FAIRBANKS, Alaska (AP) - A decade after the Pentagon began confronting rape in the ranks, the U.S. military frequently fails to provide justice to the children of service members when they are sexually assaulted by other kids on base.
An Associated Press investigation finds that sex assault cases on bases where military kids live and learn often die on the desks of prosecutors. Criminal investigators shelved an unknown number of reports.
Instead of punishment or rehabilitation, offenders may be shuffled into the civilian world.
The Pentagon doesn’t know the problem’s true extent. On Alaska’s bases, records the Army acknowledged were incomplete cited zero cases. But AP documented at least five sex assault reports among children or teens since 2007. Fort Wainwright had three, Fort Greely had two.
Pentagon officials promised to take “appropriate actions.”
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