Justice has many faces

 

 

A Senate panel in Washington, D.C. heard testimony yesterday from victims who suffered rape and abuse while serving in the United States Military. 

Former Army sergeant Rebekah Hayrilla was raped by a superior while deployed to Afghanistan and told the panel, “I chose not to do a report of any kind because I had no faith in my chain of command.”

Speaking for the victims and to the senior military leaders present for the testimony, Kirsten E. Gillibrand, Democrat of New York and chairwoman of the Senate Armed Services personnel subcommittee said, “The issue of sexual violence in the military is not new, and it has been allowed to go on in the shadows for far too long.”

Pentagon records indicate that 19,000 sexual assaults are reported each year, a marked increase since the military engaged in a decade of constant war with a minimal force.   Last year the Pentagon released a report showing a 30 percent increase in sexual offenses and domestic violence since 2006.  Army Vice Chief of Staff Gen. Peter Chiarelli told Congress, “After 10 years of war with an all-volunteer force, you’re going to have problems that no one could have forecasted before this began.”

Mental health providers will tell you that sexual assault has nothing to do with sex and everything to do with stress, a sense of powerlessness, self-esteem problems, experienced trauma and a host of other non-sexual mental health issues.

It is clear that the military has a problem; the 99 percent (including the Senate subcommittee members) should not be surprised when they demand that a miniscule minority of the population take on the burden of ten years of war.  The problems the military faces are two fold; first they are not supporting the victims of sexual violence, and secondly they are not providing the training and mental health support to soldiers, sailors, and airman to prevent the assaults in the first place.

The danger for the military and society as a whole is that the outrage and the rightly placed empathy for victims will result in a kneejerk reaction forcing the military to prosecute assault cases either in a civilian court or institute a civilian based incarceration model of criminal justice.  We have seen this kneejerk reaction before, the U.S. leads the world in percent of prison population and long harsh punitive sentencing.

The civilian leadership has always recognized the unique challenges and stress placed on the military.  For this reason the military was allowed to institute its own form of justice called the Uniform Code of Military Justice (UCMJ).  This code allows the military to institute justice along a vast continuum of punishment possibilities.  The code allows a service member to be confined to base or to his barracks; it allows the military to garnish wages, it can require and enforce that the service member pay child support and restitution, it can require and enforce that a service member participate in mental health treatment.  The UCMJ can also send a service member to prison for life.

This system of justice allows the military to individually tailor justice to the offense, the victim, and the service member and attempts to find a balance of justice that serves all parties and circumstances.  Shocked civilians and subcommittee members that say this system is not doing enough to punish those that are defending the country should look at our own civilian justice system that routinely prosecutes and incarcerates minorities at a higher rate than whites, wrongly convicts thousands of citizens, and incarcerates hundreds of thousands of nonviolent offenders each year.

When I was a young reporter I covered a Court Martial at Fort Bragg, N.C., the defendant was accused of physically assaulting his 10-year-old son with a stick.  The prosecution had disturbing photos of the dark purple welts on the victims back and legs as well as a confession from the soldier.  The senior sergeant did not deny beating his son.  He was a black soldier and he said that this was the way his mother disciplined him growing up and that black children need firm discipline to keep them out of trouble.  I don’t know if this is true, but that is the way the defendant felt, that was his cultural bias.

Had this case been tried in a civilian court, the sergeant would have been convicted quickly of a F3 or F4 felony child assault and probably serve a decade in prison.  His family would have been instantly thrown into poverty, lost their base housing, and referred to health and human services and forgotten.  The sergeant, once he got out of prison, would have a felony record and have difficulties finding a job or a place to live.  He would also have the burden of restitution and accumulated child support; in short he would be buried in debt with no way out and no way to help his family.  You have to look long and hard to find justice in this outcome, everyone would lose.  The son would be more likely to drop out of school, live in poverty, and be involved with the criminal justice system himself.

However, I have to admit, seeing the evidence I wanted to throw the man in jail for years, the victim was innocent and the wounds were terrible.  The senior officers that sat on the Court Martial panel, a form of jury,   saw things a little more clearly.  They knew they had other options, besides prison, available that would allow them to punish the actions of the sergeant while supporting the victim.  The sergeant could be restricted to the company barracks and denied unsupervised visitation with his son, he could be required to work extra-duty and have his weekend privileges revoked, basically a 24/7 work gang.  The sergeant could be required to attend mental health treatment.  The family, on the other hand, would be allowed to stay in their base housing, because the soldier would still be in the military.  The soldier would still have an income to pay child support and victim’s treatment for his son and wife.   The son would be allowed to remain in the base school where there is a support system for children who routinely endure trauma associated with 10-years of war.

The officer’s ruling, they decided not to send the sergeant to prison, would mostly likely anger many civilians and the Senate subcommittee that do not understand all the avenues open to the military to ensure justice is served to all.  And that’s the danger of having 99 percent of the population clueless about the lives of the one percent who we place so much responsibility.

*Remember the Air Force Academy Cadets accused of sexual assault in Colorado Springs?  Had these college students been charged in a civilian court they would be serving life sentences under Colorado’s harsh Lifetime Supervision Act that has incarcerated thousands for over a decade.