Sexual Assault against CAP cadet in Florida by USAFR LTC?

[Walkman]

While we should heed the directive about discussions, I believe we can use this incident to remind ourselves of why there's CPP in the first place, and give our AoR a once over in that respect.

NIN, your first post about culture was really a good place to start me thinking. The right culture, relationships and epsrit d' corps can go a long way to help prevent these situations.

[RogueLeader]

It ended up in my junk box about 415 local this morning. You might want to check there.

[Майор Хаткевич]

I finally got it in the early am yesterday.

[O-Rex]

I knew this guy: we weren't 'buds' but we'd run into each other when I was a group commander because FLWG used to time commander's calls with cadet events, which he was usually in attendance.  He had some kind of venture with cigars in Tampa, cuz he always bright stogies to WingConfs, he'd pass them around and we'd literally 'smoke & joke.'

He just seemed like a regular guy: sometimes you just can't tell.  Nonetheless this is a black eye all-around.

[Johnny Yuma]

Actually, I think this incident is proof that the CPP was never intended to protect cadets but only the organization.

The CPP only covers CAP members, period. It stands mute on protecting cadets from any other source of abuse other than CAP members. It gives members zero guidance on what should be done if a member witnesses or believes a cadet is being abused by members of the .mil, .gov, private individuals not affiliated with CAP or even family members whether it be during a CAP activity or otherwise.

In this case, the offender was a USAFR field grade. CPP doesn't apply. The only reason we're hearing about this is the media attention NHQ can't throw off and the letter from NHQ pretty much says so.

Why is this? Simple. Members abusing cadets brings liability to the organization. Anyone else beating or molesting our cadets doesn't, which is why we have no policy protecting cadets from that form of abuse. You'll notice in the letter that NHQ states if anyone has any information regarding this incident to take it to the law, not them.

If NHQ was truly interested in protecting cadets, it would create an anti abuse policy that covers ALL situations involving our kids, not just who the lawyers want to protect, even if it means opening us up for for liability. If that means we help protect more kids from similar situations, then so be it!

[Garibaldi]

Actually, I think this incident is proof that the CPP was never intended to protect cadets but only the organization.

The CPP only covers CAP members, period. It stands mute on protecting cadets from any other source of abuse other than CAP members. It gives members zero guidance on what should be done if a member witnesses or believes a cadet is being abused by members of the .mil, .gov, private individuals not affiliated with CAP or even family members whether it be during a CAP activity or otherwise.

In this case, the offender was a USAFR field grade. CPP doesn't apply. The only reason we're hearing about this is the media attention NHQ can't throw off and the letter from NHQ pretty much says so.

Why is this? Simple. Members abusing cadets brings liability to the organization. Anyone else beating or molesting our cadets doesn't, which is why we have no policy protecting cadets from that form of abuse. You'll notice in the letter that NHQ states if anyone has any information regarding this incident to take it to the law, not them.

If NHQ was truly interested in protecting cadets, it would create an anti abuse policy that covers ALL situations involving our kids, not just who the lawyers want to protect, even if it means opening us up for for liability. If that means we help protect more kids from similar situations, then so be it!

Hm. Makes a bit of sense now. Anything taking place out of the scope of CAP authority, CAP is not responsible for. Anyone outside the scope of CAP responsibility and authority, CAP is not responsible for. For instance:

Parental abuse
Bullying at school
Abuse by teachers
Abuse by military
Abuse by government
Abuse by members of non-CAP peer organizations (BSA, GSA, etc)

It does make sense that CPP does not protect the cadet but the organization from harm such as lawsuits and bad publicity. I mean, all a cadet has to do is make an accusation against a SM and that SM is pretty much history. At the very least the SM's reputation is completely shot. Having an accusation of abuse, unfounded or real, hanging over your head...it's hard to get any work done.

I'm not making light of this at all. It is a very serious matter. JM is right; we do need a more comprehensive policy that protects not only cadets, but seniors as well. There is very little we can do as members to intervene in the above mentioned abuse scenarios except pass along our suspicions or whatever proof we have to the proper authorities, CAP or otherwise.

It's a tough road.

[wuzafuzz]

The policy is fine.  It does a good job of protecting cadets.  I would change "should" to "must" in this line:
"Senior members, cadets, and parents/guardians should immediately report incidents of observed or suspected abuse to the unit commander or commander at the next higher level of command."   It makes no difference if the suspected abuser is a CAP member or not.  Report it.

Other portions of the policy present reasonable requirements and protections for cadets as well as CAP. 

The policy requires 2 "approved" senior members at overnight cadet activities, it recommends 2 senior members at all cadet activities (with a few exceptions), and requires an "approved" senior member be present at all times when cadets interact with non-CAP members at CAP activities.  The policy also acknowledges mandatory reporting requirements that may exists outside of CAP.

What else should the policy include? 

[Eclipse]

The CPP protects everyone in CAP.

Make no mistake, while we can't protect our cadets from everything and everyone, we are certainly responsible for situations where people are in contact with our cadets because of CAP, or in a CAP context.

In this case several articles mention that some of the alleged abuse occurred during a conference(s), if these were CAP activities, the staff and leaders should have been more diligent.  A cadet, regardless of age, has no business staying alone with a non-member adult in a hotel room, etc.

For some reason, some members get the idea that members of the military, especially the USAF, have some sort of special force powers over CAP members.  They don't, and are subject to the same "non-member" rules as everyone else.

[Smokey]

Having been a cop for 40 years I can say that you cannot protect cadets from everything in the world.  We can only try to provide a reasonable attempt while they are involved in CAP activities.  CAPNHQ & the lawyers are not ducking the issue, but there is no way CAP could prevent all instances of abuse nor should they or individual CAP members be responsible for issues outside of their control.

If a cadet meets a non CAP pilot at an airshow the cadet is working and a week later the cadet meets the pilot at the pilot's house to "learn more about flying" and is abused, is CAP responsible?  There is no way CAP can prevent this. 
Child predators will find ways no matter how many policies are put in place.  It is the nature of the beast. 

[EMT-83]

You need a regulation to tell you to report a crime against a cadet?

[lordmonar]

CPP is like Safety......yes we want to make sure that are people are safe....but "real reason" why you right the regulation is to protect the organisation from law suits for "not doing enough to prevent this from happeing".

Now you can be a cynic like Johnny Yuma and take that to bank and say that the organisation is ONLY concerned about protecting the organisation........but that is not true and he knows it.

[AngelWings]

I think there should be a bit more in the CPP about teaching cadets to know when they are subject towards someones command or not. It's different in CAP compared to the regular joe world.

In the regular joe world, it doesn't matter what someones says (excluding Mr. and Mrs. Legal Capital-Punishment IE your parents and those who have actual authority), you do not have to listen to them and there is no huge punishment for telling them to screw off. In CAP, cadets are always following the CoC, and when someone is a FG officer, there is a huge misconception that they have a huge amount of authority over you.

Basically, you need to tell cadets that they're not subject to military officers commands unless otherwise stated by a CAP officer for something along the lines of a class or some form of training. Same goes for ANYONE in the military, since cadets generally take "CAP is not the military" to mean that "the military outranks CAP and that CAP is subject to military orders".

It wouldn't be a huge change, and for any intelligent cadet, they should already know this. However, you have little kids in CAP who are extremely impressionable to whatever they're told and do assume a great deal.

[lordmonar]

I agree that we need some sort of CPP for all cadets and all parents.....so that they know when and how to report things.

[spaatzmom]

The CPP protects everyone in CAP.

Make no mistake, while we can't protect our cadets from everything and everyone, we are certainly responsible for situations where people are in contact with our cadets because of CAP, or in a CAP context.

In this case several articles mention that some of the alleged abuse occurred during a conference(s), if these were CAP activities, the staff and leaders should have been more diligent.  A cadet, regardless of age, has no business staying alone with a non-member adult in a hotel room, etc.

For some reason, some members get the idea that members of the military, especially the USAF, have some sort of special force powers over CAP members.  They don't, and are subject to the same "non-member" rules as everyone else.

There have not been any CAP conferences in Brevard County( info from articles),  the last east coast conferences we had in the early 2000's were in Daytona Beach and Fort Lauderdale.  There have been numerous events held in Brevard County over the years but not in the time frame that the articles state that I am aware of, but since 2010 that could have changed a bit even though they tend to be annual events held at generally the same time of year each year.

[Eclipse]

There have not been any CAP conferences in Brevard County( info from articles),  the last east coast conferences we had in the early 2000's were in Daytona Beach and Fort Lauderdale.  There have been numerous events held in Brevard County over the years but not in the time frame that the articles state that I am aware of, but since 2010 that could have changed a bit even though they tend to be annual events held at generally the same time of year each year.

The most casual search of the names involved will bring up plenty of photos in this regard.

[spaatzmom]

There have not been any CAP conferences in Brevard County( info from articles),  the last east coast conferences we had in the early 2000's were in Daytona Beach and Fort Lauderdale.  There have been numerous events held in Brevard County over the years but not in the time frame that the articles state that I am aware of, but since 2010 that could have changed a bit even though they tend to be annual events held at generally the same time of year each year.

The most casual search of the names involved will bring up plenty of photos in this regard.

Not sure just what photos you are referring to, but even on his fb page there is nothing out of the ordinary.  I was pointing out that the "conferences" mentioned in numerous articles, all googled, were not CAP conferences as the wing conf is in Feb and up through last year were held in counties other than what the articles specified for dates.  I have attended every wing conference in Fl. since 2000.

[NIN]

NIN, your first post about culture was really a good place to start me thinking. The right culture, relationships and epsrit d' corps can go a long way to help prevent these situations.

Thanks, I appreciate that.

(long post follows, if you have ADD, step away)

Thats my point all along: culturally speaking, there are a few things at work here.

Professionalism & Leadership

If the correct culture is in place, relations between cadets and adult officers/NCOs absolutely must remain at a professional level. Always. Always.

That does not mean that I expect my cadets to stand at attention and call me "Sir!" when they run into me at the mall. But I do expect that any interactions we have outside the unit are respectful and based on the relationship (officer-cadet) that we already have _at_ the unit. 

When I was on active duty, if I ran into one of my officers at the Shoppette on a Saturday and we were both in civvies, I didn't say "Hey, there, Joe, how's it hanging?"  I might say "Hi, sir, whats the good word?" or "Whats up, sir?"  Why? Because come Monday, he's still the LT and I'm still the PFC.   I mean, yeah, we were always on a first name basis: He called me "Private" and I called him "Lieutenant." Easy, right?

The bottom line there is that as a commander, I expected and required that I and my officers & NCOs  comport ourselves in a professional fashion around the troops.  Plain and simple: Its called "leadership." We must exercise it around our subordinates.  That means professional behavior both in and out of uniform. And "leadership" is incumbent upon the leaders, not the subordinates.

Familiarity Breeds Contempt

Continuing in that vein, remember this phrase: "Familiarity breeds contempt."  You will be tested on this material later..

Lets define that phrase a little bit.

Familiarity.  What kind of familiarity?

• First name basis between officer & cadet?
• At the commander's house for dinner on Sundays?
• Watch the testing officer's kids when him & the wife are at the movies?
• Dating Cadet Jones' mom?
• Sneaking a beer at the battalion commander's place?
• Inappropriate access to personal activities/info?
• Overshare on the Internet?
• Possible sexual talk/contact? (email, chat, phone, Facebook, outside of cadetting meetings)

Remember, as I suggested above:  the end of the day, this is as much a leadership exercise (as in "standards of leadership") as anything else. 

Think about what constitutes "fraternization" or "inappropriate relations" (and thus, a high degree of familiarity) between officers & enlisted in the military. 

Now think about what constitutes "inappropriate relations" between teacher/officer and student/cadet.  (and think of it in that context, too, the "teacher/coach/leader" and "student/player/follower." There are legal definitions of these roles, too, especially pertains to criminal sexual conduct.)

So now lets talk about the second part: "contempt."

Contempt. For what? (just in this context, even)

• Authority (duly appointed/constituted. Legal. Community)
• The rules.
• The organization.
• You.
• Other officers.
• Good order and discipline.
• Other cadets.

You name it. 

We need to avoid becoming unduly familiar with our cadets.  They are our charges, not members of our social circles, peer group or "dating targets."

That doesn't mean that you don't know them or their parents or whatever, or perhaps have contact with them in a social setting.

It means you're maintaining a professional level of relationship and discourse thru your interactions with them, whether that is in-person, via email, over the phone, or on Facebook (more on this in a minute).

I think if you go back and look at most situations like the one at hand, you will see repeated instances where the "leader" or "teacher" failed to uphold their standards of leadership and forgot their role.  Plain and simple.

Leadership in Social Media

Its no surprise that I'm a Facebook fan. It facilitates any number of things. It also creates tons of headaches.  However, like email, text messaging and such, it is a communication tool. Really, its not much more than that with a bunch of flashy crap bolted on.

The subject of "How can I maintain a professional situation with my cadets on Facebook?" is in and of itself a completely different thread. Suffice to say, it can be done and it *must* be done if you're to retain any sense of credibility and leadership.  But it requires that people keep their wits about them, and set themselves up for success and not be "stupid on the Internet." 

For example: if a cadet or other subordinate sends me a friend request on Facebook, they go right into my "Limited Profile" group. They can see that I exist, some fairly minor info about me, but 99% of my FB info available to my "friends," including photo uploads, daily status updates, etc, is not available to my Limited Profile. 

Even with that in place, I am also careful to not post things, generally, that are not "cadet friendly" or appropriate for subordinates. (Heck, just the other day, I reposted a neat photo from a FB group called "I [expletive] Love Science!" I did so without linking back to the original group due to the expletive because thats not how I roll on FB.  Anybody who knows me knows that the particular expletive in question and I are really good friends, but not in front of the troops. Ever.)

In this way, I keep the familiarity aspect via FB down to an absolute minimum. Oddly enough, I can usually see *everything* my cadets are doing via their FB accounts, even though they can't see my activities, so it provides yet another "leadership window" into the goings on of cadets.

The downside, of course, is the people who just cannot, or will not, get it, no matter what.

There is an officer I am familiar with who posts all manner of crapola on Facebook: political memes, photos of cadet-inappropirate stuff, really interesting inappropriate personal overshare items, etc. Cadets can see it all and are always commenting on these things. Hell, I'm not even a friend and I can see all of it.  And I cringe when I see it. Why? Because it sets a bad example for other officers, it erodes cadet's confidence in their officers and sets us up for unduly familiar relations between cadets and officers/NCOs.

Even worse: it creates a baseline among other officers that cause them to reset their expectation to the "new normal".  Bad news.

But getting back to the cultural aspects of this for a minute.

If our cadet protection culture is properly built and maintained by _everybody_, the incidents like the one at hand seldom are allowed to happen and continue because the behavior sticks out like a sore thumb.

example: Permission slips. CPP already suggests their use. How many units actually _use_ them in the manner suggested?  When mom & dad are used to filling out a permission slip for every activity, when their cadet suddenly is going on an overnight activity 'sans permission slip', mom & dad would hopefully go "Hey, uh, wait a second here?"

Regular parental briefings and communciations.  The CPP already suggests their use.  Are you doing them? Much like the permissions slips, if the unit has a calendar and way to keep moms & dads in the loop, then a "sudden conference" or something that does not come from unit's leadership is a red flag.

If the unit's standards of leadership are high, then going on an overnight trip with one officer would seems so far out of the ordinary that a question would be raised by either the cadet, the parents, or another officer.

For the most part, the rules are already there.  Do they need adjustments? Maybe. Do they need to ensure that they're being followed?  Definitely.

I'm telling you: people would be more on the ball about following the rules on some of these items if someone got rather publically flogged and made an example of for not following the rules.  I'm just saying...

[RADIOMAN015]

It's very sad to see these type of incidents happen.

I'm not sure if we really need any more regulations on cadet protection -- Those adults involved in sexual misconduct with children have crafted their methods over many years.  Having seen this happen personally while serving in the USAF with one peers and direct supervisor's children, by a hospital commander, who was a medical doctor with a specialty in pediatrics, was especially disturbing to me

You know it's interesting as to what the National Commander's letter DID NOT state.

RM 

[Garibaldi]

NIN made an interesting point about Facebook and social media. I had resisted adding any of my squadron members, even seniors, as friends. I have a wide variety of views on every subject being posted by my friends. I kind of wanted to keep "church and state" separate. I decided to go ahead and acknowledge their existence and friend them. I made a wide, sweeping status update that warned them that there would be a lot of objectionable material being posted either by me or my friends. I do not censor myself, except in person.

Then, I realized that not all the stuff my radical friends were posting showed up on MY timeline, just the stuff I wrote, which made it tons easier on me.

I do not chat with the cadets. I do not comment much on anything they post, and when I do, I keep it general. I especially do not comment on pictures they post of themselves, regardless of what it is.  Group photos or photos of events, yes.

In the end, I just keep it user-friendly, as if I am having a conversation in person with an audience. No radical viewpoints, not a whole lot of swearing (and now that I know how to keep folks on a limited profile-viewer, they're going to go on that ASAP), and absolutely NO sexual content. Period. I don't want to be "that guy" anymore than you do. It's far too easy now for someone to go back and see stuff you have posted since you joined Facebook or MySpace (does that even exist anymore?) and retroactively get offended. None of us really needs to take that chance.

[Eclipse]

The only way to "win" social media is "not to play".

Considering that all you are doing is becoming a more valuable product for marketers, the risk / reward benefit is simply
not favorable.

Many will say "but I connected with my high-school buddies, blah, blah".  If they were that important, yo would have found them some other way.

"Social Media" is about nothing but narcissim and the cult of personality.  There are other, better ways to communicate with people who
are actually real friends and family.