Hickam dorms
may ban alcoholThe Pacific Air Forces
leader suggests a "dry dorm
policy" may help reduce rapes
Hickam Air Force Base officials may ban alcohol from enlisted airmen's barracks after a three-year study showed that drinking was a factor in about 60 percent of 92 rape cases involving Air Force personnel in the Pacific region.
Gen. William Begert, commander of Pacific Air Forces, made the suggestion in a memo Friday, but left the decision to institute a "dry dorm policy" to the heads of the nine bases in the Pacific.
"We found that the single-most influential factor in PACAF sexual assault cases was alcohol," said Col. Steve Lepper, staff judge advocate and chairman of a team to review and assess the 92 rape allegations.
"Whether it caused male suspects to do things they normally wouldn't do or prevented female victims from responding or resisting the way they would to protect themselves, on both sides it proved to be a significant factor."
Eleven of the rapes took place at Hickam. The Air Force's five-month study covered 2001 through 2003 and found that 106 servicemen were accused of rape in 92 cases. Two thirds of the cases resulted in disciplinary action, and some cases are pending.
Col. Ray Torres, who commands the 15th Air Lift Wing, said he doesn't believe the number of sexual assault cases at Hickam are alarming but that they are "a continual concern."
"The safety and security of our airmen is my No. 1 priority. Without our people, we cannot perform the mission," he said. "Sexual assault is a crime that will not be tolerated. We have and will aggressively pursue allegations of sexual assault while ensuring we support the victims throughout the process. Air Force people are our most precious asset."
Capt. Heather Zwicker, Hickam spokesman, said Begert's dry-dorm suggestion is "still being discussed" by Torres and his staff and a decision will be made by summer.
In his memo, which directed commanders to take nine steps to prevent sexual assault, Begert noted that Elemendorf Air Force Base in Alaska, one of nine Pacific bases, has prohibited alcohol in its dorms.
Under current Hickam policy, military personnel who are at least 21 are allowed to drink in their dorm rooms. Hickam is one of six bases in the Pacific that allow drinking in dorms.
"Random checks for underage drinking in our dormitories are conducted by supervisors on a routine basis," Zwicker said. "Some organizations visit the dormitories weekly, others on a monthly basis."
The Air Force study noted that after the Elemendorf wing commander prohibited the storage and drinking of alcohol in the dorms on May 28, 2002, two rapes were reported. Before the policy was established there were five rape cases in the dorms -- all involving alcohol; six other cases were reported to take place outside the dorms.
At the two other Pacific bases -- Kunsan Air Base in South Korea and Kadena Air Base on Okinawa -- consumption of alcohol is forbidden in dormitory hallways and common areas.
All six dormitories at Hickam are co-ed, but men and women do not share sleeping rooms or bathroom facilities. Nearly 700 men and women live in separate wings or floors.
Some Pacific Air Force bases require squadron commanders and first sergeants to patrol their dormitories on a routine basis and place a noncommissioned officer in the dorms over weekends.
At Hickam, all single Air Force personnel from the rank of airman basic to senior airmen with less than three years of service are required to live in dorms.
In the 92 reported assault cases, the victims and their reported attackers generally were under 25, and most knew each other. Nearly half of all rapes occurred in the dorm rooms of victims, suspects or their friends.
Begert's memo said all airmen must attend annual sexual assault briefings. Pacific Air Force's lawyers also will be required to give commanders written legal reviews when they receive sexual assault reports.
In his four-page memo, Begert said "the most significant study finding is that too many sexual assaults have occurred and continue to occur."
As a result of cases surfacing at the U.S. Air Force Academy and the 92 sexual assault allegations, Begert formed the Sexual Assault Assessment Group, made up of medical, legal, Office of Special Investigations, and law enforcement experts. The group first met in November.
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11 rapes reported
at HickamAn Air Force review shows
accusations on the rise in the Pacific
At least 92 accusations of rape involving Air Force personnel in the Pacific were reported to military authorities there from 2001 to 2003, according to a new study by the service.
Eleven of the 92 were reported at Hickam Air Force Base on Oahu.
Korea led the total number of reported rapes rape with 27 cases — 13 at Osan Air Base, another 13 Kunsan Air Base and one at Seoul. Elmendorf Air Force Base in Alaska also reported 13 cases.
The findings, which surprised some top Air Force officials, also singled out serious flaws in the reporting of sexual assault claims and assistance to victims.
The five-month review was the most comprehensive report of its kind by an Air Force command and has led to a servicewide investigation into how sexual assault is reported, how it can be prevented and how commanders deal with victims. Investigators from other commands said yesterday that conditions varied at their installations, depending on the services available on and off bases.
Last week, Gen. William Begert, the commander of Pacific Air Forces who sought the review, ordered broad changes in training, reporting of sexual assaults and assistance for victims. He has also summoned his top field commanders to a meeting in April at his headquarters at Hickam Air Force Base to discuss the problem.
“I found it disturbing,” Begert said in a telephone interview yesterday, referring to the number of rape accusations, mostly made by servicewomen but also, in some cases, by civilians. “We’ve got to take this on and lower the number of incidents. Our mission gets done by us trusting each other, and this undermines that trust.”
The Air Force inquiry focused on the command’s nine major bases, in Japan, South Korea, Guam, Hawaii, Alaska, Singapore and Diego Garcia, an island in the Indian Ocean.
Of the 106 service members accused in the 92 cases cited in the report, 14 were tried by court-martial. Seven were convicted, four for rape and sentenced to an average of eight years in prison; more than 40 others have been convicted of lesser, related offenses and received punishments like demotions, lost pay and letters of reprimand. No action was taken against 28, and many cases are still pending. The review was first reported Friday by the Colo rado Springs Gazette.
The Air Force’s Pacific command study comes as the overall military faces the most serious accusations of sexual misconduct in years. There have been at least 112 reports of sexual misconduct, including rape, in the past 18 months in the Central Command area of operations, which includes Iraq, Kuwait and Af ghani stan. Two dozen women at Sheppard Air Force Base in Texas have reported to a local rape-crisis center that they were assaulted in 2002.
The Defense Department and the Army have opened separate inquiries in recent weeks, and the Pentagon established a toll-free number, 800-497-6261, last week for people to provide information to the investigations. The individual armed services have already set up such numbers.
Sens. Barbara Boxer, D-Calif., and Olympia Snowe, R-Maine, introduced legislation yesterday to help military women who are victims of rape or incest. Under current law those women can have abortions at military hospitals, but they have to pay for the procedure. The bill would allow for military money to cover the abortions.
The Air Force Pacific command’s inquiry grew out of Begert’s desire to understand the problem in his area after the disclosure last year of more than 50 reported rapes or assaults over the past decade at the Air Force Academy.
Investigators immediately discovered a major problem: The Pacific command, and the Air Force in general, had no common standard for reporting rapes or other sexual assaults.
“Keeping track of the data is a real mess,” Col. Steven Lepper, the command’s top lawyer and leader of the review, said yesterday in a telephone interview.
Lepper said his team had to go by hand through every rape report filed in the command from 2001 to 2003, Begert’s time as commander. Lepper said he was “surprised a bit” by the figures but not necessarily by the profile of those involved.
The majority of the cases involved Air Force men and women, age 25 or younger, and took place in the dormitory room of either the accuser or the reported assailant. Alcohol was often a factor.
Though in most cases male airmen assaulted female service members, some civilian women, including married women and prostitutes, also reported being raped.
The largest number of reported rapes — about one-third of the accusations — were in South Korea, where about one-quarter of the Pacific command’s 34,000 troops are based. About 19 percent, or 6,635, of the command’s troops are women. The report noted that most service members were on unaccompanied tours, with families remaining in the United States; that most lived in dormitories; and that alcohol was prevalent.
The number of rapes reported in the Pacific command seems to be increasing: 34 rapes were reported in 2001, 17 in 2002 and 41 in 2003. In the first four weeks of this year, six have been reported.
“Not a promising picture,” said a briefing slide that Begert used in a presentation for senior Air Force officials last week in Washington.
The command’s review also found most bases had poor services to help victims with medical care and counseling.
“I was a bit disappointed by our apparent lack of a good, solid victims’ assistance program that was proactive and had good follow-up,” Begert said.
In a directive to his commanders, Begert ordered new sexual-assault awareness training for all airmen, written legal reviews of all sexual assault investigations, and more responsive victims’ advocates, who are appointed immediately after an accusation is made.
Begert also suggested that commanders improve supervision of dormitories and consider banning alcohol there, as Elmendorf Air Force Base in Alaska has done.
Victims’ advocacy groups applauded these steps but said more was needed. “They’re useful, but there are some elements still missing, including confidentiality to victims,” said Christine Hansen, executive director of the Miles Foundation in Newtown, Conn., a victims’ advocacy group that focuses on the military.
Star-Bulletin reporter Gregg K. Kakesako and the New York Times contributed to this story.