Erik Slavin reports:
Civilian victims of sexual assault on military bases are entitled to much less confidentiality when reporting the crime than military victims, a disparity that some victims and a senior military expert on the issue believe is suppressing reports and prosecutions.
Less than a third of all sexual assault reports that prompt an immediate investigation on military bases came from civilian victims, according to a Defense Department report released in 2009. But no one knows whether the actual proportion of civilian victims is higher, because the military’s reporting system for sex crimes requires that the identity of civilian sex-crime victims be disclosed to local commanders.
Read more on Stars and Stripes.