The sexual assault problem is a cancer on the military. It's time to make our military justice system independent from the chain of command in felony cases: this will give confidence to those service members assaulted to come forward in search of justice.
The Pentagon estimates that 26,000 sexual assaults occurred in the military last year, a 34% increase from 2010. What's worse, the percentage of victims who actually reported the crime dropped to just 9.8%. If these numbers tell us anything, it's that the sexual assault problem is getting worse, while service members have lost faith in the military criminal justice system.
We need to systemically change the way the military handles sexual assault cases. This can be done by reforming of Article 60 of the Uniform Code of Military Justice to make the military justice system independent at the felony level, as Senator Gillibrand has proposed.
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Originally published in MSNBC
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