Air Force Secretary reports 54 cases of rape, assault at Academy...

Drudge ^

[Mark17]

It was a dumb, lefty social experiment from the beginning and should be stopped as soon as possible.

Roger that. USAF, Retired

[Dark Wing]

The Air Force Problem is institutional and not just limited to women.

This is the "killer 'graph" from the Ed Offley Soldiers for Truth article I linked to above:

>Bill and Linda Graney are convinced that Air Force Academy officials
>and some upper-class cadets colluded in the ouster of their son
>because of David’s and their attempts to force the Academy to fully
>investigate the March 2002 assault and other alleged problems at the
>Academy, including the now-publicized allegations of dozens of
>sexual assaults.

Under Art. 2 of the UCMJ, cadets are subject to military law, Art. 120 on rape is a capital offense "Death or other punishment as a court-martial may direct."

Either the commandant of the academy, Brigadier General Sylvanus T. Gilbert or the next higher two-star is the General Court-Martial convening authority and should have long since ordered an Article 32 (pre-trial) investigation.

Instead the USAF brass starting with Chief of Staff Jumper, is doing an 'eek-a-mouse' routine. This reaction verges on criminal conspiracy given what happened to the Graney twins. And, by the way, "Conspiracy" in military law is Art. 81 UCMJ (10 U.S.C. § 881).

[Thud]

I disagree. At this point the USAF Academy command staff are the issue. They let the heart of the Air Force's institutional culture go Serb.

"The issue is not about whether or not women should be in the military, the issue is about a bunch of cadets who can't follow orders and who should not be in the military ..."

[Thud]

All of them reserves. No ring-knockers.

"Yep...time to bring in new middle and upper management for the Zoomies ..."

[185JHP]

Sad that it impacts a great Service. I've heard it said that the military justice system is better for you if you're guilty, but much worse if you're innocent. Your experience confirms this. FReegards

[Thud]

Sexual assault and rape in this context are demonstrations of power disparities. Sexual gratification is secondary. It is definitely related to physical abuse and assault by upper classmen against lower classmen. Both involve males with ego problems expressing those against victims they feel are, or should be, weaker.

Aided and abetted by officers for whom neglect of duty is a profession.

[af_vet_rr]

The two-gender military does not work.

I see your an expert on the military. Oh wait, you've been teaching in a university for the the past 20 years - that would mean you have no first hand knowledge of women in the military.

Women have been around and in the military for several decades now, and the only failures we have had in regards to the military all stemmed from politicians not knowing what the hell they were doing (Truman, Kennedy/Johnson, Carter, Clinton). To be honest, most weren't failures - the military did exactly what the politicians wanted. You can't blame women for what a bunch of democrats did. The military has worked just fine with women in it - I know, I was there.

plus women not being able to meet the same physical standards as the men.

Many of the duties in the military do not require heavy physical activity, no more physical activity than you encounter in your everyday activities, and women are not in front-line units for the most part (where heavy physical activity could be required at any time). I would make the argument that women in the military free men up for the heavy-duty activities that they may not physically be able to handle, if I felt like making such an argument.

There are people in this thread who think you should not be working, that women joining the workforce screwed up the economy, families, etc. and here you are supporting them. Weird to say the least.

One other thing, many jobs over the past decade, in the military, were farmed out to contractors - who aren't taking physicals and have to pass few tests outside of security clearances.

[af_vet_rr]

Sexual assault and rape in this context are demonstrations of power disparities. Sexual gratification is secondary. It is definitely related to physical abuse and assault by upper classmen against lower classmen. Both involve males with ego problems expressing those against victims they feel are, or should be, weaker.

Aided and abetted by officers for whom neglect of duty is a profession.

Very good points. I would be willing to be it's not just women these cretins are harassing/assaulting, but probably anybody they have any power over. I hope to God that we can purge and try these people, as well as anybody above them who may have covered this up. These people are not fit to be officers. I did come across somebody who could have easily been one of the types you talk about. It was a lengthy process, and took a lot of work, but people like that can be given the boot.

[ken in texas]

I remember that one. One slight correction though -- he was at AF while his girlfriend went to Annapolis. I think his last name was Graham or something like that. Too lazy to Google right now.

[Illbay]

Yes, you remember correctly. Here are some of the details:

Trial nears for cadet held in deadly lovers' triangle/Midshipman girlfriend found guilty of girl's death

By JOHN W. GONZALEZ
Staff
Houston Chronicle, 7/5/98


NEW BRAUNFELS - The plot is as tragic as they come, even the second time around.

Bright young students, aspiring military officers - one consumed by jealousy, the other eaten by guilt after betraying their love pact - brutally slay the girl who briefly came between them.

They keep their secret for nine months before being found out. Then their promising futures quickly dissolve into a made-for-Court TV melodrama that scuttles their careers, ruins their relationship, banishes them to separate jail cells and brings heartbreak to three families.

With cameras rolling in an all-too-real courtroom, that script soon will be laid out for the second time - this time in New Braunfels - for jurors in the capital murder trial of former Air Force Academy cadet David Graham. A panel of 500 potential jurors will assemble Monday, with testimony scheduled to start on July 15.

At the request of the victim's family, prosecutors are not seeking the death penalty for Graham, 21. If convicted, he faces only one possible punishment - life in prison, with a minimum incarceration of 40 years.

Graham's ex-girlfriend, former Naval Academy midshipman Diane Zamora, 20, was convicted in February. She was given a life sentence for her role in the Dec. 4, 1995, beating and shooting death of Adrianne Jones, 16, an attractive sophomore honor student and athlete at Mansfield High School.

When Graham told Zamora of a sexual encounter he and Jones had following a track meet, Zamora, then a high school senior, flew into a rage. She said only Jones' death would satisfy her rage, according to her trial testimony.

Graham was held by Tarrant County jailers for 21 months before his recent transfer to Comal County to await trial. Because of extensive publicity for Zamora's Fort Worth trial earlier this year, including Court TV coverage, a judge agreed to move Graham's trial here with hopes of minimizing jurors' preconceived notions about the case.

But even Graham's lawyer has acknowledged the difficulty of offsetting damning evidence against Graham that includes written admissions he and Zamora made after they were snatched from their coveted appointments to the prestigious military academies.

Assistant District Attorney Michael Parrish of Tarrant County, citing a gag order issued by state District Judge Don Leonard, declined comment on speculation that Graham's trial will be a rerun of Zamora's, in terms of evidence and witnesses presented. Zamora, who testified in her own defense, is not a subpoenaed witness in Graham's trial; no decision has been made on whether Graham will take the stand.

Dan Cogdell of Houston, Graham's lead defense attorney, said he will try to discredit Graham's statement to police.

"Come to New Braunfels" to find out more, said Cogdell.

Cogdell indicated in pretrial hearings that he will challenge investigative work by the Grand Prairie Police Department and will attempt to show jurors that Graham's written version of events was inaccurate. But in an early blow to the defense, the trial judge ruled in April that Graham's statement is admissible as evidence.

The defense's best hope, short of acquittal on the capital murder charge, is conviction on a "lesser included offense" such as involuntary manslaughter or murder .

More than 200 miles from the scene of the crime, prosecutors will attempt to prove to jurors that Graham and Zamora collaborated in the crime in order to obliterate the one person who had threatened their obsessive relationship.

Graham and Zamora met in August 1995 and became engaged a month later, vowing to wed on Aug. 13, 2000.

But on Nov. 4, 1995, Graham had a sexual tryst with Jones that gnawed on him until he admitted it to Zamora, according to both of their written statements.

"They were sexual activities, short-lived and hardly appreciated," Graham told police.

Yet, his confession to Zamora a month after the affair was not the end of his torment, according to the statement he gave to police after his September 1996 arrest.

"The month that followed was one of guilt and shame. I was always being told by Diane that our relationship was so perfect and pure. The love we shared would never be broken and no one would never come between us. No one, that is, except that one girl that had stolen from us our purity," Graham wrote.

IN HER statement to police, Zamora acknowledged becoming "hysterical" upon learning of the affair, saying she "kept ramming my head against the walls and when I was on the ground I kept ramming my head into the floor trying to crack my skull." When Graham tried to calm her, she said she told him, "Kill her, kill her."

"He was so scared, he wasn't about to say no to me," Zamora said.

A month later, Zamora claimed, Graham had garnered the resolve to kill Jones. She said Graham called Jones late on Dec. 3 , 1995, and convinced Jones to let him pick her up after midnight.

"She thought she was coming out so they could have sex again," Zamora said in her statement, adding that she hid in the trunk until Graham and Jones drove to a remote location. Then, Zamora said, she emerged to confront the surprised Jones.

Graham claimed in his statement that Zamora struck the first blow by hitting Jones in the head with a barbell weight that was to have been used to sink the victim's body in Joe Pool Lake. The blow sent Jones scurrying from the car to escape the trap, but she collapsed in a field by a fence, where Graham said he ended her flight with his 9 mm pistol.

"In that short instant, I knew I couldn't leave the key witness to our crime alive. I just pointed and shot," he told police.

"I was very confused and scared; I probably looked like the perverbial (sic) headless chicken running around the crime scene. I fired again and ran to the car. Diane and I drove off. The first things out of our mouths were, `I love you.' "

ALTHOUGH SOMEONE else was wrongly accused of the crime initially, the dam that held back Zamora's secret began to erode as months passed. By now a midshipman, Zamora eventually confided in colleagues about her role in the Texas killing. They, in turn, told Navy authorities, leading to her and Graham's arrests in September 1996.

By the time Zamora's trial was held, their relationship was over and the two were bitterly fighting over the possibility she would blame him for the murder . In a letter from his jail cell, Graham lashed out, "You not only gave in to your parents and lawyer, but you made a fool of me."

Zamora admitted on the stand that she urged Graham to kill Jones, but asserted he was the dominant person in the relationship and it was he who fired the fatal shots. Sex, Zamora added, was Graham's most controlling urge. She described Graham as a sex fiend "99.9 percent of the time."

There is no indication that their passion has rekindled while Graham awaits trial and Zamora serves her sentence.

Soon after Zamora arrived in prison in late February, she was assigned to a "hoe squad," chopping weeds outside the Murray Unit near Gatesville. A month later, she became a maintenance clerk in the unit's warehouse and is now "an average inmate" said Larry Todd, spokesman for the Texas Department of Criminal Justice.

"She does what she is told and does her job," he said.

Zamora, who lives in a dormitory with 40 other women and has a 10- by 4-foot cubicle of her own, has adjusted well to prison regimen, perhaps because of her previous military-style training at Annapolis, Md., Todd said.

Her prison routine, which begins daily at 3 :30 a.m., is rarely broken. On the advice of her attorney, she is not granting media interviews. Last week, ``Inside Edition'' visited the prison to do a "day in the life of" story, but they had to do it without Zamora, Todd said.

When Graham's trial is shown on Court TV, Zamora might be able to watch parts of it, Todd said, just as Graham watched her trial while in jail. But Zamora won't get special treatment such as time away from work to watch the proceedings, and she doesn't have control over what's on the communal television.

"They have cable (TV) in there," said Todd, "but the way they decide what to watch is by vote. An officer keeps the channel changer."

[Illbay]

Notice in the above article:

1. She coerced him into killing the girl, because she was jealous. He, "scared" when she seemed to try to harm herself, consented.

2. She, Zamora, struck the first blow against the young girl (a blow that probably would have been fatal had she not then been shot by Graham).

3. As soon as the guilt began to set in, this dominant witch-woman immediately began to shift ALL the blame to him. It was all his fault and he was really "the dominant one in their relationship." (Huh? In that case why would he have wanted to kill the girl; he was "gettin' some" on both ends?)

4. She testified against him at HIS trial but he refused to testify against her.

Now, this is just one example of how a collusion of this kind could go down, but it ought to give pause to those who might believe every single one of these cases were "rape."

I hope they investigate thoroughly.

[VMI70]

"Unfortunately castration is not considered a suitable punishment these days."

Well, that just about says it all.

Helloooo--Come in, Berlin? Is the grass green? Will the sun shine tomorrow? For your edification, punishment by castration is alive and well in the military schools and services and has been for many years.

I know that fact is terribly disappointing to you and your egalitarian ilk on this thread who wish the castration to be real and not figurative. However, you all can take solace in the fact that the damage done is virtually the same.

[Bush2000]

Sad that it impacts a great Service. I've heard it said that the military justice system is better for you if you're guilty, but much worse if you're innocent. Your experience confirms this. FReegards

Actually, I'm glad to say that I wasn't involved in that sordid affair. But I knew most of the people that were.

[ken in texas]

I hope they investigate thoroughly.

I also hope the investigations are thorough. I have no doubt that there have been some rapes. In my time at the AFA I ran across some people who might have been capable of a crime like this. Not all who attend are fit to serve.

The trouble is... there are at least two sides to every story. One's claim of something doesn't make it factual. However, any cadet found guilty of rape should receive the maximum punishment permitted by law.

[185JHP]

I didn't mean to imply that you were a wrongdoer - just that you saw evidence that the innocent can get hurt in the scramble for "closure and PR." FReegards