in that it undermines core
values, degrades mission readiness and esprit de corps,
subverts strategic goodwill and raises financial costs. Since
we reported on the implications in 2008, DOD reported nearly
3,000 alleged sexual assault cases. It remains impossible to
accurately analyze trends or draw conclusions from this data,
because DOD and the Coast Guard have not yet standardized their
reporting requirements.
Our written statement is divided into three parts. The
first addresses the steps that DOD has taken to implement our
August 2008 recommendations regarding the oversight and
implementation of its programs. To its credit, DOD has
implemented four of the nine recommendations in that report.
For example, DOD evaluated Department program guidance for
joint and deployed environments. And it evaluated factors that
may hinder access to health care following a sexual assault
incident.
But DOD's actions to address the other five recommendations
reflect less progress. For example, a key recommendation was
that DOD develop an oversight framework, which they have.
However, we found that the draft framework lacks key elements
needed for effective strategic planning and successful
implementation, such as criteria for measuring progress to
facilitate program evaluation and identify areas that may need
improvement.
The second part of our statement addresses the steps DOD
has taken and still needs to take to establish a centralized
sexual assault incident database. DOD did not meet the
legislative requirement to establish the database by last
month. It is unclear when the database will be established,
because DOD does not yet have a reliable schedule to guide its
efforts.
Also, system acquisition best practices associated with
successfully acquiring and deploying information technology
systems, such as economically justifying the proposed system
solution, and effectively developing and managing requirements,
have largely not been performed.
Third, the last part of our statement addresses the steps
the Coast Guard has taken to implement our August 2008
recommendations for further developing its sexual assault
prevention and response program. The Coast Guard has partially
implemented one of two GAO recommendations. It has not
implemented the other.
The Coast Guard began assessing its program staff's
workload in June 2009, which represents progress for staffing
key installation level positions. But it has not addressed our
recommendations to develop an oversight framework.
In summary, Mr. Chairman, while the progress DOD and the
Coast Guard have made is noteworthy, their efforts have not
fully established sound management frameworks that include a
long-term perspective and clear lines of accountability, all of
which are needed to withstand the administrative, fiscal and
political pressures that confront Federal programs on a daily
basis.
Further, successful program implementation will require
personal involvement of top leadership in order to maintain the
long-term focus on and accountability for program objectives.
Without such support, DOD and the Coast Guard programs will not
be able to maximize the benefit of their respective
initiatives, and they may not be able to effect the change in
military culture that is needed to help ensure that their
programs are institutionalized.
Mr. Chairman, that concludes our opening. Mr. Hite and I
will be happy to take questions when you are read.
[The prepared statement of Ms. Farrell follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Tierney. Again, thank you very much. We couldn't have
done the work that was done without GAO's good assistance and
help on this, and we appreciate it.
Doctor, we are calling you, I assume, because that trumps
Admiral? Dr. Iasiello, please.
STATEMENT OF LOUIS IASIELLO AND SHARON DUNBAR
Admiral Iasiello. Chairman Tierney, Ranking Member Flake,
distinguished members of the subcommittee, thank you for this
opportunity to present the work of the Defense Task Force on
Sexual Assault in Military Services.
As co-chairs, we are honored to be here to discuss the
recommendations and findings of the Task Force and the staff.
Given the fact that our formal statements have been forwarded
to you, we will keep these opening comments short and brief.
As regards our authority, Congress directed the Task Force
in its 2005 Defense Authorization Act, and it was established
by the Secretary of Defense in August 2008.
The Task Force employed an extensive methodology, employing
both quantitative and qualitative measures. Over a period of 15
months, we visited 60 installations, CONUS, OCONUS and in the
AOR, interviewing 3,500 individuals, 61 victims, senior
military and civilian Department of Defense leadership, sexual
assault response coordinators and their supervisors, victim
advocates, first responders, medical personnel, legal
personnel, pastoral care providers, the chaplains, military
police, and the Department of Defense's criminal investigative
services. We reviewed hundreds of their criminal investigative
reports, as well as all prior reports on sexual assault leading
up to our work. At the completion of our work, we submitted the
report to the Secretary of Defense on the 1st of December 2009.
The Task Force focused its work in three distinct yet
interrelated areas, that of victim response, prevention and
training, and accountability and strategic oversight. First
off, the report recognizes the progress made by the Department
of Defense in victim response, since it inaugurated its Sexual
Assault Prevention and Response Program in 2005. We believe
that the recommendations contained in the Task Force report
will significantly improve programs in this critical area.
Next in the area of strategic direction, the Task Force is
recommending that the Deputy Secretary of Defense take
responsibility for SAPRO for a period of at least 1 year, and
until the Secretary of Defense apprises Congress that the SAPR
office is meeting its established goals. We recommend that the
SAPR program be given a more permanent complexion in the
Department of Defense. The Department of Defense needs to
communicate the message that the SAPR program is here to stay,
and illustrate that resolve through designated funding for SAPR
funding in its DOD budget process.
The Task Force recommends that the organizational design,
personnel and mission of the DOD SAPR office be revised to
strategically lead the Department of Defense in this critical
area. We recommend the establishment of a uniform SAPR
terminology and core structure to be implemented across service
lines. The Task Force recommends the professionalization of
victim advocates to ensure for qualified personnel with
national certification. And we recommend that sexual assault
and response coordinators are Department of Defense civilians
and/or uniform personnel in the Department of Defense.
The Task Force recommends the development of program
standards and subsequent metrics which will enable the
Department of Defense to more accurately measure the heath of
the SAPR programs. And finally, in this area of strategic
direction, the Task Force is strongly recommending funding for
SAPR research in collaboration with civilian experts throughout
our great country, such as those found in the world of academia
and our advocacy groups which work so hard in this area, and
other Federal agencies.
Now I would like to turn the mic over to General Dunbar.
General Dunbar. Mr. Chairman and other distinguished
members of the subcommittee, as we have submitted our statement
for record, I will continue to provide brief remarks. Over the
course of our 15 months, there were several trends that
emerged. The first is that prevention of sexual assault needs
to be the No. 1 priority. Second, response to victims has
demonstrably improved, but more improvements need to be made in
that area. There needs to be much greater consistency among the
services, given deployed operations, joint basing and other
joint operations, as well as greater consistency among the
active component and the Reserve and Guard components.
Given the nature of time that we had to conduct our review,
we were not able to conduct extensive analysis of what is
existing in the Guard and Reserve components at the unit level
or the State level. So we recommend that the Secretary of
Defense undertake additional review in that area.
Then as the GAO had indicated, on the data aspect, we
really do believe that there needs to be greater consistency,
reliability of the data in order for us to be able to do trend
analysis and be able to continue to improve the program.
Finally, we believe that the SAPRO office, while it was
initially established with response to victims in mind, needs
to be extensively expanded in order to address more effectively
prevention as well as the data accountability issues.
On the prevention and training area, as I mentioned, we
believe that prevention is the No. 1 priority, because that is
absolutely key in order to be able to prevent sexual assault
from occurring in the first place. We are advocating that there
needs to be a much greater comprehensive strategy. I think the
DOD has done a great job in terms of establishing bystander
intervention training. But we would state that the training,
and essentially the strategy, needs to be much more than
bystander intervention, to include community awareness, to
include the partnership, building partnership capacity with our
communities, with academia and addressing the issue.
In the training area, we are advocating much more than the
rote training that takes place. We would propose that there
needs to be training along a continuum that addresses not just
the first responders, but those in leadership, from the
commanders as well as the senior enlisted and our civilians,
that training occur over the course of an individual's career.
Also, the training needs to be geared toward just
generating greater awareness and appreciation for the incidence
level of sexual assault, debunking many of the myths that
continue to prevail, not just within the military but within
society as well, addressing risk factors, victim and
perpetrator factors, as well as risk mitigation strategies.
We would also advocate specialized and recurring training
for those that are extensively involved in providing the
response to our victims. And then in the victim response area,
a couple of key areas that I would address would be that we
need to try to provide greater care for the victims. Many of
them, as you had indicated, Mr. Chairman, have expressed dismay
over the treatment that they receive. I think that much can be
done in terms of providing greater response to them, from
professionalizing the victim advocates that we have to
providing them with legal assistance up front, so they know
they can have a conversation that will provide them with
confidentiality, to also being able to confide in a peer or
trusted agent as opposed to feeling that their third party then
will end up being subpoenaed in order to testify against them.
Then likewise, we would advocate that the individuals who,
if they decide that they want to opt out of an investigation,
that the victims be allowed to do so. And last, on the
accountability, which GAO has addressed fairly substantially so
I won't get into that, we do believe that there needs to be
much greater accountability on the data and that we couldn't
emphasize enough the importance of having the data system up
and running.
From the best practices, just to highlight what we believe
is important, the common theme there is engaged leadership,
increased awareness and the candid discussion that needs to
take place at all levels within the DOD. Much of that is taking
from with the senior leadership down to the unit level. But
again, much more needs to be done.
With that, sir, I conclude. Thank you.
[The prepared statement of Admiral Iasiello and General
Dunbar follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Tierney. Thank you. I want to thank you both for your
abbreviated testimony.
Dr. Whitley.
STATEMENT OF KAYE WHITLEY
Dr. Whitley. Mr. Chairman, Ranking Member Flake and members
of the subcommittee, thank you so much for inviting me to
discuss the progress that the Department of Defense has made in
preventing and responding to sexual assault. Since we provided
written testimony, I will keep my remarks brief.
The reason for our commitment to this issue is clear.
Sexual assault levies a tremendous human toll, disrupts lives
and destroys the human spirit. While we talk about these
Department-wide efforts, we should always keep in mind that
behind each of these numbers, there is an individual whose life
is changed forever.
Our policies and programs continue to improve. I would like
to recognize the collaborative efforts of my DOD colleagues.
For example, the strategic plan and oversight framework was the
product of hundreds of hours of collaboration. The activities
identified in these documents will greatly expand my office's
efforts, and to that end, we have already begun to restructure
the SAPRO office, and we will grow from 7 to 21 employees.
We have received more than 100 recommendations from the
GAO, the DTFSAMS and our Inspector General. We were already
working on many of these recommendations. However, others are
new and they will strengthen and expand our program.
We are working with nationally known experts in the
civilian communities and premier civilian organizations and
State coalitions to improve our prevention and response
efforts. Further, we are members of an interagency group led by
the White House Office on Women and Girls to explore ways that
all Federal agencies can work together to prevent interpersonal
violence in society, as well as in the military.
I would like to thank my leadership, especially Ms. McGinn,
and our staffs for their dedication. We also want to express
our appreciation to all of the SAPR staffs around the world,
not just in the Pentagon, who work every day on this program.
It is because of their efforts that we have implemented many of
the things in our new program.
We believe that we have made great strides in training. We
have to train more than 2 million service members, and then we
have to train a huge cadre of professionals to respond to
sexual assault, even sexual assault response coordinators,
victim advocates, chaplains, commanders, trial counsel,
investigators. So training all of those responders around the
world is a big task.
Your oversight is key to our progress, and also working
with the GAO and the members and staff of the DTFSAMS has been
a pleasure. Throughout this process, we have all worked very
closely together, because we all want to make the military a
better place for those who serve to keep us safe.
Our task is daunting, and we recruit from a society where
sexual assault is one of the most under-reported crimes. And we
do understand that there is more to do, and we will welcome
your continued attention and oversight. Thank you for your
support.
[The prepared statement of Dr. Whitley follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Tierney. Thank you, Doctor.
Ms. McGinn.
STATEMENT OF GAIL MCGINN
Ms. McGinn. Mr. Chairman, Ranking Member Flake, other
members of the subcommittee, I too thank you for the
opportunity to appear before you today to discuss the
Department's progress in addressing the crime of sexual
assault. I also submitted a long testimony for the record, so
this will be very brief.
But the answer, I think, to the question posed by this
hearing, are we making progress, is yes. We are making
progress, but we are certainly not at the finish line. We won't
be at the finish line until we have eliminated sexual assault
in the armed forces.
In 2008, we had over 2,900 reported assaults. And we know
from survey results that this is only a portion of those that
reportedly occurred. Only about 20 percent of service members
who experience unwanted sexual contact report the matter to a
military authority. So indeed, we need a strong prevention
strategy, an effective training strategy and potent measures to
ensure that we are heading in the right direction.
I understand that some of this is uncharted territory.
Thus, we want to work with the right experts and in concert
with the military departments to advance our knowledge as we go
forward.
I was pleased to see that the Defense Task Force on Sexual
Assault in the Military Services emphasized service culture.
For indeed, we need a culture that extends the concept of
watching out for your buddy in danger on the battlefield to
watching out for your buddy in danger of sexual assault. This
was the theme of our last prevention strategy, and one that we
need to constantly emphasize.
But we have made progress. In 2005, when we established the
Sexual Assault Prevention and Response Office, we believed we
needed a small policy office to formalize instructions we had
issued, identify new policy concerns and address them, and
evaluate implementation, kind of a standard policy model for
us.
Over the ensuing years, in conversations with the Congress,
this subcommittee, the GAO and the Task Force, it became clear
that the Office needed to expand its mission and thus become
more robust. Dr. Whitley, who you just heard from, has done a
great job managing that expansion with advancements coming in
investigator and trial counsel training, the development of our
congressionally directed database, initiation of the first
Department-wide prevention effort, and development of a
strategic plan and oversight framework. Indeed, we welcome the
reports of the Task Force and the GAO as we continue to refine
our approach and determine further steps.
Today, leadership support of our efforts has never been
stronger. It begins with the Secretary of Defense and the
Chairman of the Joint Chiefs and continues with the dedicated
efforts of our service secretaries and senior military
leadership. The military departments are making every effort to
ensure that every service member knows that sexual assault is
unacceptable and to assure that there is help for victims as
they need it.
Just last week, we welcomed our new Under Secretary for
Personnel and Readiness, Dr. Clifford Stanley, to the
Department. He has indicated that he is also determined to
advance our efforts in this regard.
So in closing, let me thank the subcommittee for your
support of this very important program. I am happy to answer
any questions you may have.
[The prepared statement of Ms. McGinn follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Tierney. Thank you very much.
Thank all of you for helping us frame the issue here. We
are going to take about a 20 minute break for votes and be back
at that point in time. Thank you.
[Recess.]
Mr. Tierney. Thank you for your forbearance.
Mr. Turner, you had wanted an opportunity to give a brief
opening statement, and now might be a good time for that, if
you would.
Mr. Turner. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I want to thank you
for your continued focus and effort here.
I also want to thank Jane Harman for her career-long focus
on this. We have had the good fortune to work with Jane on a
number of issues.
As some of you know, my initial interest in this came about
by the unfortunate murder of Maria Lauterbach, who is from my
community. That brought to light several issue as to how rapes
are handled within the command and for the victim. So I have
worked with a number of members on issues where we have tried
to find ways to change both laws and to work with DOD on ways
that we can enhance the protection to victims and also find
ways to provide them additional support.
This report is, I think, an excellent report for a basis to
begin the process of looking at additional ways that we can
support victims. I want to focus on one aspect, an item that I
know is important to all of you, and that is the issue of
culture. Almost in every sexual assault hearing that I go to, I
read this provision of an answer that I got as a response to
questions that I had submitted concerning Maria Lauterbach.
General Kramlich of the U.S. Marine Corps was responding to a
series of questions that I had posed with respect to the Maria
Lauterbach case. And a number of statements were made through
DOD and the Marines that I found troubling. One of those was
they had indicated that they had no notice that Maria
Lauterbach might be at risk, because there had been no violence
that had been alleged in the allegations of what had occurred
to her.
So I wrote a question of, doesn't a rape accusation
inherently contain an element of force or threat? The answer
that I got back was that in May 2007, when Lauterbach formally
made allegations of rape against Laurean, the command was only
made aware of two reported sexual encounters, one sexual
encounter characterized as consensual by Lauterbach and the
other alleged to be rape. Lauterbach never alleged any violence
of threat of violence in either sexual encounter.
Now, the reason why I read that in every hearing, because
when we have the issue of culture, I would hope that throughout
DOD, no one would ever write again that any sexual assault
could not have an allegation of violence or threat of violence.
Because as we all know, it is inherent in the sexual assault
itself.
So with that, Mr. Chairman, I thank you for bringing the
spotlight to this. I know that we all have a lot of work to do,
and we appreciate the work that you are undertaking.
[The prepared statement of Hon. Michael R. Turner follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Tierney. Thank you. We will begin the questioning, if
nobody has any objection to that.
Dr. Whitley, back in August 2008, we had a report from the
Government Accountability Office, which made nine
recommendations to improve the Department's Sexual Assault
Prevention and Response programs. Today's report from the GAO
states that you have implemented only four of those
recommendations, and two of those four were actually addressed
by non-SAPRO Task Forces.
So can you explain to us why some 18 months after the
report came out, such a small percentage of those nine
remaining objectives have been dealt with effectively?
Dr. Whitley. We may have actually addressed more since
then. I could probably answer the question better if we talked
specific recommendations.
I know one thing that was of particular interest to you,
sir, was the oversight framework and the strategic plan. We
have completed that. I did take it, per your suggestion, to Ms.
Farrell and give her a briefing on it. They made suggestions. I
went back and took their edits and their suggestions. That has
been completed and we have already begun some implementation.
We are still waiting for it to be signed on by the new Under
Secretary.
Mr. Tierney. Ms. Farrell, of the five that were unaddressed
at all of your recommendations, can you prioritize those for
us?
Ms. Farrell. Certainly. I would like to focus on the
oversight plan. We do appreciate the cooperation that we
received from DOD by sharing the draft framework with us during
our review, so that we could see it and analyze it and comment
on it. They should be given credit for laying a foundation for
their oversight framework, which is quite a challenge. But that
oversight framework, strategic plan, whatever you want to call
it, based on our body of work, looking at best practices of
successful organizations that are results-oriented, there are
identifiable key elements that you would want to see in the
oversight framework, which we noted in the August 2008 report.
At a minimum, you want clear goals, objectives, milestones
and performance measures. Performance measures are very key for
that road map. As I mentioned in the opening, performance
measures are necessary to gauge where you are as you are headed
toward your goal, and to measure and make a course change, if
necessary. That is one of the key elements that is missing in
that oversight framework, is the performance measurement.
Another that we discussed with DOD back in November, before
we sent the draft report over with the recommendations that we
would like to see is once you have the performance measures,
you need strategies of what you are going to do with the
results once you get them in order to make those course
corrections.
Another element we would like to see is tying the program
objectives with budget priorities. This is very key, because
that will help DOD to support justification for any resources
that they need, whether it is personnel or funding.
Last, there were three documents that DOD provided to us
during the review. And sometimes you will have one
comprehensive strategic plan, sometimes there are multiple
documents. That is fine. We do not take issue with how many
documents they have that comprise their strategic framework.
But with the three documents provided to us, it was
difficult to tell how they complemented each other. Two of the
documents had five objectives that did match up. But then the
oversight framework that they discussed with us and provided to
us that was responding to our recommendation had nine
improvement initiatives that we could not correlate back. So it
is still not clear to us what that oversight framework that
they provided to us, where that fit with the other documents
that comprised their strategic planning.
Mr. Tierney. Dr. Whitley, is that helpful? Is that
something you can work with Ms. Farrell and correct?
Dr. Whitley. Absolutely. We did take the plan back, after
my meeting with her, and we developed a user guide. We also
have requirements in the Department to have a strategic plan.
It would be confusing to someone looking at three documents. We
have to align ours with the Personnel and Readiness plan and
the Secretary's plan. We also had to go back and refit all of
that.
Then the oversight framework, we hung that, if you will, on
our strategic plan and saw that as part of our oversight. We
see our role as prevention, victim care and response. And then
our role is system accountability. That is where we hung the
framework. I think now we have made it more user friendly. We
have also developed measures.
One of the things that we talked about at the last hearing,
our civilian and Federal partners all struggle with finding the
best measures for sexual assault. Because as you know, you
can't use reports, because it so under-reported. So we are
looking at ways now to measure prevention and response. We are
able to get at least four or five measures in the P&R strategic
plan. We are going to measure awareness, we are going to
measure victim satisfaction, and we are developing surveys. It
is a challenge, and there are not many models out there.
Mr. Tierney. It seems to me that you have a good working
relationship with GAO, and I appreciate that. So I am trusting
that you will be able to continue that and resolve those
issues. I think they provide value added to you and are a
resource for you. So I appreciate that you are working with
them and being open about it. We will expect that those things
will be resolved.
Ms. McGinn, just before my time is up, how are you aligning
the resources to this, the money, so people will know that we
are serious about it and it is going to get funded
appropriately? And two, the General made a good point: are you
going to be able, at the Department of Defense, to undertake a
review of the Guard and Reserve at the State and unit level?
Ms. McGinn. We have just recently, I think it was last
year, established program element codes. Into those program
element codes the military services put their money that they
have dedicated to this program, so that we have visibility over
it, and we can see that it is in there and it is not being cut
or it is growing or whatever. I think in fiscal year 2010,
there is about $110 million so far that the service had
identified.
In addition to that, we have succeeded in getting
additional funding for the Sexual Assault Prevention and
Response Office, $20 million, to help with our outreach
efforts, our oversight efforts with the development of the
database and those kinds of things. So one, we are watching the
money and two, we are actively engaging in the budget process
to try to find more money where necessary for it.
We absolutely believe we need to look harder at the Guard
and Reserve. We are looking at ways that we might do that. We
do have a yellow ribbon program, as you know, that works with
the Guard and Reserve, and we are involving the Guard and
Reserve in our various oversight committees. We agree with that
recommendation. We will take action on that.
Mr. Tierney. Mr. Flake.
Mr. Flake. Thank you.
Brigadier General Dunbar, you mentioned in your testimony
that things were improving. I just wasn't quite clear as to if
you are referring to fewer incidents of abuse, and how would
that be measured, or that the plan being implemented, that is
improving in speed. Can you qualify that statement? Maybe I
heard it wrong, but you mentioned something like that.
General Dunbar. In terms of improving, what I am referring
to is that the program focus certainly within the services, the
leadership attention that is being given to it from the
Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff to the service
secretaries and service chiefs, down to in some locations, not
universally all locations, unit commander involvement in
addressing the issue. From the SAPRO standpoint, I think since
2005, the establishment of restrictive reporting, which I think
a lot of commanders were very reluctant to embrace, now many
people are seeing that as very good because more victims are
coming forward, those victims who wouldn't have come forward
had they not had that restrictive reporting option.
So I think awareness is growing and appreciation for a lot
of the mechanisms, thanks to Congress' oversight, and thanks to
the continued emphasis. We are having folks come on board,
people are accepting the fact that sexual assault does occur
with the military services and it needs to be addressed.
So from a program standpoint, response has increased, even
in the prevention area, which we were initially finding
lacking. The fact that the DOD SAPRO office is really working
the bystander intervention, all the services are addressing
that. That is positive progress. But at the same time, one of
the concerns that we have is that bystander intervention is not
the be all, end all in terms of a comprehensive prevention
strategy, and that more needs to be done.
So progress, but still more to be done.
Mr. Flake. Can somebody tell me, over the past, say, 2
years, have the reported cases of sexual abuse gone up or down?
Dr. Whitley. We have had approximately 3,000 reports each
year. We will be releasing our fiscal year 2009 report on March
15th. We already know the numbers have gone up slightly. We
want people to report. That is our goal.
Mr. Flake. My next question is, certainly the
recommendations include increased awareness and education, and
with that comes reporting requirements. Recognizing that part
of the improvement is getting more people to come forward, are
there metrics then to gauge whether we are improving or not in
terms of incidence of sexual abuse, independent of how many are
reported?
Dr. Whitley. We are developing a survey with the Defense
Manpower Data Center to ask people on the survey if they have
experienced unwanted sexual contact and if they have reported
it. One statistic I do have since we have had restrictive
reporting, starting in the middle of June 2005: we have had
over 2,600 people use the restrictive option reporting. So that
is data that tells me that is something that we should continue
and that is a good option for us in reducing barriers to
reporting. We are working on other ways to measure the
prevalence of sexual assault.
Even in society, statistics show us that only about 18 to
20 percent of victims report to an authority. So it is vastly
underreported. So what we are doing in our program is we are
trying to remove the barriers that keep people from coming
forward and to try to build climates of confidence and to
reduce stigma. We want to reduce stigma for any type of mental
health that people are seeking.
Mr. Flake. Thank you.
Mr. Tierney. Mr. Turner, you are recognized for 5 minutes.
Mr. Turner. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
After you all testify, there will be a gentleman who is
testifying whose name is Merle Wilberding, who is an attorney,
who has worked with the Lauterbach family, and has worked with
my office on some of the legislation that we have sponsored on
issues such as military protective orders, ensuring that they
don't expire, and also that local jurisdictions are notified.
Because actually in Marla Lauterbach's case, the local
jurisdiction did not know that a military protective order had
been put in place. We changed that in legislation with the
National Defense Authorization Act.
In addition to representing them, I just want to give you
one fact about his legal career. As an Army JAG captain, he was
assigned the responsibility to represent the Government in the
Lieutenant Calley appeal of his conviction in the infamous My
Lai massacre. So he has a little bit of information on the
inside, in addition to representing this family.
In his testimony, one of the things he is going to
highlight is the issue of the victim advocates. He is going to
lay out the case of whether or not people feel that system is
responsive. And then he has a recommendation that perhaps
victim advocates need to establish a line of authority outside
the base chain of command. I wondered if you all might comment
on that, having looked at the issue through your Task Force.
That is not something that you have recommended. But I would be
interested to get your thoughts on that.
General Dunbar, why don't we start with you?
General Dunbar. Congressman Turner, one of the things that
we did recommend was to provide some confidentiality with the
victim advocates. Because in the statistics that we saw,
approximately 78 percent of the attorneys who were prosecuting
cases had indicated that they would, or in the defense, would
subpoena victim advocate records. So when you know that you
have victims who we tell to go to a victim advocate to seek the
care and yet, at the same time, know that they are vulnerable
to having whatever they disclose be used against them, that is
not what we consider to be providing adequate victim support.
We do think that you can establish a system that allows the
victim advocates to have that confidentiality and still have
them within the military structure as opposed to going outside
of a military reporting machine.
So in answer to your question, we did not explore
specifically the proposal that you have outlined. But we
recognize the importance of victim advocates and the care that
they provide, and realize that we have a deficiency as it
currently is set up.
Mr. Turner. Do you have an opinion on that issue, on his
recommendation?
Dr. Whitley. Well, sir, as I said, I do believe that we can
cure the issue without having to have the victim advocates
report outside the chain of command. There are a variety of
options I think that exist.
Mr. Turner. Anyone else wish to comment on the issue of
chain of command?
Ms. McGinn. If I could?
Mr. Turner. Yes.
Ms. McGinn. I think, we want commanders to be involved, and
to be proactive and to be advocates and to help solve these
problems. I think there could be a little bit of danger taking
this outside the chain of command, that you would create a
space where the commander wouldn't know what was going on,
would not be involved, and would set up almost a conflicting
relationship. So I would just caution that I think we want
commanders, as I said, to be involved in this process and to
understand their responsibilities and to respond correctly.
Mr. Turner. General.
General Dunbar. If I could just add, I think the issue,
especially in our review as we looked at restrictive reporting,
we have found that the commanders, if they know that certain
restrictions exist, they respect those restrictions. So whether
it is within the chain of command, if a victim advocate were
granted confidentiality, I think a commander would jeopardize
his or her position by trying to pry information out of a
victim advocate.
So that is basically why I think we have options that we
can work within.
Admiral Iasiello. If I may weigh in on this, too, we found
one of the issues, access to a commander, is critical for the
health of the program. So with the Sexual Assault Response
Coordinators, when they had that access with their commanders
and were able to voice their concerns and bring issues before
them, we felt that they were very successful in what they were
trying to do.
When they had two or three levels of bureaucracy that they
were trying to deal with, their effectiveness as response
coordinators was significantly diminished. That is why the use
of contractors as Sexual Assault Response Coordinators was one
of our recommendations. We think that access is critical. It is
not only important to the program, but as many people have
mentioned, the commander sets the tone. And the commander
really needs to know what is going on in his or her command.
Mr. Turner. With the chairman's indulgence, the reason why
I find it an important recommendation is because in the
military, the situation is so unique in that the military in
effect has a custodial relationship with the victim, where they
can't get up and leave. They are told where they are to be. You
don't have the same freedom of movement that you would have if
you were a victim in the private sector.
And then to have what is ultimately up the chain of
command, your boss, having the same people reporting to you
that are supposed to be aiding you, the inherent conflicts of
interest are just obvious as to how they could arise. So I do
think it is something for us to have more discussion on. Thank
you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Tierney. Thank you.
Ms. Harman, we want to welcome you to the subcommittee, and
thank you for your interest in this subject, and your
leadership on it, and welcome you to give us 5 minutes of
questioning, if you would.
Ms. Harman. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I appreciate the fact
that this subcommittee on a bipartisan basis has held four
hearings on this subject. There is intense concern from
Congress about what I would call an epidemic of assault and
rape in the military, which I view as both a moral problem and
a force protection problem.
And at a time when the public looks at Congress and thinks
we can't do anything together, I hope everyone was listening
up. I think both sides of the aisle in this subcommittee are
equally concerned. I know, Mike, that the Lauterbach family is
very lucky to have you as their representative. You have been
passionate about this issue, which is something we all need to
be.
On that point, only one of you, and that was Dr. Whitley,
mentioned in personal terms the toll that rape and assault
takes on people. Dr. Whitley said it changes a human being's
life forever. And it may terminate some human beings' lives, as
in the case of Maria Lauterbach. So I think we have to keep
that in mind. It is not just a question of statistics and
strategies and milestones and goals. This is a deeply personal
issue. It is a violation of one's physical space and as I guess
the only woman member sitting up here, I want to say how
strongly I feel about this and how urgently we have to fix
this.
I guess my message and my questions today are focused on
prevention. It is good to, you have all heard me say this in
the past, it is good to be better at response and better at
victim care. I applaud you for trying to do that. And it is
good to coordinate the statistics and create more comfort for
victims to come forward. All of that is important.
But wouldn't it be better if we didn't have victims? Let's
get a sense of the proportion of this. In August 2007, I went
to the West Los Angeles VA, where there is a women's clinic. I
was blown away to hear that 41 percent of the female veterans
they see are victims of military sexual trauma, and 29 percent
were raped. Now, this isn't a scientific survey, but I am sure
those are accurate figures for 3 years ago in the West LA VA.
And generalizing this to the country gets me to my little sound
bite, which is, a woman is more likely to be raped in the
military by a fellow soldier than killed by enemy fire.
So my question to you is, shouldn't we be doing more about
prevention? I welcome your response, each of you. And
specifically, shouldn't we be doing more of what the Army is
doing with its I Am Strong campaign, by hiring outside
investigators and prosecutors to teach a team of 300, I
understand, prosecutors in the Army to do a better job of
investigating and prosecuting these rapes and assaults, so it
sends a strong message to people that you cross a red line,
either as a perpetrator or someone in the chain of command, and
you pay a big penalty?
Ms. Farrell.
Ms. Farrell. Thank you. I would like to note regarding that
first part, our report does note that not only does sexual
assault have implications for the individual, but for the
family, the friends, the colleagues, the whole community
besides the unique impact, obviously, on the military, that we
were discussing earlier.
Regarding prevention, shouldn't that be important, I
believe all three----
Ms. Harman. Shouldn't it be more important, more
emphasized.
Ms. Farrell. It should be, it is prevention, response, and
resolution. So I think there has to be emphasis on all three.
As you know, after SAPRO was established, the emphasis was
really more on response, taking care of the victims was
driving. It is just, I think in the last year, and of course,
DOD can speak to this more, where they have gotten more of a
handle on the prevention. And that is what we are looking for.
Again, in the strategy of what are the clear goals of what are
you trying to accomplish. By having a very clear goal on
prevention and how you are going to get there, maybe we will
see this, actually, the numbers go down.
Ms. Harman. Mr. Chairman, could others just answer my
question? I know my time is expiring.
Mr. Tierney. Sure.
Dr. Whitley. Thank you always for the support that you have
given this program, Ms. Harman. One of the things, I know the
Army came out with their I Am Strong campaign, and the
Department has a DOD-wide strategy. We work very closely with
the Centers for Disease Control and use their spectrum of
prevention, which tells us you have to work the strategy at
every level, from the individual all the way up to policies and
laws. And we also work with the National Sexual Violence
Resource Center.
Each of the services, in fact, the Navy and the Air Force
each held summits just a few months ago. They brought in their
highest levels of leadership. I can tell you, in talking with
some of the generals that were there, and the leaders, they are
all on board. I think we have a very strong prevention campaign
and strategy in all of the services now.
Ms. Harman. If I could add, I had noted that there needs to
be a greater emphasis on prevention. Having the strategy is
great, the bystander intervention is one facet of it. But it
also includes the community awareness and physical safety. For
instance, when we were over in the AOR, how you actually set up
a location, where you put the female latrine, where you site
the female tents, sometimes we have the cultural issues of this
is the way it has always been done before. Likewise, even when
you are going through the dormitory or the barracks areas,
basic security measures. In some of the newer facilities, you
find that you have the video cameras, surveillance cameras that
are set up.
A lot of it is driven by culture. The more awareness that
we have in addressing the issues, the greater you can provide
prevention at basic levels. The key to all this is leadership
involvement. The senior leadership of the services, no doubt,
are all engaged, as I mentioned, the chairman is engaged. That
needs to populate down to unit commanders, who have to
understand that they have to be out front addressing this issue
on a regular basis, and have candid discussions of the fact
that sexual assault is not tolerated. And even those things
continue on to include sexual harassment, that those behaviors
are not going to be accepted within service in the Armed
Forces.
Ms. McGinn. Could I just add one thing about culture,
because the military culture is created. And we take young
people off the streets of America and we send them to basic
training and we turn them into soldiers, sailors, airmen and
Marines. While it is a more long-term solution, if we look to
what we already know in terms of how to create soldiers,
sailors, airmen and Marines, couldn't we also look to how we
change attitudes and how we inculcate this as a cultural issue?
I would just to note, I was reviewing service programs in
preparation for this. I was struck by the fact that the Army,
for their new recruits, the new recruits receive sexual assault
training during their reception, during the first week of basic
training, just prior to their first overnight pass and upon
advanced individual training entrance. So that kind of emphasis
I think at the basic training level would go a long way for us.
Ms. Harman. Thank you.
Admiral Iasiello. If I may, you have highlighted what was
for us as a Task Force one of the most critical
recommendations, that we have a comprehensive prevention
strategy, cross-service, that is given a strategic leadership
by the SAPRO office, which has the measurements in there to
know whether it is working or not, to give us the granularity
to be able to identify trends, to see whether or not it is in
fact doing what it is supposed to do.
But one of the other recommendations which ties into it is
the fact that we don't feel the DOD can do this alone. If we
are going to develop a truly effective, comprehensive
prevention strategy, we need to partner with our national
allies in this effort, with academia, with the national
alliances against rape and crimes against women. We need to
partner with these experts throughout the country so that we
can move forward with a comprehensive prevention strategy and
results.
Mr. Tierney. Thank you Ms. Harman. Thank all of you.
I think I am going to give people an opportunity to just
ask another question or two, if they have it, before we let you
all go. When you talked about culture, Ms. McGinn, I was
thinking, what we listened to at the last hearing was a
connection, by one of the witnesses, the connection between the
ban on women in ground combat and sexual assault. Specifically,
that witness testified that the ban sends a signal from the top
that women are second class soldiers and thus inferior to male
soldiers. The inferiority perpetuates an antagonistic view of
women that helps create a culture that is conducive to sexual
assault. Do you want to reflect on that for us, whether you
think that is true or not and what we might do about it if it
is?
Ms. McGinn. I haven't really given that any thought. I do
know that, and I think it was in the last Task Force report on
the academies, Dr. Iasiello can correct me, the Task Force
noted that at the academies the percentage of women that you
had made a difference in terms of the attitudes and the way
that people were treated, that there needed to be kind of a
critical mass of women there.
I don't know that the ban necessarily creates an issue for
us. I hadn't really thought that through.
Mr. Tierney. We can provide that testimony for you, so you
might be able to take a look at it and let us know what you
think about it at some other time.
Ms. McGinn. OK, that would be fine.
Mr. Tierney. I don't want to hit you unfairly, but it
struck me when you were saying that, it tied in on that.
Mr. Hite, you have been very good to sit there through the
whole hearing. I do want to ask you to weigh in in terms of
data collection, where you think we are on that, what needs to
be done to make sure we are at the point we need to be.
Mr. Hite. Certainly, Mr. Chairman. For any large database
like this, it should be viewed as a process. It is a journey
that you have to walk down. So I would say at this juncture
that the Department is at the end of the beginning of the
process.
There are some things that have been done, I give them
credit for that. But there really is a lot that still remains
to be done. While I am cautiously optimistic going forward, in
part because the Department agreed with the recommendations we
laid out, which was things that needed to be done going
forward, I do have some doubts. And some of those doubts
surround what I believe is the need for perhaps more staffing
in the program office that is devoted to the acquisition and
implementation of this database, and to make sure that we are
not too reliant on contractors to do that work for us.
Mr. Tierney. Thank you very much.
Finally, the last question I had on this was priorities for
the General and the Admiral to address. I think you mentioned
one of them, prevention, was amongst the many recommendations
that you made to improve the prevention and response program.
Is there another priority that you think needs attention right
away, and to a better degree than it is getting now?
General Dunbar. We have already discussed the data. We
absolutely believe that the database and the tracking for
accountability is essential in order to be able to do trend
analysis to further address the issue. Without that, I would
continue to just kind of chase tails around the table.
Mr. Tierney. Great.
Mr. Flake, did you have any other questions?
Mr. Flake. I will just yield my time to Mr. Turner.
Mr. Tierney. Mr. Turner.
Mr. Turner. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
In looking to the report, General Dunbar, you and I spoke
about the issue that there are a number of recommendations in
it that are for congressional action. As you know, the National
Defense Authorization Act will be moving here in the next
couple of months. Jane Harman and I last year got a number of
things that were in it. Obviously the report, we can peruse
through it and pick out those things that are highlighted as
congressional action, to take action. But I wondered if DOD in
response to the report had plans on providing us the
legislative direction in some of the areas that you are making
a suggestion that Congress take action. Is that on your to-do
list, or will you be leaving it to us to go through the report
and begin to initiate those items?
General Dunbar. Congressman Turner, we provided those
recommendations to the Department of Defense and the Secretary
of Defense and the military services are looking at that. They
will be providing, Secretary of Defense, I believe on the 1st
of March, will be providing the report with his comments. So we
will leave it up to the Department of Defense. The Task Force
for the most part has concluded its review in providing the
report to the Secretary of Defense.
Mr. Turner. Ms. McGinn, they had some very specific
recommendations. When we met in my office, I saw the urgency of
it and was saying, gosh, we need to get on these. As you know,
the bill will be moving in the next couple of months. I
wouldn't want to miss a whole year that DOD has it on its
agenda to get those items to us.
Ms. McGinn. If I am not mistaken, I think in the process
right now, we have been working with the military departments,
looking at all of the recommendations of the Task Force, and
sorting out an overall DOD response. Because not everybody
agrees with everything. So our job is to adjudicate that and
make it a consolidated decision for the Secretary.
As we do that, if we see things that need legislative
action, we can certainly formulate them for legislative action.
Mr. Turner. I appreciate your commitment on that. Because
on the ones that you agree with that are on the report, we
should move now. And rather than our just taking them and
putting them forward and then waiting for a response, it would
be great if we could work together on that.
Ms. McGinn. Just to be honest with you, our process might
take longer than that. The process is a bureaucratic process in
the building.
Mr. Turner. Well, that is the information I need to know.
Because if we need to start the process without DOD, we
certainly have the report. I can get with Members, including
Jane, to see what items that she sees that are important that
we might need to move forward.
Mr. Tierney. Thank you.
Ms. Harman, do you have an additional comment?
Ms. Harman. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I assume your
committee member----
Mr. Tierney. Ms. Speier, if you are done. She is next and
final here.
Ms. Harman. I would yield to you first. Do I have to go
now?
Mr. Tierney. If you have it, go with it.
Ms. Harman. OK. Two things. First, the comment on
leadership, I surely agree. I have spoken personally to the
Secretary of Defense and the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs about
speaking out on this issue. We all know that don't ask, don't
tell has gotten a lot of air time lately. I personally hope we
repeal that policy. But they have spoken out on that issue. And
I would just use my time to urge them to speak out on this very
compelling issue.
But here is my question. I understand in the new GAO report
you have findings, for example, that say victims don't seek
prosecutions for fear of a humiliating public trial. You also
say that half the women who do not report rape or sexual
assault do so for fear of retaliation. There are remedies for
these things. For example, you could recommend some way to
close the trial so it would not be publicly humiliating, or you
could recommend that people have an easier time to see a base
transfer, in the case of those who worry that they would be
retaliated against. That was one of the issues in the
Lauterbach problem.
Why didn't you make those recommendations?
Ms. Farrell. I think this is the Task Force report, not to
be confused with the GAO report.
Ms. Harman. Excuse me, I did confuse it with yours. Defense
Task Force, you folks in the middle, why didn't you make those
recommendations?
Admiral Iasiello. I think, Congresswoman, all the many
areas that we looked at, we understood the role of leadership,
we understood when we went around and interviewed all the
commanders, especially the courts martial convening authorities
in every place, and if you saw the extensive list of
visitations that we did.
Ms. Harman. Right.
Admiral Iasiello. We looked at whether or not they
aggressively addressed the issue of sexual assault and how
aggressively they prosecuted any sort of concerns that arose
within their commands. The feeling that we got as a Task Force
was that the majority, the major majority of commanders and
courts martial convening authorities not only take this
seriously, but they are out aggressively prosecuting where they
can with the advice of counsel.
As far as the safety issues, we have specific
recommendations for the safety of victims. And we were very,
very concerned about the way victims were treated once they
reported to their command. And even those that in a restricted
way reported to the chaplain or someone else, as the General
mentioned, we were very concerned about the safety and security
issues. We even went into the barracks and the dormitories of
the Air Force, we went to see about the security issues that
were there, and how people were handled, how they were
processed, how they were tended to whenever they reported an
incident of sexual assault.
So that was part of our focus, a very important part of our
focus. And our recommendations, I think, did address some of
those issues.
Ms. Harman. Well, let me just conclude, Mr. Chairman. I
think the rate of prosecutions lags way behind civil society. I
think there is much more to do. Part of it is a training issue
for prosecutors. Again, I think the Army offers the best
example for what needs to be done there.
And on the safety issue, there are some specific
recommendations that I think could have been in your report and
weren't. For example, facilitating base transfer, which would
encourage a lot of women to come forward who would otherwise be
afraid to do so, and if they did so in the case of Lauterbach,
would have a horrible outcome. So I think there is more to do,
and I think it needs to focus around prevention much more than
just response. We would get a lot farther a lot faster with
this epidemic among those who step forward to protect our
country and who in fact we don't protect well enough.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I appreciate the opportunity to be
here.
Mr. Tierney. Thank you, Ms. Harman. We appreciate your
interest and concern.
The gentlewoman from California, Ms. Speier, we thank you
for your interest and for your leadership on this issue. We are
happy you could join us here today. You are recognized for 5
minutes.
Ms. Speier. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
A question to the Task Force. My understanding is that in
2008, there were 2,265 unrestricted reports that were filed. Of
those reports, how many of them then were pursued as full
criminal investigations and court martials?
General Dunbar. Congresswoman, actually, I believe that the
SAPRO office is better suited, because they have the data for
that, to answer the question.
Ms. Speier. Right.
Dr. Whitley. I think we have the report. There were 2,389
investigations on reports made on this and prior years. We
collect data by fiscal year. But certainly, if an assault
occurs in September, for example, that case may not be
completed by then. But there were 2,763 subjects, 592 were
pending disposition, and 136 subjects were civilians or foreign
nationals not subject to the UCMJ, so the commander couldn't
take action. There were 129 subjects that were unidentified.
There were 1,074 subjects that had cases that were
unsubstantiated, unfounded, lacked sufficient evidence or
involved a victim that recanted or a subject that died. There
were 1,339 subjects that were referred by commanders for the
following action: there were 317 referred for courts martial,
247 for non-judicial punishment and 268 administrative actions
or discharges.
Ms. Speier. OK, if I understand this correctly, over half
of the cases or just about half the cases were not dealt with?
You said 1,074 because of lack of evidence or recanting or the
like. So half of those people who had the guts to come forward
were dismissed for whatever reason, correct? And then of the
remaining, you have 317 that were court martials of that
original 2,300 figure, and 247 that had some kind of
administrative action taken.
So I am in the service, I know those figures. What is the
likelihood of me reporting a second time, when those who had
the guts to report end up seeing that half of them are thrown
out? Now, I don't know the circumstances when they were or how
they were thrown out. But those numbers are chilling. If in
fact there are so many more that go unreported for the very
reason that they are concerned about ostracism or retaliation,
we have a bigger problem than one might suspect.
Dr. Whitley. Well, there is another point. We have six
different categories of sexual assault in the UCMJ, from the
least egregious, which would be indecent touching, to
aggravated assault or rape. So there is a wide variety of
sexual assault. It is not just rape. But what you were
talking----
Ms. Speier. Well, wait a second. With all due respect,
unwelcome touching to me is an assault. And I think for most
women it would be an assault. To somehow diminish them because
there are levels of gravity is not really comforting.
Dr. Whitley. The commander does have the discretion to
award a punishment he feels fits the crime, if you will. And we
do provide synopses in our report which describes each of these
cases. And I don't think you will get any of us disagreeing
with you and we know we can do better. Just as Ms. Harman said,
part of her interest and her relationship with the former
Secretary of the Army, we are looking closer at how to train
trial counsel. We actually just got the funding to train
prosecutors and investigators, so that we can improve the
process.
I wanted to comment on something. You used the word
chilling. And there is something in the literature called the
chilling effect. If you do send a case to court martial and
that person gets off, by the time it gets back to the people in
the unit or the people in the academy, usually the perception
is the victim lied. It has a tremendous effect when that
happens.
Ms. Speier. So I would suggest a couple things. One is,
there has to be a way to video tape a victim and change their
voice so that they aren't necessarily specifically
identifiable. Two, I think that there should be a zero
tolerance policy that is communicated everywhere and then is
reflect in what actually takes place. Third, I think there
should be some kind of a review of those women who come forward
and who make a complaint. There is a court martial, the
individual perpetrator is court martialed. What then happens to
the victim in their professional career? I would like to see us
track them to see, what is their life like afterwards. Because
if their life is for all intents and purposes professionally
destroyed, that sends us yet another message of why were are
not getting people coming forward.
Thank you. I yield back.
Mr. Tierney. Thank you very much.
That concludes our questioning of this panel. I just want
to take one moment to thank our friends from the Government
Accountability Office. You have been steadfast and incredibly
helpful on this. I suspect your work isn't done. At some point
we may want you to look at this again for us. I just want to
thank you for the great work that you have done.
Dr. Iasiello and General Dunbar, thank you for your service
to the country generally, but specifically on this Task Force.
I understand from your testimony you think you are done now and
that completes your responsibilities on this. So I am sure you
are on to other things. We appreciate a great deal the work
that you did. We understand the magnitude of it, the time and
effort that went into it, and the specificity in your report is
incredibly helpful. I really believe that it is going to be
looked at and used as a guide to folks going forward. So we
thank both of you as well.
And Dr. Whitley and Ms. McGinn, when this whole series of
hearings started, we weren't too favorably disposed toward the
Department's attitude toward this. That is nothing personal
against Dr. Whitley, because I think she had her work impeded.
Mr. Dominquez and others I think were horrible, and I think
they did things they shouldn't have done. I think their
attitude wasn't where it should be on this issue.
I am impressed with both of you, with the sense of
responsibility and desire to deal with this. I think we have a
way to go, and I think your acknowledgement of that is
comforting to us, that you understand exactly what is going on
here and that there is work to do. You seem quite willing to do
it and to use the good resources that you have at your disposal
to get it done.
I think I can speak for the rest of the subcommittee on
this: we appreciate that. It has not always been the case. It
gives us a feeling that as we go forward, we don't have to have
hearing after hearing after hearing to see whether or not the
Department of Defense takes it seriously.
So good luck going forward. Thank you everybody for your
work. I hope that the men and women in the service are somewhat
comforted by the fact that you are on it, you are on the case
and you are working on it, and as a group, we will all take
this as a joint challenge and move forward. Thank you very
much.
At this point in time, I want to thank the witnesses on
this panel and we will now receive testimony from our second
panel before us, Mr. Merle Wilberding.
Good afternoon, Mr. Wilberding. Thank you very much for
being here.
Mr. Merle Wilberding is an attorney with the law firm of
Coolidge Wall in Dayton, OH. He represented Mary Lauterbach
after the death of her daughter, Lance Corporal Maria
Lauterbach. He has previously worked with a number of
additional families of victims of military sexual assault. He
is also a retired captain in the U.S. Army, where he served in
the Judge Advocate General Corps. Mr. Wilberding holds a J.D.
from the University of Notre Dame.
I want to thank you for coming here, Mr. Wilberding, making
yourself available for us to help us. I ask that you stand and
raise your right hand.
[Witness sworn.]
Mr. Tierney. Thank you very much.
With that, Mr. Wilberding, you have a statement, I
understand. Your full statement will be put on the record, of
course. But if you could tell us in 5 minutes generally your
points, your high points on that, we would appreciate it.
STATEMENT OF MERLE F. WILBERDING, ATTORNEY, COOLIDGE WALL
Mr. Wilberding. Thank you. Thank you, Chairman Tierney,
Congressman Flake and members of the panel. I appreciate the
opportunity to appear before you today. I have submitted m
written statement and I will give you a short summary right
now.
I am Merle Wilberding. I am an attorney from Dayton, OH.
During the Vietnam War I served as a captain the Army Judge
Advocate General Corps. Since early January 2008, I have
represented Mary Lauterbach, the mother of Marine Lance
Corporal Maria Lauterbach, who had filed a claim of sexual
assault against fellow Marine Corporal Cesar Laurean, only to
be murdered 6 months later and buried in a shallow fire pit in
Cesar Laurean's back yard.
At a hearing before this subcommittee on July 31, 2008,
Mary Lauterbach became the voice of her daughter as she shared
the fears and harassment that Maria had endured after she had
filed the sexual assault complaint. This afternoon, I want to
talk about the continuing stream of other victims and their
families who have reached out to Mary and me.
For me, it started in the cemetery after Maria's funeral. I
was approached by three or four women, all of whom told me that
they had been victims of sexual assault in the military and all
of whom told me that their lives had never recovered. As time
continued, the stories from other victims continued. In
February, we had a call from a mother whose daughter had filed
a sexual assault claim against a fellow soldier. My heart went
out to her as she said, ``Maria's story could have been my
daughter's story. The only difference between my daughter and
Maria Lauterbach is that Maria is dead.''
In March, we had another call from a mother whose 19 year
old daughter had filed a sexual assault claim against a fellow
soldier. Instead of receiving protection and programs to help
her recover, she was haunted by the ostracism and the disbelief
of the fellow members of the unit. Meanwhile, the accused was
treated with sympathy and deference as the case moved forward.
In June, we received a phone call from a mother who had
watched NBC's Dateline program on Maria Lauterbach's case. Her
20 year old daughter was a Marine who had just made a sexual
assault claim. Now she feared for her life. She had a military
victim advocate assigned to her, but the victim advocate told
her that there wasn't really anything she could do for her.
All of these stories were virtually identical. The
complaining victim became isolated and harassed. Their lives
were disoriented. The victim became the accused; the accused
became the victim. Significantly, all of these victims were no
longer effectively contributing to the mission of the military.
I want to focus on victim advocates, or as I often call
them, victim listeners. In every discussion I have had with
victims and victims' families, the victim advocate was
described as a very nice person who expressed her concern and
understanding but was not proactive and was not independent,
and either could not or was not able to do anything. In Maria
Lauterbach's case, her victim advocate was her direct report
within the chain of command. Consequently, her victim advocate
had to think about her own efficiency reports, her own
performance reviews and her own obligations to the command.
I have read the report of the Defense Task Force on Sexual
Assault in the Military Services. There are recommendations to
improve the victim advocate program, but I do not believe they
go far enough. Victim advocates need the ability and the
training to be more proactive. It is at these most critical
times that the victim advocate must act. It is important to
remember that these victims are often 18 to 21 years old and at
this point, very vulnerable, very much alone and very much
incapable of making good decisions.
Victim advocates need clear authority to act independent of
the command. Congress should consider establishing a line of
authority for victim advocates that is outside the base chain
of command. Are we making progress? I am at the boots on the
ground level. What I see is not progress. I have heard the
testimony of the panel before and the difficulties of making
progress and of measuring progress. I accept their testimony
for what it was. But I do not think we have done enough. We
need to do more.
Victims need a better protection system to survive sexual
assaults in the military. And the military needs a better
victim protection system to protect their own interests in
continuing to have a supportive and healthy and active military
force.
Thank you, and I am open for any questions you may have.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Wilberding follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Tierney. Thank you, sir. We appreciate that.
Why don't we start the question with Mr. Turner, who was
kind enough to make sure that your testimony was procured for
us here today? Mr. Turner.
Mr. Turner. Thank you Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Chairman, I want to thank you again and also Ranking
Member Flake, for allowing Mr. Wilberding to testify. In
addition to his work, obviously his perspective is very helpful
to us, as he has reviewed the report that we have just
received.
I would like to ask, if I could, to enter into the record
an op-ed piece that Mr. Wilberding has written, ``Sexual
Assault in the Military: Looking for a Few Good Changes,'' that
has some of the recommended changes that he just spoke about.
Mr. Tierney. Without objection, so ordered.
[The information referred to follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Turner. I wanted to ask Mr. Wilberding, when you began
to represent the Lauterbach family and the facts began to
unfold, you had a critical eye and ability to look at where
things went wrong, where the military and DOD did things wrong.
I greatly appreciated that, because it has been a great
assistance to me as we have looked to legislation that might be
able to address some of the issues.
But one thing I find really compelling about the story of
your experience, since you began working with the Lauterbach
family, is that others have come to you. They have come to you
with their stories of their experiences. Why do you think
people are reaching out so, and have been contacting you to
tell you their stories also?
Mr. Wilberding. It has been an interesting process in the
time period now really 2 years from that. And people have
called from all over the country. The cases I cited here, they
were in military bases throughout the country. And each time,
what was consistent to me was that they had nowhere to turn to,
their daughters, in every case, could not, did not have any
faith and trust in the victim advocate that they were dealing
with. They didn't have any faith in the superiors they were
dealing with. They were really struggling. And these are, for
the most part, hard-working people who didn't have the money to
go to faraway places. In every instance, their daughter was a
very long distance away from home.
So there wasn't the support system for the daughter from
the home that you could have, for example, if a rape occurred
in a college atmosphere. But in the military, it is different.
I think they were reaching out to us, primarily because one,
they wanted to tell their story. I thought they really wanted
to get the story out of the struggles, the frustrations they
had. And two, I think they were looking for a support group
that reassured them that people cared about them. I thought
that was what I really felt, was that they were so alone and
their daughters were so alone, they were getting no support
from anyone in the military. That is what they were reaching
out for.
Mr. Turner. Your recommendation on the victim advocates,
taking them from the chain of command, how will that allow them
to be more proactive and what would that do to help us in the
system?
Mr. Wilberding. It is an interesting concept, especially in
light of the conversation from the panel earlier today. My
initial thought had always been that when the Marines issued
their statement on January 15, 2008, remember that her body was
found on Friday, January 11th, and at 3 o'clock the Marines
issued a nine-page opening statement, they called it, that
listed everything they had done.
What struck me about it, and by the way, they read it to
us, this was in a conference room with Mary Lauterbach, they
read it to us literally minutes before they walked in front and
read it. So we had no opportunity to see it in advance and were
trying to take notes on it.
But what struck me about that nine-page opening statement
was, it was a series of statements as to providing some basis
for why they didn't do, didn't take things seriously, didn't
take certain actions, didn't pursue her. Everything seemed to
us that it looked like they were giving reasons why they didn't
do anything, and why their guesses at that were reasonable
guesses. What struck me is, there wasn't anything in there, gee
whiz, we could have done more, we should have done more.
It came across with not a mea culpa, but a Maria culpa. It
really struck me as they were saying, well, nobody gave us all
the hard evidence. If you had just told me all that. And they
are putting the burden on the accused to connect the dots.
There were a lot of red alerts in that.
What struck me about the conference and the panel earlier
was that when the question was asked, why wasn't it in the
report, and the response was, they talked to the commanders,
and I have a good appreciation for that, and a good amount of
respect for them, great respect for them. When you talk to the
commanders, it is like the same situation to my reaction, it is
the same as what I saw here.
It is the same as people in general. When people look at
facts, they tend to look at it as reinforcing their own
position. When institutions look at facts, they tend to look at
the facts reinforcing their own position.
So when the Marines looked at the Lauterbach facts, they
looked at it in the sense of, well, we did this, we did that,
nobody told us about this, nobody told us about that. And that
is what I heard, frankly, in my view, of the commanding
generals: do we need an independent one? No, we are doing a
good job ourselves.
And I sort of sense that is how the, it is part human
nature and part institutional nature. But I think it is
something to keep in mind as you evaluate those positions.
Mr. Turner. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Tierney. Where would the line of authority line to best
assure that independence?
Mr. Wilberding. That is a fair question. A reasonable
opportunity as to whether or not there is, I recognize the
suggestion that it should be a DOD employee, a civilian or a
member of the military if it is a military victim advocate. But
I think if they talk about it, and I have been out of the Army
for a number of years, but the Defense Council and the military
have a separate chain of command that the prosecutors don't
have. They did that to create some independence in that.
In terms of that, why I think it is important, and Maria's
case is a good illustration, is the Marines gave their
statement on January 15th, this is what happened, every fact is
true and nobody told us differently and we obviously don't have
any obligation to pursue it.
But in doing that, they didn't really look at what had
happened beforehand. Consequently, things just fell by the
wayside. They didn't have an independent victim advocate
saying, particularly in that period, it should have been all
the time, from May until December, she went missing on December
14th, victim advocate could have been and should have been
doing more things.
But from December 14th to January 11th, to me that is where
an independent advocate could have been most helpful. What
about this evidence? Mary Lauterbach, as the mother, could have
been in contact with her, found this, found that, why don't you
do more.
Mr. Tierney. I get that aspect of it. I think it is a point
well made. But to whom would that victim advocate report?
Mr. Wilberding. I think they would have to create that
system within the military.
Mr. Tierney. And what about the Task Force recommendation
that there be privileged communications between the advocate
and the victim? Is that a good idea?
Mr. Wilberding. I think that is a very good idea. I read
the victims' stories in Appendix F and detailed the stories
where defense counsel for the accused had essentially taken the
depositions, called them to trial, I think that is a very good
suggestion.
Mr. Tierney. Mr. Flake. Mr. Turner.
Sir, I want to thank you for coming all this way to make
your suggestions. I appreciate your letting us put your article
in the record. I think these are things that help inform our
decisions as we go forward, particularly that one idea that
certainly needs and warrants to be explored.
So with our appreciation, thank you.
Mr. Wilberding. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Tierney. With that, the meeting is adjourned.
[Whereupon, at 5:11 p.m., the subcommittee was adjourned.]
[Additional information submitted for the hearing record
follows:]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]