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In this third installment of our unintentional series about sex scandals at the Air Force Academy, former investigator Brandon Enos confirms coverups and retaliation, despite public claims of “zero tolerance” and cleanup efforts.Enos spent 3 years investigating sexual harassment, sexual assault and other violations by cadets at the Air Force Academy in Colorado Springs, CO.
On August 10, we posted the interview with Teresa Beasley, a sexual assault counselor who’d been recruited to the Academy to address a wave of offenses. On August 31, we posted the interview with former cadet Eric Thomas, who was an undercover informant who enabled the convictions of 3 football players for sexual assault, and was expelled just 6 weeks before graduation.
Enos, who managed the investigations called “Operation Gridiron”, says Thomas was essential to these convictions, and was retaliated against by General Gould, then superintendent, and an Academy alumnus who had played football there.
Enos is direct and forthcoming in describing what he saw in his 3 years at the Academy, the politics of sex crimes in the military, the failure of the honor code due to the “bro culture” of covering up violations by fellow cadets. He comments on the efforts of Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand (D-NY) and Rep. Jackie Speier (D-CA) to remove investigations and prosecutions from the chain of command.
During his stint at AFA, Enos found that the public statements of top brass about reporting all sexual violations and confronting the problems honestly weren’t true….the “old boy” networks upheld the expulsion of Thomas despite the obvious evidence that many of his demerits were the result of his undercover work.
You can read the Inspector General’s report we refer to here.