FederalDaily - May 10, 2005
DoD Reports 1,700 Sexual Assault Allegations in
2004
During 2004, military criminal investigators received 1,700 allegations of
sexual assault involving members of the armed forces worldwide. These
allegations included 1,275 incidents where a servicemember was a victim and
1,305 incidents where a servicemember was an alleged offender. This information
comes from the Department of Defense’s annual report on sexual assaults
for calendar year 2004. Congress requested this data in the Ronald W. Reagan
National Defense Authorization Act for fiscal year 2005. The report provides
the synopsis of, and the disciplinary action taken, in each substantiated case.
For more on this story, see the upcoming May 16, 2005, issue of Federal Employees
News Digest. To subscribe, click here.
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Army Official Took Bribes for Contracts
Percy Lee Powers, a former civilian official for the Army, was sentenced
to 26 months in prison on charges of accepting more than $20,000 in bribes
and defrauding the U.S. government, according to the Department of Justice.
Powers, 49, had previously pleaded guilty to the charges. In addition to the
prison sentence, Powers was sentenced to three years of supervised release
and ordered to pay $55,000 in restitution to the Army. Between 2001 and 2003,
he was responsible for purchasing and contracting on behalf of the Army. Powers
used his official position to violate Department of Defense (DoD) contracting
rules and sole-source several DoD contracts for truck parts, supplies and services
to a Korean contractor in exchange for more than $20,000 in bribes.
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Federal Jobs Easier for Veterans
Rep. Pat Tiberi, R-Ohio, introduced legislation, H.R. 2205, that would extend
hiring preferences for federal jobs to many veterans. "Under existing
law, only those veterans who have spent 30 consecutive days in a combat theater
such as Afghanistan or Iraq are eligible for preference in federal hiring," Tiberi
said. "Thousands of active Army, National Guard and Reserve forces
who have served both in this country and around the world have sacrificed but
don't qualify, simply because they didn't meet the 30 consecutive day standard.” T
he legislation offered by Tiberi would repeal that standard. Instead, any honorably-discharged
veteran who served more than 180 consecutive days on active duty, any part
of which occurred after September 11, 2001 , would receive preference when
seeking a U.S. government job.
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Bill Bolsters Nurse-Patient Ratio
Legislation introduced by Rep. Jan Schakowsky, D-Ill., the Nurse Staffing
Standards for Patient Safety and Quality Care Act of 2005, H.R. 1222, would
require hospitals to follow minimum nurse-to-patient staffing ratios. The bill
also would require that the Department of Health and Human Services establish
staffing requirements for licensed practical nurses. To assure that nurses
are free to speak out for their patients, the bill includes whistleblower protection. "Veterans
and the nurses who care for them will benefit from passage of this important
nurse staffing legislation because it applies to VA hospitals as well as Medicare
reimbursed hospitals," American Federation of Government Employees (AFGE)
President John Gage said. AFGE is supporting the bill.
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