Al Jazeera America: Pentagon moves to curb sexual assault
Protect Our Defenders Advocacy Committee Member Colleen Bushnell and Communications Director Brian Purchia are featured in this article from Al Jazeera:
“Until you address the core, you’re not going to actually solve the problem,” Brian Purchia, POD spokesperson, told Al Jazeera, adding that “the numbers are what back us up.”
A quarter of victims of sexual assault in the military indicated that their offender is someone in their chain of command, POD reported. Half of female victims stated that they did not report the crime because they believed nothing would happen, and of those few who did report, 60 percent were retaliated against.
Colleen Bushnell, a 40-year-old veteran from Albany, N.Y., who worked as a public affairs official at Lackland Air Force Base in San Antonio, Texas, told Al Jazeera she was retaliated against when she reported that she was sexually assaulted by her commander, a woman, in 2004. “The critical issue we hear from victims every day is that commanders have let them down,” Purchia added.
This skepticism was echoed by some on Capitol Hill.
