Military Personnel
Sustained Leadership and Oversight Needed to Improve DOD's Prevention and Treatment of Domestic Abuse Gao ID: GAO-10-923 September 22, 2010In 2001, the Deputy Secretary of Defense stated that domestic violence will not be tolerated in the Department of Defense (DOD). Despite this posture, DOD's clinical database indicates that 8,223 incidents met criteria for domestic abuse in fiscal year 2009. However, because this database includes only cases reported to military clinical offices, it does not represent all cases. In response to a congressional request, GAO evaluated whether DOD is able to determine the effectiveness of its domestic abuse efforts. To conduct this review, GAO reviewed legislative requirements and DOD guidance, analyzed domestic abuse data, and interviewed officials involved in domestic abuse prevention and treatment and persons eligible to receive services at five military bases.
DOD has taken some actions to prevent and treat domestic abuse in response to recommendations made by the Defense Task Force on Domestic Violence in 2001 through 2003 and by GAO in a 2006 report. However, DOD has no oversight framework with goals, milestones, and metrics with which to determine the effectiveness of its efforts. This issue is complicated by uncertainty regarding the completeness of DOD's data on domestic abuse. In 2007, DOD issued guidance on military protective orders after GAO had found that its lack of guidance had resulted in inconsistent practices. However, DOD closed its Family Violence Policy Office in 2007, which had staff dedicated to overseeing the implementation of recommendations made by the Defense Task Force, after DOD had taken action on some key recommendations. At that time, the specific responsibilities of that office for overseeing implementation of the remaining Task Force recommendations were not reassigned, although overall oversight responsibility remained with the Under Secretary of Defense for Personnel and Readiness. DOD guidance assigns many domestic abuse-related responsibilities to this office, including responsibility for developing DOD's domestic abuse instruction and ensuring compliance. GAO found the following examples in which having sustained leadership attention and an oversight framework would have helped guide DOD in obtaining information that would allow it to fully manage its efforts and determine their effectiveness: (1) Significant DOD guidance has been in draft since 2006. As a result, the services are anticipating ways to implement the draft guidance, which contains, among other things, new guidelines for the services' clinical treatment and evaluation boards, without finalized guidance. (2) The database intended to satisfy legislative requirements enacted in 2000 continues to provide incomplete data, and DOD still collects domestic abuse data in two databases. In 2006, GAO reported on data discrepancies in these databases and recommended that they be reconciled. This recommendation remains open, and those problems continue today. Because DOD cannot provide accurate numbers of domestic abuse incidents, it cannot analyze trends. (3) It is DOD policy to target families most at risk of domestic abuse, but DOD has not defined goals for its efforts or metrics with which to measure progress. DOD collects only information on gender, rank, age, and substance use. Without information on other factors, such as length and number of deployments, DOD will be unable to fully analyze risk factors. During GAO's site visits, these factors were routinely mentioned. (4) DOD lacks metrics for measuring the effectiveness of its awareness campaigns. As a result, it does not know how to direct its resources most effectively. Without sustained leadership and an oversight framework, DOD will remain unable to assess the effectiveness of its efforts to prevent and treat domestic abuse. GAO recommends that DOD finalize guidance on how the services are to comply with DOD policies and develop an oversight framework to guide its efforts to prevent and treat domestic abuse that includes collecting data on contributing factors and establishing metrics to determine the effectiveness of DOD's awareness campaigns. In commenting on a draft of this report, DOD generally concurred with GAO's recommendations.
RecommendationsOur recommendations from this work are listed below with a Contact for more information. Status will change from "In process" to "Open," "Closed - implemented," or "Closed - not implemented" based on our follow up work.
Director: Brenda S. Farrell Team: Government Accountability Office: Defense Capabilities and Management Phone: (202) 512-3604GAO-10-923, Military Personnel: Sustained Leadership and Oversight Needed to Improve DOD's Prevention and Treatment of Domestic Abuse
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Report to the Chairman, Subcommittee on National Security and Foreign
Affairs, Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, House of
Representatives:
United States Government Accountability Office:
GAO:
September 2010:
Military Personnel:
Sustained Leadership and Oversight Needed to Improve DOD's Prevention
and Treatment of Domestic Abuse:
GAO-10-923:
GAO Highlights:
Highlights of GAO-10-923, a report to the Chairman, Subcommittee on
National Security and Foreign Affairs, Committee on Oversight and
Government Reform, House of Representatives.
Why GAO Did This Study:
In 2001, the Deputy Secretary of Defense stated that domestic violence
will not be tolerated in the Department of Defense (DOD). Despite this
posture, DOD‘s clinical database indicates that 8,223 incidents met
criteria for domestic abuse in fiscal year 2009. However, because this
database includes only cases reported to military clinical offices, it
does not represent all cases. In response to a congressional request,
GAO evaluated whether DOD is able to determine the effectiveness of
its domestic abuse efforts. To conduct this review, GAO reviewed
legislative requirements and DOD guidance, analyzed domestic abuse
data, and interviewed officials involved in domestic abuse prevention
and treatment and persons eligible to receive services at five
military bases.
What GAO Found:
DOD has taken some actions to prevent and treat domestic abuse in
response to recommendations made by the Defense Task Force on Domestic
Violence in 2001 through 2003 and by GAO in a 2006 report. However,
DOD has no oversight framework with goals, milestones, and metrics
with which to determine the effectiveness of its efforts. This issue
is complicated by uncertainty regarding the completeness of DOD‘s data
on domestic abuse. In 2007, DOD issued guidance on military protective
orders after GAO had found that its lack of guidance had resulted in
inconsistent practices. However, DOD closed its Family Violence Policy
Office in 2007, which had staff dedicated to overseeing the
implementation of recommendations made by the Defense Task Force,
after DOD had taken action on some key recommendations. At that time,
the specific responsibilities of that office for overseeing
implementation of the remaining Task Force recommendations were not
reassigned, although overall oversight responsibility remained with
the Under Secretary of Defense for Personnel and Readiness. DOD
guidance assigns many domestic abuse-related responsibilities to this
office, including responsibility for developing DOD‘s domestic abuse
instruction and ensuring compliance. GAO found the following examples
in which having sustained leadership attention and an oversight
framework would have helped guide DOD in obtaining information that
would allow it to fully manage its efforts and determine their
effectiveness:
* Significant DOD guidance has been in draft since 2006. As a result,
the services are anticipating ways to implement the draft guidance,
which contains, among other things, new guidelines for the services‘
clinical treatment and evaluation boards, without finalized guidance.
* The database intended to satisfy legislative requirements enacted in
2000 continues to provide incomplete data, and DOD still collects
domestic abuse data in two databases. In 2006, GAO reported on data
discrepancies in these databases and recommended that they be
reconciled. This recommendation remains open, and those problems
continue today. Because DOD cannot provide accurate numbers of
domestic abuse incidents, it cannot analyze trends.
* It is DOD policy to target families most at risk of domestic abuse,
but DOD has not defined goals for its efforts or metrics with which to
measure progress. DOD collects only information on gender, rank, age,
and substance use. Without information on other factors, such as
length and number of deployments, DOD will be unable to fully analyze
risk factors. During GAO‘s site visits, these factors were routinely
mentioned.
* DOD lacks metrics for measuring the effectiveness of its awareness
campaigns. As a result, it does not know how to direct its resources
most effectively.
Without sustained leadership and an oversight framework, DOD will
remain unable to assess the effectiveness of its efforts to prevent
and treat domestic abuse.
What GAO Recommends:
GAO recommends that DOD finalize guidance on how the services are to
comply with DOD policies and develop an oversight framework to guide
its efforts to prevent and treat domestic abuse that includes
collecting data on contributing factors and establishing metrics to
determine the effectiveness of DOD‘s awareness campaigns. In
commenting on a draft of this report, DOD generally concurred with
GAO‘s recommendations.
View [hyperlink, http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-10-923] or key
components. For more information, contact Brenda S. Farrell at (202)
512-3604 or farrellb@gao.gov.
[End of section]
Contents:
Letter:
Background:
DOD Has Made Some Positive Changes but Has No Oversight Framework to
Determine the Effectiveness of DOD's Efforts to Prevent and Treat
Domestic Abuse:
Conclusions:
Recommendations for Executive Action:
Agency Comments and Our Evaluation:
Appendix I: Scope and Methodology:
Appendix II: DOD Actions Taken in Response to GAO's 2006
Recommendations:
Appendix III: Incidents of Domestic Abuse as Reported in the Family
Advocacy Program Central Registry:
Appendix IV: Comments from the Department of Defense:
Appendix V: GAO Contact and Staff Acknowledgments:
Tables:
Table 1: Discussion Group Types by Service:
Table 2: GAO's Recommendations in 2006 Report on Domestic Violence and
DOD Response:
Table 3: DOD's Family Advocacy Program's Central Registry Record of
Incidents of Domestic Abuse:
Figures:
Figure 1: Organization Chart Showing the Offices Involved in Managing
DOD's Prevention and Treatment of Domestic Abuse:
Figure 2: Military or Nonmilitary Status and Rank of Substantiated
Perpetrators of Domestic Abuse Reported to DOD's Family Advocacy
Program's Central Registry for Fiscal Year 2009:
Figure 3: Age of Substantiated Domestic Abuse Victims in DOD's Family
Advocacy Program's Central Registry for Fiscal Year 2009:
Figure 4: DOD's Family Advocacy Program Central Registry Record of the
Rates of Domestic Abuse Incidents per Thousand Married Couples:
Abbreviations:
DOD: Department of Defense:
OSD: Office of the Secretary of Defense:
USD (P&R): Office of the Under Secretary of Defense for Personnel and
Readiness:
[End of section]
United States Government Accountability Office:
Washington, DC 20548:
September 22, 2010:
The Honorable John F. Tierney:
Chairman:
Subcommittee on National Security and Foreign Affairs:
Committee on Oversight and Government Reform:
House of Representatives:
Dear Mr. Chairman:
In 2001, the Secretary of Defense noted in a memorandum to all senior
Department of Defense (DOD) leaders that domestic violence will not be
tolerated in DOD. He stated that "We must make every possible effort
to establish effective programs to prevent domestic violence but when
it does occur, we have a duty to protect the victims and take
appropriate action to hold offenders accountable."[Footnote 1]
National estimates indicate that approximately 1.5 million women and
835,000 men in the United States are physically assaulted or raped by
intimate partners annually. DOD's clinical database indicates that
8,223 reported incidents were determined to meet the criteria for
domestic abuse in fiscal year 2009. However, because this database
includes only cases reported to military offices that provide clinical
services, it does not represent all cases of domestic abuse that occur
throughout DOD.
Congress, in the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year
2000, required the Secretary of Defense to (1) establish a central
database of information on domestic violence incidents involving
members of the armed forces[Footnote 2] and (2) establish a Department
of Defense Task Force on Domestic Violence (Task Force).[Footnote 3]
The law charged the Task Force with establishing a strategic plan that
would allow DOD to more effectively address domestic violence matters
within the military. In fiscal years 2001, 2002, and 2003, the Task
Force issued three reports containing almost 200 recommendations to
improve the safety of victims, accountability for offenders,
coordination among support-service providers, and recording of data on
cases of domestic abuse.[Footnote 4] To coordinate implementation of
these recommendations, DOD established a Family Violence Policy Office
in January 2003. In 2007, the Deputy Under Secretary of Defense for
Military Community and Family Policy closed this office after DOD had
taken actions in response to what it reported to be 82 percent of the
recommendations made by the Defense Task Force on Domestic Violence.
However, key recommendations, such as the longstanding one to maintain
a database of the incidents of domestic violence, have still not been
completed.
In 2006, we issued a report stating, among other things, that DOD had
taken action on a majority of the Defense Task Force's
recommendations.[Footnote 5] For example, we reported that while DOD
had established a domestic violence central database, the database was
not yet fully operational and did not contain complete information
about reported incidents of domestic violence. We also reported that
until the database had complete and accurate data, DOD could not fully
understand the scope of the problem.[Footnote 6] The National Defense
Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2010 required us to review and
assess the progress DOD had made in implementing recommendations
contained in our 2006 report.[Footnote 7] To satisfy that mandate, we
issued a report in April 2010 stating that DOD had addressed one of
the recommendations in our 2006 report to improve its efforts to
prevent and treat domestic violence and taken steps toward
implementing two more, but it had not taken any actions on four other
recommendations.[Footnote 8] (See appendix II for a summary of the
status of DOD actions taken in response to GAO's recommendations, as
it appeared in the April 2010 report.)
DOD guidance defines domestic abuse as domestic violence or a pattern
of behavior resulting in emotional/psychological abuse, economic
control, and/or interference with personal liberty that is directed
toward a person of the opposite sex who is (a) a current or former
spouse, (b) a person with whom the abuser shares a child in common, or
(c) a current or former intimate partner with whom the abuser shares
or has shared a common domicile. Domestic violence is defined as any
offense listed in the United States Code, the Uniform Code of Military
Justice, or state law that involves the use, attempted use, or
threatened use of force or violence when that offense is directed
against a person of the opposite sex who meets the same criteria as
defined for domestic abuse. Domestic violence also includes the
violation of a lawful order issued for the protection of a person of
the opposite sex as defined above.[Footnote 9]
You asked us to report on DOD's prevention and treatment of domestic
abuse. Specifically, this report evaluates the extent to which DOD is
able to determine the effectiveness of its domestic abuse policies and
procedures.
To evaluate the extent to which DOD is able to determine the
effectiveness of its domestic abuse policies and procedures, we
reviewed laws, DOD-and service-level guidance, official documents, and
available data on domestic abuse. To assess the reliability of the
Defense Incident-Based Reporting System and the Family Advocacy
Program's Central Registry, we reviewed documents and interviewed
knowledgeable officials about the systems' quality controls for
ensuring the data are complete and accurate. In addition, we obtained
samples of data provided from each system. We determined that the
Family Advocacy Program's Central Registry data were sufficiently
reliable for our purposes--which were to (1) identify the incidence of
domestic abuse cases reported to Family Advocacy Program offices and
(2) describe the demographic factors that may contribute to domestic
abuse in cases reported to the Family Advocacy Program offices. We
determined that the Defense Incident-Based Reporting System data were
not sufficiently reliable for these purposes (see appendix III). We
expanded on work we had underway to satisfy a congressional mandate to
report on progress DOD had made to implement recommendations we had
made in a 2006 report.[Footnote 10] We also interviewed knowledgeable
officials and submitted formal questions about DOD's efforts to
prevent and treat domestic abuse to the Office of the Under Secretary
of Defense for Personnel and Readiness. That office provided us with
written answers representing DOD's official position. We visited five
military installations in the United States, where we conducted 69
discussion groups with military and civilian personnel, including
officials from the Family Advocacy Program, law enforcement personnel,
enlisted servicemembers, and victim advocates. Further details about
our scope and methodology can be found in appendix I.
We conducted this performance audit from July 2009 to August 2010 in
accordance with generally accepted government auditing standards.
Those standards require that we plan and perform the audit to obtain
sufficient, appropriate evidence to provide a reasonable basis for our
findings and conclusions based on our audit objectives. We believe
that the evidence obtained provides a reasonable basis for our
findings and conclusions based on our audit objectives.
Background:
DOD Organization and Responsibilities for Preventing and Treating
Domestic Abuse:
Current DOD guidance assigns responsibilities for managing DOD's
efforts to prevent and treat domestic abuse to, among others, the
Under Secretary of Defense for Personnel and Readiness and the
Principal Deputy Under Secretary of Defense for Personnel and
Readiness.[Footnote 11] For example, DOD Instruction 6400.06 charges
the Under Secretary of Defense for Personnel and Readiness with
developing and maintaining that instruction as well as ensuring
compliance. Additionally, DOD Directive 6400.1 assigns a number of
responsibilities related to management of the Family Advocacy Program,
which is the primary vehicle for DOD's efforts to prevent and treat
domestic abuse, to the Principal Deputy Under Secretary of Defense for
Personnel and Readiness. A DOD manual, issued under the authority of
DOD Directive 6400.1, assigns certain responsibilities to the Director
of the Defense Manpower Data Center, which maintains two databases
containing information on domestic abuse: (1) the Family Advocacy
Program's Central Registry, which contains data on clinical cases
involving domestic abuse; and (2) the Defense Incident-Based Reporting
System, which contains data on domestic violence cases that involve
military law enforcement. The Defense Human Resource Activity's Office
of Law Enforcement Policy and Support has a role in managing the
Defense Incident-Based Reporting System. (See figure 1 for an
organizational chart showing the offices involved in managing DOD's
domestic abuse activities.)
Figure 1: Organization Chart Showing the Offices Involved in Managing
DOD's Prevention and Treatment of Domestic Abuse:
[Refer to PDF for image: illustration]
Top level:
* Under Secretary of Defense for Personnel and Readiness:
Second level, reporting to Under Secretary of Defense for Personnel
and Readiness:
* Principal Deputy Under Secretary of Defense for Personnel and
Readiness:
Third level, reporting to Principal Deputy Under Secretary of Defense
for Personnel and Readiness:
* Defense Human Resource;
- Law Enforcement Policy and Support;
- Defense Manpower Data Center;
* Deputy Under Secretary of Defense for Military Community and Family
Policy;
- Family Advocacy Program.
Source: GAO‘s presentation of DOD information.
[End of figure]
In August 2004, DOD issued Directive 6400.1, which updated guidance
addressing DOD's Family Advocacy Program. In this directive, DOD
states that it is DOD policy to prevent child and domestic abuse
through public awareness, education, and family support programs
provided by the Family Advocacy Program and through standardized
programs and activities for military families who have been identified
as at risk of experiencing child abuse or domestic abuse. It goes on
to state that it is DOD policy to promote the early identification and
coordinated, comprehensive intervention, assessment, and support to
persons identified as victims of child or domestic abuse. According to
the directive, it is also DOD policy to provide assessment,
rehabilitation, and treatment for persons alleged to have committed
child and domestic abuse.
This directive assigns a number of responsibilities for elements of
the Family Advocacy Program to the Office of the Principal Deputy
Under Secretary of Defense for Personnel and Readiness. Among the
responsibilities assigned to this office are to develop a coordinated
approach to family advocacy issues; coordinate the management of this
program with similar medical and social programs servicing military
families; collect and analyze Family Advocacy Program data; assist the
military services in their efforts to establish, develop, and maintain
comprehensive Family Advocacy Programs; collaborate with the DOD
components to establish Family Advocacy Program standards; and monitor
and evaluate existing Family Advocacy Programs at the headquarters
level.
In July 2005, DOD issued Manual 6400.1-M1, under the authority of
Directive 6400.1, which addresses reporting requirements associated
with domestic abuse. The manual assigns responsibility to the Under
Secretary of Defense for Personnel and Readiness or his or her
designee for reviewing information collected, analyzed, and reported
by the military services on domestic abuse that is captured in the
Family Advocacy Program's Central Registry, which is an automated,
incident-based reporting system that includes the number of reports
each military installation's Family Advocacy Program Office responds
to (i.e., "cases to be worked"). The Defense Manpower Data Center,
located in the Defense Human Resource Activity, is DOD's central
repository for data, and according to the manual, the Defense Manpower
Data Center is responsible for receiving data provided by Family
Advocacy Program managers of the DOD components and maintaining these
data. The Defense Manpower Data Center is also responsible for
assisting in the creation of statistical reports of domestic abuse
from the Central Registry, and according to the DOD manual that
addresses the Defense Incident-Based Reporting System, for matching
Family Advocacy Program Central Registry data with data from the
Defense Incident-Based Reporting System to satisfy reportable
information requirements.[Footnote 12] While the Data Center would be
responsible for producing domestic violence-related reports based on
information in the Defense Incident-Based Reporting System, there are
currently no reporting requirements making it necessary for them to do
so. As noted elsewhere in this report, these two databases have not
been matched recently to determine whether they overlap or could be
combined. Data reliability issues are addressed elsewhere and in the
scope and methodology section of this report (see appendix I).
In August 2007, DOD issued guidance more broadly addressing its
domestic abuse policies and procedures, DOD Instruction 6400.06,
Domestic Abuse Involving DoD Military and Certain Affiliated
Personnel. This guidance assigns responsibility to the Under Secretary
of Defense for Personnel and Readiness for collaborating with the
military services to establish procedures and programs consistent with
its instruction and maintaining a central DOD database of domestic
violence incidents. The Deputy Under Secretary of Defense (Military
Community and Family Policy) is assigned responsibility for, among
other things, issuing standardized guidelines to the secretaries of
the military departments for developing a coordinated approach to
addressing domestic abuse and monitoring compliance with the DOD
instruction.
Another office in the Office of the Principal Deputy Under Secretary
of Defense for Personnel and Readiness has a lead role in managing the
database of law enforcement incidents involving servicemembers, which
is called the Defense Incident-Based Reporting System. The Law
Enforcement Policy and Support Office, which is located in the Defense
Human Resource Activity, is involved with policy areas related to
operation of this system.
DOD Maintains Two Separate Databases Containing Information on Cases
of Domestic Abuse:
Historically, DOD has maintained two separate databases on domestic
abuse. DOD uses the Defense Incident-Based Reporting System, which was
created following the enactment of the Uniform Federal Crime Reporting
Act of 1988, to capture criminal incidents of domestic violence. DOD
maintains a second database--the Family Advocacy Program's Central
Registry, which was created in 1994--to capture information about
domestic abuse cases reported to the Family Advocacy Program. The
Central Registry contains cases that were reported to the Family
Advocacy Program, regardless of whether or not law enforcement was
involved. Conversely, the Defense Incident-Based Reporting System
contains information about domestic violence cases that involved law
enforcement, regardless of whether or not they were reported to the
Family Advocacy Program. In 1999, Congress directed the Secretary of
Defense to create a central database of domestic violence incidents
involving servicemembers and to include information about the actions
taken by command authorities in response to these incidents.[Footnote
13] We reported in 2006 that, in an effort to satisfy the legislation,
DOD established the central domestic violence database within its
Defense Incident-Based Reporting System. However, we also noted that
the database did not contain complete information about reported
incidents of domestic violence; nor did it contain information from
the Family Advocacy Program's Central Registry.[Footnote 14]
DOD Has Made Some Positive Changes but Has No Oversight Framework to
Determine the Effectiveness of DOD's Efforts to Prevent and Treat
Domestic Abuse:
DOD has made some positive changes to its efforts to prevent and treat
domestic abuse. However, it is unable to determine the effectiveness
of these efforts because the department lacks an oversight framework
to guide the continued implementation of its efforts. In April 2010,
we reported on the progress DOD had made in implementing the
recommendations in our 2006 report.[Footnote 15] More recently, in
response to our April 2010 report, DOD stated that it intended to
develop an action plan that outlines initiatives it will take to
further respond to our 2006 recommendations. Additional plans for
further improvements are contained in draft guidance that DOD
anticipates issuing in 2010. If implemented as drafted, this guidance
should provide some important management tools for DOD to use in
standardizing its efforts to prevent and treat domestic abuse and in
collecting data that will help it analyze the effectiveness of these
efforts. However, because DOD currently lacks an oversight framework
with clear objectives, milestones, performance measures, and criteria
for measuring progress, it does not have the information necessary to
evaluate the effectiveness of its efforts to prevent and treat
domestic abuse or to make fact-based improvements. This issue is
compounded by uncertainty regarding the completeness of DOD's data on
domestic abuse. While it may be difficult to measure the effectiveness
of DOD's efforts to prevent domestic abuse, our prior work has shown
that determining how to measure progress when implementing change is
critical to making improvements.[Footnote 16] At present, the Office
of the Under Secretary of Defense for Personnel and Readiness (1) has
limited visibility over the number of incidents of domestic abuse DOD-
wide, including both those contained in its law enforcement and
clinical databases; (2) does not systematically collect data on
factors that may contribute to domestic abuse; and (3) cannot
determine how effective its awareness campaigns are. Also, though DOD
officials and servicemembers stated that domestic abuse has a negative
effect on readiness, we recognize that measuring the effect would be
difficult.
DOD Has Made Some Positive Changes and Plans Future Improvements When
It Issues Draft Guidance:
In April 2010, we reported that DOD had addressed one of the seven
recommendations in our 2006 report and taken steps to implement two
others. (See appendix II for more details on our recommendations and
actions DOD has taken to implement them.) For example, in 2007, it
issued DOD Instruction 6400.06, which clarified its guidance on clergy
confidentiality. In responding to a portion of a second
recommendation, DOD also clarified its guidance on military protective
orders. In our 2006 report, we had stated that DOD's lack of guidance
on military protective orders had resulted in inconsistent practices
among the services in how they distributed copies of these orders.
More recently, in response to our April 2010 report, DOD stated that
it intended to develop an action plan that outlines initiatives it
will take to further respond to our 2006 recommendations. DOD has also
provided us with an updated matrix summarizing actions it has taken in
response to recommendations made by the Defense Task Force on Domestic
Violence.[Footnote 17] DOD also has guidance that has been in draft
since 2006 and includes significant guidance to the services.[Footnote
18] For example, Volume 3 of the manual that DOD has in draft sets out
a process for determining whether allegations of abuse meet the
criteria to be entered into the services' Family Advocacy Program
Central Registry, DOD's database of clinical cases, while Volume 4 of
the draft manual prescribes guidelines for Family Advocacy Program
assessment, clinical rehabilitative treatment, and ongoing monitoring
of individuals who have been reported to the Family Advocacy Program.
While we believe that many of the provisions in the current version of
the draft guidance may represent important improvements to its efforts
to prevent and treat domestic abuse, DOD has still not finalized and
issued this guidance. It is not clear why the guidance has been in
draft since 2006. During our field visits, we found that all services
were anticipating ways to implement the draft guidance without knowing
whether the draft guidance will be finalized as it is currently
written.
The draft guidance, if finalized as currently written, would prescribe
new procedures for determining whether allegations of domestic abuse
meet criteria for entry into the service Family Advocacy Program
Central Registry (the database of clinical cases of domestic abuse,
discussed later). For example, one major change introduced in this
draft guidance is that the services would no longer form Case Review
Committees; instead, they would use Incident Determination Committees.
These new committees would be multidisciplinary teams, including
command representatives, with similar membership and voting rules
across the services. They would evaluate alleged reports of domestic
abuse and determine whether these cases meet the relevant criteria for
domestic abuse and entry into the Family Advocacy Program's Central
Registry. This change could represent an improvement because it should
help to better ensure that the services involve senior-level command
authorities in the determination process and that uniform criteria for
determining whether allegations of domestic abuse are entered into the
Family Advocacy Program's Central Registry are applied by each
service. It could also help to better ensure the accuracy and
completeness of data on domestic abuse incidents that are reported to
the services' Family Advocacy Program's Central Registry and allow DOD
to do cross-service comparisons and trend analyses.
In the area of clinical treatment, Volume 4 of DOD's draft guidance
states that clinical intervention approaches should reflect the
current state of knowledge. In addition, Volume 4, if finalized, would
establish quality assurance procedures related to clinical
intervention as well as evaluation and accreditation reviews for
installation domestic abuse treatment programs. These provisions may
help ensure that the services are consistently using clinical
practices recognized as most effective throughout the field.
DOD Lacks an Oversight Framework That Would Allow It to Evaluate the
Efforts of All Organizations Involved in Preventing and Treating
Domestic Abuse:
While DOD has established some mechanisms for overseeing its efforts
to prevent and treat domestic abuse, it lacks a comprehensive
oversight framework to manage the prevention and treatment of domestic
abuse by all the organizations involved. Our prior work has
demonstrated the importance of using an oversight framework to enable
successful program oversight.[Footnote 19] Such a framework would
include clear objectives, milestones, performance measures, and
criteria for measuring progress, as well as evaluative performance
measures with clearly defined data elements with which to analyze
data. It has also shown that having an effective plan for implementing
initiatives and measuring progress can help decision makers determine
whether initiatives are achieving their desired results. Without such
an oversight framework, DOD does not have the information necessary to
perform the management functions involved in evaluating and monitoring
the efforts of all organizations in preventing and treating victims
and abusers. In our 2006 report, we recommended that DOD develop an
oversight framework to monitor implementation of the recommendations
made by the Defense Task Force on Domestic Violence.[Footnote 20] DOD
concurred with this recommendation. However, as of April 2010, the
department had not taken action. In an official response to our
written questions, DOD stated that the responsibility for developing
this framework "mistakenly was not reassigned" after the Family
Violence Policy Office was closed in 2007. During our current
engagement, we noted the lack of a broader oversight framework to
enable DOD to measure whether it was meeting its goals for all its
domestic abuse efforts. DOD's instruction on domestic abuse, which
sets out many responsibilities and requirements related to DOD's
domestic abuse prevention and response efforts, charges the Under
Secretary of Defense for Personnel and Readiness with developing and
maintaining the instruction and ensuring compliance. It also directs
the Under Secretary to program, budget, and allocate funds and other
resources to meet the policy objectives of the instruction, which
include (1) preventing and eliminating domestic abuse in DOD and (2)
providing for the safety of victims; holding abusers appropriately
accountable for their behavior; and coordinating the response to
domestic abuse with the local community. Despite these duties, this
office has not taken certain steps needed to carry out its
responsibilities.
The Office of the Secretary of Defense has established some annual
metrics from which some trends can be analyzed using data in the
Family Advocacy Program's Central Registry. For example, as we discuss
later in this report, this office can present information on the
numbers of cases reported to Family Advocacy Program offices and the
rates of domestic abuse per thousand married couples (see appendix III
for some of these data.) DOD can also use this database to present
demographic information on the persons in that database who are
victims and perpetrators, their age, rank, and whether substance use
was involved. However, as we discuss elsewhere, the Central Registry
does not represent all cases of domestic abuse that occur throughout
DOD. In order for DOD to manage all cases of domestic abuse that occur
throughout the department, these metrics would have to be applied to
both criminal and noncriminal cases. There are also other metrics,
including performance goals, that would facilitate the evaluation of
its domestic abuse efforts and the assessment of their effectiveness.
For example, the office has not established:
* goals for objectives such as reducing the frequency and severity of
domestic abuse incidents and reducing recidivism among alleged abusers,
* metrics with which to analyze trends in order to measure progress,
and:
* metrics to determine whether its awareness campaigns are effective.
According to DOD officials and servicemembers we contacted, domestic
abuse has a negative effect on readiness mostly due to the amount of
time spent by commanders and others on this issue. However, we
recognize that measuring the effect would be difficult, if not cost
prohibitive.
Because DOD does not have an oversight framework for its domestic
abuse efforts, decision makers do not have the information they need
to evaluate the effectiveness of these efforts or all the information
needed to help prevent domestic abuse from occurring or ensuring that
servicemembers who are victims of domestic abuse receive the care they
need.
DOD Cannot Determine How Many Incidents of Domestic Abuse Involving
Servicemembers Occur or Analyze Trends:
DOD has not clearly defined who is responsible for ensuring the
accuracy of data on domestic abuse and matching data in its database
on clinical cases--the Family Advocacy Program's Central Registry--to
data in its database on law enforcement cases, the Defense Incident-
Based Reporting System. As a result, DOD continues to have long-
standing problems with the reliability and completeness of data on
incidents of domestic abuse and does not have visibility over the
total number of these incidents that occur throughout DOD.
In a June 2010 letter to us, the Acting Deputy Under Secretary of
Defense for Military Community and Family Policy stated that staff
attention was not prioritized for a database with a limited
operational or oversight purpose, when other operational requirements
that affect much greater numbers of military personnel have had higher
priority. The Acting Deputy Under Secretary cited the fact that, based
on reports to the Family Advocacy Program, which are contained in the
Central Registry, the annual rate of servicemembers alleged to have
committed domestic violence against their spouses is less than 1
percent of married servicemembers. As cited earlier in this report,
cases reported to Family Advocacy Program offices do not include all
domestic violence cases reported to law enforcement. However, if we
were to assume that the rate cited by DOD represents a baseline, it is
important to remember that many individuals other than the victims are
also affected by domestic violence, including family, other
servicemembers, and the general military community. Incidents of
domestic abuse, in addition to affecting the military community at
large on a near-term basis, can also have expanded long-term
consequences. For example, the National Coalition Against Domestic
Violence states that witnessing violence between one's parents or
caretakers is the strongest risk factor of transmitting violent
behavior from one generation to the next. The coalition also states
that boys who witness domestic violence are twice as likely to abuse
their own partners and children when they become adults. Positive
leadership and oversight are critical in communicating the importance
of this issue. In prior work, we have reported that committed,
sustained leadership and persistent attention by all parties are
indispensable for making lasting change.[Footnote 21]
In an official response to our questions, DOD stated that it is the
individual service's responsibility to submit accurate and complete
information to the Defense Incident-Based Reporting System. Through a
number of interviews, data requests, and official statements, we
confirmed that the services are sending some data to the Defense
Incident-Based Reporting System. However, according to a senior
official from the Defense Manpower Data Center (the office responsible
for managing the database), the services are providing only a fraction
of the required data, and reporting from the services has not improved
significantly in the last several years. According to this official,
the Defense Incident-Based Reporting System remains unable to provide
accurate, complete, and usable statistical information about domestic
violence incidents.[Footnote 22] We first reported on the lack of
reliable and complete data in the Defense Incident-Based Reporting
System in a 2006 report.[Footnote 23] In that report we recommended
that DOD develop a comprehensive management plan to address
deficiencies in the data. In our April 2010 follow-up report, we found
that this plan had not been developed.[Footnote 24] A comprehensive
oversight framework could include a plan to resolve data discrepancies
and provide for the development of reliable and complete data with
which to understand the full magnitude of the domestic abuse problem
and analyze any trends. In a June 2010 letter to us, the Acting Deputy
Under Secretary of Defense for Military Community and Family Policy
stated that DOD planned to develop and implement a management plan "to
meet the requirements for the domestic violence database in the
statute." According to the letter, the Under Secretary of Defense for
Personnel and Readiness acknowledges that this office "has failed to
create a database, including the action taken by command in response
to every reported incident of domestic violence for which there was
sufficient evidence to take disciplinary action." The Acting Deputy
Under Secretary further states, "It was originally believed that this
requirement could be fulfilled through the integration of data
contained in existing databases." DOD provided no time frame in which
this plan will be completed, and we continue to believe that such a
plan is necessary.
DOD Is Currently Using Its Central Registry Database to Report Numbers
of Domestic Abuse Cases:
DOD currently uses its Family Advocacy Program's Central Registry to
officially report numbers of domestic abuse cases that occur
throughout the services (see appendix III for an example of these
numbers). In addition to the fact that the Central Registry only
contains information on domestic abuse incidents that were reported to
the Family Advocacy Program, the data also may not include the
following:
1. Cases that involved law enforcement but were not reported to the
Family Advocacy Program.[Footnote 25]
2. Cases involving reserve servicemembers who were not on active duty
when the incident occurred.[Footnote 26]
3. Cases involving servicemembers who receive nonmilitary clinical
services that were not reported to DOD because the servicemembers
chose not to report them or because of civilian confidentiality rules.
4. Cases handled by civilian law enforcement systems.[Footnote 27]
5. Cases reported to a commander (but not to law enforcement or the
Family Advocacy Program) in which the commander took no action, took
administrative action, or issued nonjudicial punishment.[Footnote 28]
6. Information on the disposition of cases (i.e., whether the alleged
offender was convicted, served a sentence, or received a nonjudicial
punishment).[Footnote 29]
We recognize that some of these data would be difficult to obtain, but
whether they are obtained or not, the fact that these data are
consistently missing further illustrates potential limitations in
DOD's data on domestic abuse incidents affecting servicemembers.
Because neither database alone accounts for all cases of domestic
violence in the military, DOD must match the data from these two
databases to derive a complete count of all cases of domestic
violence. It also remains important for DOD to track noncriminal
domestic abuse cases. From 2000 until 2003, while the Defense Task
Force on Domestic Violence was in operation, DOD attempted to manually
match data from the Defense Incident-Based Reporting System and the
Central Registry to compare information on specific cases. There was
no method found for smoothly matching the information from the two
databases to obtain a complete picture of domestic abuse incidents,
both criminal and noncriminal. Matching was not attempted after that
time. A senior official in the Defense Manpower Data Center, the
office responsible for maintaining both systems, stated that because
of the condition of the data in the law enforcement system, it would
not be feasible to conduct a match of the two databases in 2010. DOD
Family Advocacy Program officials agreed that it would not be possible
to link the Central Registry data with Defense Incident-Based
Reporting System data. At this time, DOD has not made a successful
data match, and therefore it is still unable to report the total
number of domestic violence incidents throughout the military.
There Is No Requirement for Reporting of Data from the Law Enforcement
Database to the Under Secretary of Defense for Personnel and Readiness:
Oversight by the Under Secretary of Defense for Personnel and
Readiness of the number of incidents of domestic abuse is limited. The
National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2000 required that
the secretaries of the military departments maintain data and report
annually to the administrator of the database, which is the Defense
Manpower Data Center. The center maintains the corporate databases on
domestic abuse. The law does not set up any additional requirements
for producing or reporting data on these incidents to the Under
Secretary of Defense for Personnel and Readiness. A senior DOD
official responsible for database policy stated that any reporting of
statistics from the Defense Incident-Based Reporting System is
currently done in response to ad hoc requests from DOD or Congress and
that no regular reports on domestic violence incidents are produced.
On the other hand, the Defense Manpower Data Center does provide an
annual report to the Under Secretary of Defense for Personnel and
Readiness that includes the numbers of cases reported to the Family
Advocacy Program's Central Registry.
DOD Lacks Data That Would Allow It to Target At-Risk Groups:
Apart from limitations in overall incident data collected by DOD, the
department also does not systematically collect data on all factors
that could contribute to domestic abuse. As a result, it is limited in
its ability to measure how well it is targeting at-risk groups. A
comprehensive oversight framework could establish specific goals, such
as reducing the frequency and severity of domestic abuse incidents and
reducing recidivism among alleged abusers. It could also establish
metrics with which to measure progress in meeting those goals.
According to the DOD Family Advocacy Program Directive, it is DOD
policy to prevent domestic abuse by providing standardized programs
and activities for families identified as being most at risk of
experiencing domestic abuse.[Footnote 30] In addition, according to
the DOD Manual for Child Maltreatment and Domestic Abuse Incident
Reporting System,[Footnote 31] it is DOD policy to maintain a central
database to analyze the scope of domestic abuse, as well as
information about domestic abuse victims and offenders to determine
the effectiveness of Family Advocacy Program services and to develop
changes in policy to address domestic abuse. The reporting
requirements established by the manual are somewhat limited and
include information about individuals, such as gender, age, rank,
whether the individual had consumed alcohol or drugs, and the
individual's relationship to the victim or offender. Without
collecting and analyzing information on other factors that may
contribute to domestic abuse, such as deployment or financial
instability, DOD is limited in its ability to effectively target at-
risk military groups, determine the effectiveness of Family Advocacy
Program services, and make fact-based changes to policy. (DOD's draft
guidance mentions these additional risk factors, as discussed later,
but does not require the services to report this information to DOD.)
During our site visits, servicemembers and civilian personnel
identified several factors that they believe contributed to domestic
abuse. We spoke with participants in 52 discussion groups about these
factors.[Footnote 32] Of the risk factors mentioned by these groups,
deployment was cited most often as a potential risk factor. Group
participants' concerns regarding deployment included the perception
that domestic abuse seems to increase following a servicemember's
return, as well as the concern that preparing for deployment may
contribute to domestic abuse. The second most cited potential risk
factor for domestic abuse was financial problems, which several groups
directly associated with deployment. For example, a couple might
experience problems in managing their joint finances when one of them
is deployed and not able to participate in this management. Other
factors cited less often were a family history of domestic violence
and infidelity or the perception of infidelity.
Several characteristics of typical victims and perpetrators of
domestic abuse were mentioned during our site visits. In particular,
participants in 34 of 52 discussion groups stated that younger
servicemembers seemed to be more likely to be involved in domestic
abuse incidents than older servicemembers. More than half of the
discussion groups that commented on contributing factors also had
participants who said that they believed alcohol contributed to
domestic abuse. DOD systematically collects some basic data from all
services on the perpetrators and victims of domestic abuse. These
data, which are recorded in the Family Advocacy Program's Central
Registry, offer some insight into demographic characteristics of
offenders and victims. For example, in fiscal year 2009, data reported
to the Family Advocacy Program's Central Registry indicate that 67
percent of abusers were male, while 33 percent were female. Sixty-two
percent of the abusers were active-duty servicemembers, while 38
percent were not. (Figure 2 confirms that the number of active-duty
military perpetrators is higher than the number of perpetrators who
are nonmilitary, referred to in the figure as civilians. However, DOD
officials stressed that it is very difficult for DOD to control the
behavior of civilian perpetrators, as DOD does not have the authority
to mandate that these perpetrators be educated, counseled, or
prosecuted.) Among domestic abuse victims, 47 percent were active-duty
servicemembers, while 52 percent were not. (See figs. 2 and 3 for
illustrations of the demographic characteristics of perpetrators and
victims of domestic abuse incidents reported to the Family Advocacy
Program's Central Registry by military status or rank and by age.)
Central Registry data also allow DOD to determine what percentage of
domestic abuse cases involved alcohol or drugs. For example, according
to these data, in fiscal year 2008, out of the 7,386 cases that were
determined to meet criteria for domestic abuse, 29 percent reported
the use of alcohol and/or drugs by the alleged offender; 18 percent
reported the use of alcohol and/or drugs by the victim; and 14 percent
reported the use of alcohol and/or drugs by both the victim and
alleged offender.
Figure 2: Military or Nonmilitary Status and Rank of Substantiated
Perpetrators of Domestic Abuse Reported to DOD's Family Advocacy
Program's Central Registry for Fiscal Year 2009:
[Refer to PDF for image: vertical bar graph]
Status: E1-3;
Number of allegations: 1,415.
Status: E4-6;
Number of allegations: 2,798.
Status: E7-9;
Number of allegations: 239.
Status: O1-3;
Number of allegations: 63.
Status: O4-10;
Number of allegations: 38.
Status: WO 1-5;
Number of allegations: 27.
Status: Civilian;
Number of allegations: 2,817.
Status: Unknown;
Number of allegations: 79.
Source: GAO‘s presentation of data from DOD‘s Family Advocacy Program
Central Registry.
Note: Civilians in this figure include nonmilitary spouses and
intimate partners of active-duty servicemembers.
Rank abbreviations are defined as follows: E1-3 = Enlisted 1-3;
Enlisted 4-6; Enlisted 7-9; Officers 01-03; Officers 04-10; Warrant
Officers 1-5.
[End of figure]
Figure 3: Age of Substantiated Domestic Abuse Victims in DOD's Family
Advocacy Program's Central Registry for Fiscal Year 2009:
[Refer to PDF for image: pie-chart]
25-35 years: 46%;
18-24 years: 41%;
Greater than 35 years: 12%;
Unknown: 1%.
Source: DOD‘s Family Advocacy Program Central Registry.
[End of figure]
DOD Has Identified Additional Potential Risk Factors in Draft Guidance
but Does Not Require the Services to Report This Information to DOD:
In the draft manual accompanying DOD's draft Family Advocacy Program
Instruction, DOD recognizes that a number of additional risk factors
can contribute to domestic abuse.[Footnote 33] Volume Four of the
draft manual, Family Advocacy Program: Guidelines for Clinical
Intervention for Persons Reported as Domestic Abusers, identifies the
following risk factors for domestic abuse, among others:
* Previous physical and sexual violence and emotional abuse committed
in current and previous relationships.
* Relationship problems such as infidelity or significant ongoing
conflict.
* Financial problems.
* Mental health issues and/or disorders.
* Experience of traumatic events during military service, including
events that resulted in physical injuries.
DOD's draft manual also addresses issues related to deployment among
factors to be considered in treatment planning and requires clinicians
to include information about whether the servicemember is scheduled to
be deployed or has been deployed within the past year in their
assessments. For example, the draft manual states that servicemembers
scheduled to deploy in the near future may be highly stressed and
therefore at risk for using poor conflict management skills. Likewise,
the draft guidance states that a servicemember deployed in a combat
operation or in an operation where significant trauma occurred may be
at a higher risk of committing domestic abuse upon return.
The draft manual recognizes that these and other factors potentially
contribute to domestic abuse and requires clinicians to collect
information about these factors during initial and follow-up
assessments. However, the draft guidance, if formalized as currently
written, will not require that the clinicians report this information
so that it can be aggregated for analysis. Additionally, draft
guidance does not contain any other new reporting requirements for
collecting data that would allow DOD to better conduct cross-service
analyses to understand the role that deployment and other factors may
have on domestic abuse. Consequently, while the draft guidance should
result in improvements in data that are collected, if implemented as
currently written, DOD and the military services will still be limited
in their ability to effectively target at-risk military families,
determine the effectiveness of Family Advocacy Program services, and
make fact-based changes to domestic abuse policy.
Domestic Abuse May Have a Negative Effect on Readiness, but Measuring
the Effect Would Be Difficult:
High-ranking DOD officials have frequently stated that servicemembers'
mental states have direct effects on mission readiness. For example,
during a speech delivered in December 2009, the Chairman of the Joint
Chiefs of Staff acknowledged that the military's ability to carry out
its mission is directly affected by the family's health. He stated
that "our readiness to be able to carry out our mission as United
States military is directly impacted, fully integrated, by how our
families are taken care of, paid attention to, and that is a
fundamental readiness issue." Similarly, a September 2009 Air Force
press release stated that "mission and family life are closely
connected. When issues surface in either area, both are affected." An
Army press release in April 2008 stated that "family readiness equals
mission readiness." A U.S. Navy press release in December 2009 stated
that the Navy is losing too many personnel to domestic violence,
drugs, alcohol, and suicide.
During our site visits we heard from participants in 27 discussion
groups that domestic abuse negatively affects mission readiness.
Groups' concerns included the belief that domestic abuse negatively
affects mission readiness because of the large amount of time the
command is required to spend dealing with the issue. Another concern
was that servicemembers involved with domestic abuse may be unable to
deploy, which can place additional resource strains on a unit. One
Army officer commented that a commander may not replace a
servicemember who has a pending domestic abuse case with a deployable
servicemember until the case is finalized. Additional concerns from
groups included that servicemembers involved with domestic abuse are
often distracted by these issues, thereby affecting the
servicemember's ability to do his or her job. This distraction can
then affect the safety, cohesion, and morale of the unit. One Air
Force commander said that a domestic abuse case may result in
"mistakes that could have significant ramifications." While it is
commonly noted that domestic abuse has a negative effect on mission
readiness, it would be difficult, if not cost prohibitive, to quantify
that effect.
Effect of Lautenberg convictions on readiness:
The 1996 amendment to the Gun Control Act of 1968, referred to as the
"Lautenberg Amendment," prohibits a servicemember with a qualifying
conviction from carrying a firearm and results in a measurable effect
of domestic abuse on readiness. [Footnote 34] DOD has an instruction
that addresses the law and provides procedures for its implementation,
as well as related DOD policies. [Footnote 35] As explained in the
instruction, the Lautenberg Amendment prohibits anyone who has been
convicted of a misdemeanor crime of domestic violence from shipping or
transporting in interstate or foreign commerce, or possessing in or
affecting commerce, any firearm or ammunition; or receiving any
firearm or ammunition which has been shipped or transported in
interstate or foreign commerce. As explained in the DOD instruction,
the Lautenberg Amendment also makes it a felony for any person to sell
or otherwise dispose of firearms or ammunition to any person he or she
knows or has reasonable cause to believe has been convicted of a
"misdemeanor crime of domestic violence."
During our site visits, one Air Force senior noncommissioned officer
explained that the Lautenberg Amendment would bar an airman from
carrying a weapon and thereby "reduce his or her value as an airman."
A Navy senior noncommissioned officer said that he would be short a
person for certain duties if the servicemember were convicted of a
Lautenberg offense. An officer from the Marine Corps explained that
the Lautenberg Amendment has a major effect on readiness because an
individual who cannot carry a weapon is "of no use" to the Marine
Corps. An official from the Army Readiness Office stated that the
number of servicemembers with such convictions is small and that the
consequent effect on overall readiness is minimal.
The military--and the civilian sectors--rely mainly on self-reporting
of Lautenberg convictions because the reporting of these convictions
by all 50 states varies. According to the Director of the Family
Advocacy Program, there is no standardized form for all counties and
states to use to record information on domestic violence offenses, and
whether this information is sent to the military depends on the state.
As such, all servicemembers with qualifying convictions may not be
known. This finding coincides with a finding reported recently by the
Army in its Army: Health Promotion, Risk Reduction, Suicide
Prevention.[Footnote 36] In that report, the Army noted "a widening
gap between the extent of high risk behavior and leaders' situational
awareness, which permits a high risk population of individuals to move
undetected through the ranks." One reason cited by the Army for this
lack of awareness is that there are "disciplinary and reporting
shortfalls by commanders, law enforcement and program/service managers
[that] create an unknown gap in visibility of criminal activity."
Conclusions:
Incidents of domestic abuse, in addition to affecting the victims, the
families, and the general military community at large, can also have
expanded, long-term consequences on the children of victims. At
present, DOD lacks the sustained leadership and oversight of its
efforts to prevent and treat domestic abuse that would enable the
department to accurately assess the effectiveness of these efforts.
Oversight frameworks, with specific goals, milestones, and metrics for
assessing results, can help federal agencies focus on priorities and
measure the success of their activities. However, implementation of
such a framework for this issue in this context will require the
sustained leadership of DOD officials to maintain the long-term focus
on and accountability for stated objectives. DOD took several actions
after it established the Family Violence Policy Office to oversee
implementation of the Defense Task Force on Domestic Violence's
recommendations. However, the dismantling of that office without
reassigning responsibilities of the staff who were dedicated to
overseeing the implementation of Task Force recommendations may have
lessened DOD's efforts to document, prevent, and treat domestic abuse.
And though overall responsibility for domestic abuse efforts remained
with the Office of the Under Secretary of Defense for Personnel and
Readiness, this office has taken few actions to demonstrate sustained
commitment to improving its efforts in this area. One significant
instruction on DOD's domestic abuse policies, for example, has been in
draft for 4 years. Also, problems with DOD's law enforcement and
clinical databases have not been resolved in a decade. In 1999,
Congress directed the Secretary of Defense to establish and maintain a
central database containing information on domestic violence incidents
involving servicemembers. In our 2006 report, we recommended that the
Secretary of Defense direct the Under Secretary of Defense for
Personnel and Readiness to develop, in conjunction with the service
secretaries, a comprehensive management plan to address deficiencies
that focuses on ensuring that accurate and complete data exist and
that all instances in the Defense Incident-Based Reporting System and
Central Registry are matched and reported annually, as required in the
Department of Defense's Manual 7730.47-M. Because that recommendation
remains open and valid, we reiterate the need for the Secretary of
Defense to take action to implement the recommendation. Having
reliable data on the numbers of domestic abuse incidents that occur
throughout DOD, as well as information about factors that may
contribute to domestic abuse, would allow DOD to determine the extent
of the problem and its effect on readiness, identify trends, and
assess the department's response. At present, DOD's leadership lacks
the visibility over information needed to understand the magnitude of
the domestic abuse problem, identify trends in domestic abuse, and use
fact-based information to improve the effectiveness of its efforts.
Recommendations for Executive Action:
In addition to reiterating our prior recommendation regarding the need
for a management plan to address deficiencies in DOD's database of
domestic violence, we recommend that the Secretary of Defense direct
the Under Secretary of Defense for Personnel and Readiness to take the
following two actions:
* Finalize and issue DOD's Instruction 6400.01 on the Family Advocacy
Program, which has been in draft since 2006, and the accompanying
multi-volume manual that is also currently in draft form.
* Develop an oversight framework to guide the efforts of all DOD
organizations involved in preventing and treating victims and
perpetrators of domestic abuse and evaluate their effectiveness. At a
minimum, such a framework should include long-term goals, objectives,
and milestones; strategies to be used to accomplish goals; and
criteria and metrics for measuring progress. As part of that oversight
framework,
(a) collect and analyze data on factors that DOD has identified as
contributing to domestic abuse to help ensure that the department's
efforts to prevent and treat domestic abuse result in reduced
frequency and severity of domestic abuse incidents and reduced
recidivism among alleged abusers and:
(b) develop and use metrics to measure the effectiveness of campaigns
to raise awareness of domestic abuse services available.
Agency Comments and Our Evaluation:
In written comments on a draft of this report, DOD concurred with one
recommendation and partially concurred with the other. In addition,
DOD agreed that two recommendations we had made in our 2006 report
still had merit.[Footnote 37] DOD's comments are reprinted in appendix
IV. DOD also provided technical comments, which we incorporated where
appropriate.
In concurring with our first recommendation,[Footnote 38] that the
department needs to finalize and issue DOD's Instruction 6400.01 on
the Family Advocacy Program, which has been in draft since 2006, DOD
stated that the instruction and accompanying manual had already been
resubmitted into the policy coordination process. DOD attributed the
delay in issuing the guidance to the fact that DOD had been addressing
and resolving the services' concern that the new guidance increases
senior-level command involvement during a period of high operational
tempo. DOD officials stated that this concern has now been addressed.
However, DOD did not provide a new estimate of when the guidance would
be finalized.
In partially concurring with our second recommendation that DOD
develop an oversight framework to guide the efforts of all
organizations involved in preventing and treating victims and
perpetrators of domestic abuse and evaluate their effectiveness,
[Footnote 39] DOD agreed that an oversight framework for DOD
organizations addressing domestic violence is appropriate. However,
DOD also stated that domestic violence is not unique to DOD but is a
national problem and that the department is ready to work with other
agencies that have federal responsibilities in this area to select
uniform goals, objectives, and metrics on domestic violence from among
any that they have developed, to adapt any that are not directly
applicable to the active component of the military, and to work
collaboratively to create them if they do not exist. While we agree
that such coordination with other federal agencies would enrich the
efforts that DOD has ongoing in the area of domestic abuse, we
continue to believe that DOD needs to first develop an oversight
framework for all DOD organizations to set long-term goals,
objectives, milestones, and metrics to gauge the progress of the
programs it has under its control in preventing and treating domestic
abuse. Further, DOD stated that the services have already begun to
collect and analyze data on factors that contribute to domestic abuse.
However, it stated that it is the responsibility of the services to
increase public awareness of domestic violence and the services are in
the best position to develop and use metrics to measure the
effectiveness of their efforts. We continue to believe that the Office
of the Secretary of Defense has an oversight role in developing
metrics to measure the effectiveness of the services' public awareness
campaigns.
In responding to a recommendation we made in a prior report that DOD
develop a comprehensive management plan to address deficiencies in the
Defense Incident-Based Reporting System and that data from this system
and the Family Advocacy Program Central Registry be matched and
reported annually, DOD again concurred and stated that it is
developing such a management plan. It also acknowledged that it has
failed to create a fully operable database, including the action taken
by commands in response to every reported incident of domestic
violence for which there was sufficient evidence to take disciplinary
action. DOD noted that it has taken steps to prepare to match its two
data systems, such as reverifying the data fields in the law
enforcement database to ensure that domestic violence reports can be
matched to Family Advocacy Program data on physical or sexual abuse of
a spouse or intimate partner. However, DOD did not state when it
planned to actually match the two databases to assure itself that the
databases are complementary and combine to provide an accurate count
of the total number of domestic abuse cases.
In responding to another recommendation we made in a prior report,
that DOD take appropriate steps to ensure that all commander actions
related to domestic violence incidents are entered into law
enforcement systems, DOD concurred. It stated that the department has
made substantial efforts to ensure that commanders are aware of their
responsibilities for reporting disciplinary actions related to
domestic violence to the law enforcement database and will continue to
explore strategies with the services to increase compliance with this
requirement.
As agreed with your office, unless you publicly announce the contents
earlier, we plan no further distribution of this report until 30 days
from the report date. At that time, we will send copies to the
Secretary of Defense and to the appropriate congressional committees.
This report will be available at no charge on GAO's Web site at
[hyperlink, http://www.gao.gov].
If you or your staff have any questions about this report, please
contact me at (202) 512-3604 or by e-mail at farrellb@gao.gov. Contact
points for our Offices of Congressional Relations and Public Affairs
may be found on the last page of this report. GAO staff who made major
contributions to the report are listed in appendix V.
Sincerely yours,
Signed by:
Brenda S. Farrell:
Director, Defense Capabilities and Management:
[End of section]
Appendix I: Scope and Methodology:
To evaluate the extent to which the Department of Defense (DOD) is
able to determine the effectiveness of its efforts to prevent and
treat domestic abuse, we reviewed relevant laws as well as current and
draft DOD guidance related to the department's domestic abuse
activities, including DOD Instruction 6400.06, Domestic Abuse
Involving DoD Military and Certain Affiliated Personnel, and DOD
Directive 6400.1, Family Advocacy Program. We also interviewed DOD
officials responsible for domestic abuse efforts, including the Acting
Deputy Under Secretary of Defense for Military Community and Family
Policy and the Director of the Family Advocacy Program. We expanded on
work we had underway to satisfy a statutory mandate to report on
progress DOD had made to implement recommendations we had made in a
2006 report.[Footnote 40] In addition, we submitted formal questions
about DOD's efforts to prevent and treat domestic abuse to the Office
of the Under Secretary of Defense for Personnel and Readiness (USD
(P&R)), and that office provided us with written answers representing
DOD's official position. We obtained and reviewed documents from the
USD (P&R) which (1) summarized the actions the office has taken since
2006 on recommendations made by the Defense Task Force on Domestic
Violence and (2) outlined initiatives the office intends to take to
further respond to our 2006 recommendations. In addition, we reviewed
service policies and guidance related to domestic abuse.
To assess the reliability of the Defense Incident-Based Reporting
System and the Family Advocacy Program's Central Registry, we reviewed
documents and interviewed knowledgeable officials about the systems'
quality controls for ensuring the data are complete and accurate. In
addition, we obtained samples of data provided from each system. We
determined that the Family Advocacy Program's Central Registry data
were sufficiently reliable for our purposes--which were to (1)
identify the incidence of domestic abuse cases reported to Family
Advocacy Program offices and (2) describe the demographic factors that
may contribute to domestic abuse in cases reported to the Family
Advocacy Program offices. We determined that the Defense Incident-
Based Reporting System data were not sufficiently reliable for these
purposes.
In conducting our review of DOD's domestic abuse activities, we
interviewed officials at the Office of the Under Secretary of Defense
for Personnel and Readiness' Military Community and Family Policy
Office, Family Advocacy Program Office, Office of Law Enforcement
Policy and Support, and the Defense Manpower Data Center; the Air
Force, Army, and Marine Corps Family Advocacy Program Offices; the
Navy's Fleet and Family Support Center; and the Marine Corps' Manpower
and Reserve Affairs Office. We visited five installations in the
United States, including Patuxent River Naval Air Station, Maryland;
Fort Carson, Colorado; Norfolk Naval Station, Virginia; Eglin Air
Force Base, Florida; and Cherry Point Marine Corps Air Station, North
Carolina. We selected these locations based on the installations'
population size, the rate of reported incidents of domestic abuse, and
the intensity of servicemembers' deployment schedules. We also
considered recommendations made by DOD personnel and whether the
installations had participated in pilot programs related to domestic
abuse.
To facilitate the information-gathering process during our site
visits, we created multiple discussion group question sets for
different types of personnel. These included officers (including
commanders); senior noncommissioned officers; junior enlisted
servicemembers; Family Advocacy Program officials (including managers,
case workers, and staff); victim advocates; law enforcement personnel;
legal officials; health care officials; spouses of military
servicemembers; and chaplains. Additionally, when possible, we
arranged to speak with officer and enlisted groups of the same gender,
in an effort to facilitate a more open discussion about domestic abuse
issues. When possible, we also interviewed civilian social service and
law enforcement officials. While some of the questions were the same
or very similar, the content of the interview questions for discussion
groups was tailored to the type of personnel interviewed. For example,
when we were speaking with counselors, chaplains, and commanders who
were responding to domestic abuse, our questions were tailored to
their perceptions of the services that they provided and their
perceptions of contributing factors to domestic abuse. When we were
speaking with enlisted males and females, on the other hand, our
questions were targeted at obtaining their views of what services were
available and what these services were. Also, we did not always ask
all questions in our question sets because of time limitations. We
conducted a total of 69 discussion groups across all five
installations between October 2, 2009, and December 4, 2009 (see table
1). The groups' size ranged from 2 to 17 participants.
Table 1: Discussion Group Types by Service:
Service: Air Force:
Group type: Enlisted personnel;
Number of groups: 2.
Service: Air Force:
Group type: Officers;
Number of groups: 4.
Service: Air Force:
Group type: Senior noncommissioned officers;
Number of groups: 1.
Service: Air Force:
Group type: Spouses;
Number of groups: 1.
Service: Air Force:
Group type: Family Advocacy Program officials;
Number of groups: 1.
Service: Air Force:
Group type: Victim advocates;
Number of groups: 1.
Service: Air Force:
Group type: Health care officials;
Number of groups: 1.
Service: Air Force:
Group type: Legal officials;
Number of groups: 2.
Service: Air Force:
Group type: Law enforcement officials;
Number of groups: 3.
Service: Air Force:
Group type: Chaplains;
Number of groups: 2.
Service: Army:
Group type: Enlisted personnel;
Number of groups: 1.
Service: Army:
Group type: Officers;
Number of groups: 5.
Service: Army:
Group type: Senior noncommissioned officers;
Number of groups: 1.
Service: Army:
Group type: Spouses;
Number of groups: 0.
Service: Army:
Group type: Family Advocacy Program officials;
Number of groups: 1.
Service: Army:
Group type: Victim advocates;
Number of groups: 1.
Service: Army:
Group type: Health care officials;
Number of groups: 1.
Service: Army:
Group type: Legal officials;
Number of groups: 2.
Service: Army:
Group type: Law enforcement officials;
Number of groups: 2.
Service: Army:
Group type: Chaplains;
Number of groups: 1.
Service: Navy:
Group type: Enlisted personnel;
Number of groups: 3.
Service: Navy:
Group type: Officers;
Number of groups: 3.
Service: Navy:
Group type: Senior noncommissioned officers;
Number of groups: 2.
Service: Navy:
Group type: Spouses;
Number of groups: 0.
Service: Navy:
Group type: Family Advocacy Program officials;
Number of groups: 2.
Service: Navy:
Group type: Victim advocates;
Number of groups: 2.
Service: Navy:
Group type: Health care officials;
Number of groups: 2.
Service: Navy:
Group type: Legal officials;
Number of groups: 4.
Service: Navy:
Group type: Law enforcement officials;
Number of groups: 1.
Service: Navy:
Group type: Chaplains;
Number of groups: 2.
Service: Marine Corps:
Group type: Enlisted personnel;
Number of groups: 2.
Service: Marine Corps:
Group type: Officers;
Number of groups: 3.
Service: Marine Corps:
Group type: Senior noncommissioned officers;
Number of groups: 2.
Service: Marine Corps:
Group type: Spouses;
Number of groups: 1.
Service: Marine Corps:
Group type: Family Advocacy Program officials;
Number of groups: 2.
Service: Marine Corps:
Group type: Victim advocates;
Number of groups: 1.
Service: Marine Corps:
Group type: Health care officials;
Number of groups: 1.
Service: Marine Corps:
Group type: Legal officials;
Number of groups: 1.
Service: Marine Corps:
Group type: Law enforcement officials;
Number of groups: 1.
Service: Marine Corps:
Group type: Chaplains;
Number of groups: 1.
Source: GAO.
[End of table]
Following the completion of our site visits, we analyzed the
information we received during the discussion groups to identify
common themes. To better understand these themes, we identified two
distinct types of groups--those who were comprised of potential users
of domestic abuse services and those who were comprised of domestic
abuse service providers or responders. The potential user groups
included officers, senior noncommissioned officers, junior enlisted
servicemembers, and spouses of military servicemembers, while the
service provider or responder groups included Family Advocacy Program
officials, victim advocates, health care officials, legal officials,
law enforcement officials, and chaplains. Of the 69 discussion groups,
31 of the groups were potential users of domestic abuse services,
while the other 38 were service providers or responders. Although the
resulting information cannot be generalized to the particular
installation or service population, we believe that the views
expressed during the discussion groups provided us with valuable
insights into DOD's efforts to prevent and treat domestic abuse.
[End of section]
Appendix II: DOD Actions Taken in Response to GAO's 2006
Recommendations:
The Department of Defense (DOD) addressed one of the recommendations
in our 2006 report to improve its efforts to prevent and treat
domestic violence and has taken steps toward implementing two more,
but it has not taken any actions on four of the recommendations (see
table 2 for a list of the recommendations and DOD's concurrence or
noncurrence with them).[Footnote 41] Specifically, DOD met the intent
of our recommendation to clarify chaplain guidance concerning
privileged communication. Regarding our recommendation on ensuring
that commander actions related to domestic violence incidents are
entered into all law enforcement systems, DOD has taken some actions
to inform commanders of their responsibility, but the data on
commanders' actions remain incomplete. For example, an Air Force
official told us that, although these data are recorded in one of its
law enforcement databases, commander actions are not reported to the
Defense Incident-Based Reporting System. Without complete information,
DOD lacks visibility into the military's response to domestic
violence. DOD has also taken actions that have partially met the
intent of our recommendation regarding a communication strategy for
disseminating DOD guidance. Although DOD nonconcurred with the portion
of this recommendation addressing the need for DOD to articulate its
policy on distributing military protective orders, it did clarify its
policy by issuing guidance in 2007. If DOD issues its draft Family
Advocacy Program guidance in July 2010, we believe the department will
have met the intent of this recommendation.
For the remaining four recommendations, however, DOD has not met our
intent. First, DOD has not developed a comprehensive management plan
to address deficiencies in the data captured in the Defense Incident-
Based Reporting System, although it partially concurred with our
recommendation. The data remain incomplete, and as a result, DOD
cannot provide an accurate number of domestic violence incidents that
are reported throughout DOD. Second, although DOD concurred with our
recommendation to develop a plan to ensure that adequate personnel are
available to implement recommendations made by the Defense Task Force
on Domestic Violence, at present, DOD has not done so. Third, because
DOD nonconcurred with our recommendation, it has not taken steps to
ensure that domestic violence training data are collected for
chaplains. According to a senior official from the Office of the
Secretary of Defense, chaplains are properly trained on domestic
violence issues during officer basic training. However, we believe
that without accurate training data, DOD lacks visibility on whether
chaplains are prepared to handle domestic violence issues. Fourth,
while DOD concurred with our recommendation to develop an oversight
framework for responding to the Task Force recommendations, it has not
done so. After the office responsible for implementing the Task Force
recommendations was closed in 2007, DOD stated that the responsibility
for developing this framework was "mistakenly not reassigned."
Table 2: GAO's Recommendations in 2006 Report on Domestic Violence and
DOD Response:
GAO recommendation: Develop, in conjunction with the service
secretaries, a comprehensive management plan to address deficiencies
in the data captured in DOD's domestic violence database that focuses
on ensuring that accurate and complete data exist and that all
instances in the Defense Incident-Based Reporting System and Family
Advocacy Program Central Registry are matched and reported annually,
as required in DOD's Manual 7730.47-M;
DOD Response: Partially concur.
GAO recommendation: Take appropriate steps, in conjunction with the
service secretaries, to ensure all commander actions related to
domestic violence incidents are entered in law enforcement systems;
DOD Response: Concur.
GAO recommendation: Develop a plan to ensure adequate personnel are
available to implement pending recommendations made by the Defense
Task Force on Domestic Violence;
DOD Response: Concur.
GAO recommendation: Establish a communication strategy for effectively
informing DOD and service officials about new guidance implementing
the Task Force recommendations, to include;
a. issuing a revised DOD Family Advocacy Program directive that is
consistent with interim guidance for implementing the Task Force
recommendations and;
b. clearly articulating its policy regarding the distribution of
military protective orders using a method that will ensure consistent
application by all services and DOD;
DOD Response: Partially concur.
GAO recommendation: Develop, in conjunction with the service
secretaries, procedures and metrics to ensure that accurate,
consistent, and timely domestic violence training data are collected
for chaplains;
DOD Response: Non-concur.
GAO recommendation: Develop, in conjunction with the service
secretaries, chaplain guidance and training materials that highlight
and clarify chaplain responsibilities concerning privileged
communication;
DOD Response: Partially non-concur.
GAO recommendation: Develop and implement, in conjunction with the
services, a DOD-wide oversight framework that includes a results-
oriented evaluation plan for the implemented recommendations and a
process for ongoing monitoring of and reporting on implementation;
DOD Response: Concur.
Source: GAO-06-540.
[End of table]
[End of section]
Appendix III: Incidents of Domestic Abuse as Reported in the Family
Advocacy Program Central Registry:
Data in DOD's Family Advocacy Program Central Registry show that the
numbers of reported incidents of domestic abuse have decreased over
the last decade (see table 3). As discussed earlier, these data
included only cases reported to the Family Advocacy Program offices.
They do not include cases that involve law enforcement or clinical
services provided by civilian organizations that were not reported to
the Family Advocacy Program. As a result, they represent only a
portion of all domestic abuse cases that occur throughout DOD.
Officials in DOD's Family Advocacy Program office told us that this
decrease reflects a similar decrease over this period in the civilian
population. They attributed the overall decline in domestic abuse in
the general population to what they believe has been a high level of
public attention paid to domestic violence in the last decade. They
cited, specifically, the Violence Against Women Act of 1994,[Footnote
42] which provided grants for law enforcement training. Also, they
believe that there is now more infrastructure for education on
domestic violence and for changing behavior. Family Advocacy Program
officials believe that the decline in military cases of domestic abuse
may be in part the result of intimate partners' being separated more
frequently from each other because of deployments and in part the
result of other factors, such as public awareness and other prevention
methods.
Despite the overall decrease in numbers of incidents since 2000, the
numbers of these incidents increased from fiscal years 2008 to 2009.
This recent increase corroborates information we received from
military servicemembers and service providers during our site visits.
Many groups we interviewed noted an increase in domestic abuse, which
they attributed to the increased stress of repeated deployments to
Iraq and Afghanistan, to financial stresses, and to other factors.
Regarding trends shown in table 3 and figure 4, it is important to
note that the numbers are not comparable over the entire decade.
Beginning in fiscal year 2006, DOD began to include cases in its
Central Registry involving "intimate partners" as well as spouses in
its reporting of "substantiated incidents." If the change in
definition is taken into account, the reduced incidence of domestic
abuse over the decade would make the decrease even more pronounced
(because excluding intimate partners in the numbers shown in the table
for fiscal years 2006 through 2009 would lower the totals even more).
However, as mentioned earlier, these numbers do not include
significant populations, such as reservists and servicemembers who
seek help from civilian organizations.
Table 3: DOD's Family Advocacy Program's Central Registry Record of
Incidents of Domestic Abuse:
Fiscal year: 2000;
Number of reported incidents: 19,479;
Number of "substantiated" incidents[A]: 12,078;
Percentage of reported incidents that were "substantiated": 62.
Fiscal year: 2001;
Number of reported incidents: 18,398;
Number of "substantiated" incidents[A]: 10,967;
Percentage of reported incidents that were "substantiated": 60.
Fiscal year: 2002;
Number of reported incidents: 17,909;
Number of "substantiated" incidents[A]: 10,546;
Percentage of reported incidents that were "substantiated": 59.
Fiscal year: 2003;
Number of reported incidents: 17,072;
Number of "substantiated" incidents[A]: 9,845;
Percentage of reported incidents that were "substantiated": 58.
Fiscal year: 2004;
Number of reported incidents: 16,392;
Number of "substantiated" incidents[A]: 9,434;
Percentage of reported incidents that were "substantiated": 58.
Fiscal year: 2005;
Number of reported incidents: 15,894;
Number of "substantiated" incidents[A]: 8,306;
Percentage of reported incidents that were "substantiated": 52.
Fiscal year: 2006;
Number of reported incidents: 15,399;
Number of "substantiated" incidents[A]: 7,926[B];
Percentage of reported incidents that were "substantiated": 51.
Fiscal year: 2007;
Number of reported incidents: 15,260;
Number of "substantiated" incidents[A]: 7,859[C];
Percentage of reported incidents that were "substantiated": 52.
Fiscal year: 2008;
Number of reported incidents: 15,939;
Number of "substantiated" incidents[A]: 7,386[D];
Percentage of reported incidents that were "substantiated": 46.
Fiscal year: 2009;
Number of reported incidents: 18,208;
Number of "substantiated" incidents[A]: 8,223[E];
Percentage of reported incidents that were "substantiated": 45.
Source: GAO's presentation of data from DOD's Family Advocacy Program
Central Registry.
[A] Cases that are "substantiated" are determined by a board to have
likely occurred and to have likely involved domestic abuse. This term
is not meant in a legal sense and will no longer be used by DOD once
it issues the draft DOD Instruction 6400.01, Family Advocacy Program,
and its accompanying manual.
[B] In fiscal year 2006, 340 substantiated cases involving intimate
partners are included in the total.
[C] In fiscal year 2007, 602 substantiated cases involving intimate
partners are included in the total.
[D] In fiscal year 2008, 619 substantiated cases involving intimate
partners are included in the total.
[E] In fiscal year 2009, 747 substantiated cases involving intimate
partners are included in the total.
[End of table]
The rates of domestic abuse incidents reported to Family Advocacy
Program offices per thousand servicemembers have also declined since
2000 but rose from 2008 to 2009 (see figure 4).
Figure 4: DOD's Family Advocacy Program Central Registry Record of the
Rates of Domestic Abuse Incidents per Thousand Married Couples:
[Refer to PDF for image: vertical bar graph]
Rate of reported incidents, per thousand servicemembers:
Fiscal year: 2000;
Incidents reported to the Family Advocacy Program: 28.4;
Incidents determined to meet criteria for domestic abuse: 17.6.
Fiscal year: 2001;
Incidents reported to the Family Advocacy Program: 27.7;
Incidents determined to meet criteria for domestic abuse: 16.5.
Fiscal year: 2002;
Incidents reported to the Family Advocacy Program: 26.2;
Incidents determined to meet criteria for domestic abuse: 15.4.
Fiscal year: 2003;
Incidents reported to the Family Advocacy Program: 24.6;
Incidents determined to meet criteria for domestic abuse: 14.2.
Fiscal year: 2004;
Incidents reported to the Family Advocacy Program: 23.5;
Incidents determined to meet criteria for domestic abuse: 13.5.
Fiscal year: 2005;
Incidents reported to the Family Advocacy Program: 22.6;
Incidents determined to meet criteria for domestic abuse: 11.8.
Fiscal year: 2006;
Incidents reported to the Family Advocacy Program: 21.7;
Incidents determined to meet criteria for domestic abuse: 11.2.
Fiscal year: 2007;
Incidents reported to the Family Advocacy Program: 21.5;
Incidents determined to meet criteria for domestic abuse: 11.1.
Fiscal year: 2008;
Incidents reported to the Family Advocacy Program: 22.2;
Incidents determined to meet criteria for domestic abuse: 10.3.
Fiscal year: 2009;
Incidents reported to the Family Advocacy Program: 24.7;
Incidents determined to meet criteria for domestic abuse: 11.1.
Source: GAO‘s presentation of data from DOD‘s Family Advocacy Program
Central Registry.
[End of figure]
[End of section]
Appendix IV: Comments from the Department of Defense:
Under Secretary Of Defense:
Personnel And Readiness:
4000 Defense Pentagon:
Washington, D.C. 20301-4000:
September 17, 2010:
Ms. Brenda S. Farrell:
Director, Defense Capabilities and Management:
U.S. Government Accountability Office:
441 G Street, N.W.
Washington, DC 20548:
Dear Ms. Farrell:
This letter provides Department of Defense comments regarding the
Government Accountability Office draft report GA0-10-923, "Military
Personnel: Sustained Leadership and Oversight Needed to Improve DoD's
Prevention and Treatment of Domestic Violence," dated September 2010.
The enclosure specifically addresses the GAO's assessment of DoD's
efforts stated in the report and each of the GAO's recommendations.
The audit provided valuable independent oversight and assessments of
the Department's response to domestic violence. The Department agrees
that there is room for improvement and is committed anew to developing
a management plan that serves the Force efficiently and satisfies the
GAO's intent with regard to its recommendations.
For questions concerning this report, please contact David Lloyd,
Military Community and Family Policy, at (703) 602-5090 or
david.11oyd@osd.mil.
Sincerely,
Signed by:
Clifford L. Stanley:
Enclosure: As stated:
[End of letter]
GAO Report ” "Military Personnel: Sustained Leadership and Oversight
Needed to Improve DoD's Prevention and Treatment of Domestic Abuse,"
dated September, 2010, (GAO code 351361/GAO-10-923):
Recommendations from prior GAO Reports concerning the DoD database of
domestic violence:
Prior Recommendation 1: That the Secretary of Defense direct the Under
Secretary of Defense (Personnel and Readiness) (USD(P&R)) to develop,
in conjunction with the Service Secretaries, a comprehensive
management plan to address deficiencies that focuses on ensuring that
accurate and complete data exist and that all instances in the Defense
Incident-Based Reporting System (DIBRS) and Family Advocacy Program
Central Registry are matched and reported annually, as required in
DoD's Manual 7730.47-M.
DoD Comment: Concur with the GAO recommendation. USD(P&R) is
developing and implementing a management plan to meet the requirements
for the domestic violence database in the statute. USD(P&R)
acknowledges it has not created a fully compliant database, including
the action taken by command in response to every reported incident of
domestic violence for which there was sufficient evidence to take
disciplinary action.
While the major problem DoD has encountered is the failure to enter
all the appropriate law enforcement data and commanders' actions into
a database, DoD has taken steps to address the disparity of data in
the law enforcement and Family Advocacy Program (FAP) databases. This
disparity is due in part to the different purposes and definitions for
these databases and in part due to the military's process for
responding to reports of domestic abuse and for data entry into the
law enforcement and FAP databases. By either formal protocol or
informal practice, incidents of domestic violence handled by civilian
law enforcement systems are reported to military commanders or
military law enforcement agencies. If reported to the latter, FAP is
notified in compliance with the four Services' specific policies.
Similarly, DoD Directive 6400.1, Family Advocacy Program, and
Services' FAP policies require installation FAP staff to notify law
enforcement authorities when a report of domestic abuse is received
(unless it is a restricted report), whether or not the service member
receives FAP clinical services. Recently, USD(P&R) offices have re-
verified the data fields in the law enforcement database to ensure
that domestic violence reports can be matched to FAP data on physical
or sexual abuse of a spouse or intimate partner. As a result, FAP data
with respect to domestic violence offenses should match military law
enforcement data with respect to those offenses, but FAP data about
domestic abuse incidents of emotional abuse or neglect that are not
domestic violence offenses are excluded from the data matched to data
in the law enforcement database.
Data regarding an incident involving a Service member that is reported
to a commander but not to law enforcement or FAP would not be in
either the law enforcement or the FAP databases. regardless of the
commander's action (no action, administrative action, or nonjudicial
punishment). USD(P&R) is addressing this problem.
Recommendation 2: That the Secretary of Defense direct the USD(P&R) to
take appropriate steps, in conjunction with the Service Secretaries,
to ensure all commander actions related to domestic violence incidents
are entered in law enforcement systems.
DoD Comment: Concur with the GAO recommendation. The Department has
made substantial efforts to ensure commanders are aware of their
responsibilities for reporting disciplinary actions related to
domestic violence to the law enforcement database. USD(P&R) will
continue to explore strategies with the Services to increase
compliance with this requirement.
Concern has been expressed that there may be misinterpretation of
commanders' responses to reported incidents for which there was
evidence sufficient for supporting disciplinary action. This concern
arises because, under Rule 306(b) of the Manual for Courts-Martial
Rules for Courts-Martial, commanders are expected to dispose of
allegations in a timely manner at the lowest appropriate level of
disposition, including taking no action or taking administrative
action in lieu of taking disciplinary action. As the discussion
section under Rule 306(b) notes:
Many factors must be taken into consideration and balanced, including,
to the extent practicable, the nature of the offenses, any mitigating
or extenuating circumstances, the character and military service of
the accused, any recommendations made by subordinate commanders, the
interest of justice, military exigencies, and the effect of the
decision on the accused and the command. The goal should be a
disposition that is warranted, appropriate, and fair.
In deciding how an offense should be disposed of, factors the
commander should consider, to the extent they are known, include:
(A) the character and military service of the accused;
(B) the nature of and circumstances surrounding the offense and the
extent of the harm caused by the offense, including the offense's
effect on morale, health, safety, welfare, and discipline;
(C) appropriateness of the authorized punishment to the particular
accused or offense;
(D) possible improper motives of the accuser;
(E) reluctance of the victim or others to testify;
(F) cooperation of the accused in the apprehension or conviction of
others;
(G) availability and likelihood of prosecution of the same or similar
and related charges against the accused by another jurisdiction;
(H) availability and admissibility of evidence;
(I) existence of jurisdiction over the accused and the offense; and;
(J) likely issues.
The statutory requirement for including "a description of the
substantiated allegation" for each incident of reported domestic
violence that is submitted into the database would not include a
record of how a commander would have considered these factors and
evaluated them in making the disposition.
New Recommendations:
Recommendation 3: That the Secretary of Defense direct the USD(P&R) to
finalize and issue DoD's Instruction 6400.01 on the Family Advocacy
Program, which has been in draft since 2006, and the accompanying
multi-volume Manual that is also currently in draft form.
DoD Comment: Concur with the GAO recommendation. The FAP Instruction and
accompanying Manual have been resubmitted into the policy coordination
process. As the GAO noted, the draft guidance increases the level of
senior-level command involvement. The delay was attributable in part
due to concerns about whether such increased involvement could be
implemented during this period of high operational tempo. USD(P&R)
believes that these concerns have been addressed.
Recommendation 4: That the Secretary of Defense direct the USD(P&R) to
develop an oversight framework to guide the efforts of all
organizations involved in preventing and treating victims and
perpetrators of domestic abuse and evaluate their effectiveness. At a
minimum, such a framework should include long-term goals, objectives,
and milestones; strategies to be used to accomplish goals; and
criteria and metrics for measuring progress. As part of that oversight
framework:
(a) Collect and analyze data on factors that DoD has identified as
contributing to domestic abuse to help ensure that the Department's
efforts to prevent and treat domestic abuse result in reduced
frequency and severity of domestic abuse incidents and reduced
recidivism among alleged abusers.
(b) Develop and use metrics to measure the effectiveness of campaigns
to raise awareness of domestic abuse services available.
DoD Comment: Concur in part with the GAO recommendation. USD(P&R)
agrees that an oversight framework for DoD organizations addressing
domestic violence is appropriate and is working to re-establish it.
However, both the Defense Task Force on Domestic Violence and the GAO
have recognized that domestic violence is not unique to DoD but is a
national problem. Since this recommendation has national implications,
DoD believes that rather than independently developing such long-term
goals, objectives and milestones, criteria, and metrics they should be
the product of Cooperation with the Department of Justice (DoJ) and
the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), both of which have
primary federal responsibility to administer the Violence Against
Women Act, and with the Veterans Affairs (VA), to ensure as much
national comparability as appropriate. DoJ and HEIS administer grant
programs to state and local public agencies and to nonprofit agencies
for prevention, intervention, and treatment of domestic violence, and
grants to conduct related research. They also issue contracts for
evaluation of these grant programs. The VA provides treatment to both
veterans and to members of the Reserve Component whose experiences
during military deployment may have created or exacerbated risk
factors for domestic violence. DoD is ready to work with these federal
agencies to select uniform goals, objectives and metrics on domestic
violence from among any that they have developed, to adapt any that
are not directly applicable to the Active Component of the military,
and to work collaboratively to create them if they do not exist.
In order to set goals, objectives, and milestones to reduce the
frequency of domestic violence it is first necessary to ascertain the
prevalence of this problem to establish a baseline. DoD has already
taken steps to accomplish this. USD(P&R) has contributed funding to
the Centers for Disease Control and Injury Prevention for the National
Intimate Partner and Sexual Violence Surveillance System (NISVSS),
which included military samples. As a result, by the end of 2011 both
the civilian sector and DoD will have reliable estimates of the annual
extent of domestic violence, whether reported or unreported, in both
the civilian and active component military sectors for use as
baselines.
In the meantime, OSD FAP has independently implemented several annual
metrics on domestic abuse and analyzes their trends for DoD: (1) the
number of restricted reports to their domestic abuse victim advocates
and FAP staff, for the percentage of these that become unrestricted,
and for the number of unrestricted reports to such victim advocates
and FAP staff; (2) the rates of reports and substantiated reports per
1,000 married couples in the Active Component over time from the data
in the Services' FAP Central Registries (which takes into the account
the increase or decrease in the Active Component force, rather than
merely increase or decreases in the number of reports and
substantiated reports); (3) recidivism data on alleged abusers in
substantiated reports (with plans to set a goal for reducing
recidivism after the forthcoming policy on clinical treatment of
abusers takes effect); and (4) effectiveness of domestic abuser
treatment for those who successfully complete FAP treatment. A joint-
Service FAP research project to standardize the ratings for incidents'
severity is well underway. Such standardization is a necessary step
for establishing severity baselines and then setting a goal for
reduction in severity.
The Services have already begun the collection and analysis of data on
factors that contribute to domestic abuse. However, the application of
this in particular strategies must take Service differences,
complexity and cost into account ” a "one size fits all" approach may
not be appropriate. Similarly, the Services have the responsibility
for increasing public awareness of domestic violence and resources to
address it and have developed Service-wide and local approaches to
implement this effort. As such, the Services may be in the best
position to develop and use metrics to measure the effectiveness of
their efforts. If other federal agencies establish cost-effective
measures for evaluating the effectiveness of the national or local
public awareness campaigns that they sponsor by grant or contract, DoD
will consider the feasibility of applying or adapting these measures.
[End of section]
Appendix V: GAO Contact and Staff Acknowledgments:
GAO Contact:
Brenda S. Farrell, (202) 512-3604 or farrellb@gao.gov:
Acknowledgments:
In addition to the contact above, Marilyn Wasleski, Assistant
Director; Cynthia Grant; Nicole Harms; Elizabeth Kowalewski; Joanne
Landesman; Alberto Leff; Eli Lewine; Ann Rivlin; Cynthia Saunders;
Beverly Schladt; Dale Wineholt; and Elizabeth Wood made key
contributions to this report.
[End of section]
Footnotes:
[1] Secretary of Defense Memorandum, Domestic Violence (Feb. 28, 2001).
[2] According to DOD Manual 7730.47-M, Manual for Defense Incident-
Based Reporting System (Jul. 25, 2003), the Defense Incident-Based
Reporting System is the database intended to satisfy the legislative
requirement.
[3] Pub. L. No. 106-65, §§ 591, 594 (1999).
[4] Defense Task Force on Domestic Violence, 2001; Second Annual
Report, 2002; Third Year Report, 2003 (Arlington, VA: Feb. 28, 2001;
Feb. 25, 2002; and 2003).
[5] GAO, Military Personnel: Progress Made in Implementing
Recommendations to Reduce Domestic Violence, but Further Management
Action Needed, [hyperlink, http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-06-540]
(Washington, D.C.: May 24, 2006).
[6] In responding to a draft of this report, DOD noted that it had
contributed funding to the Centers for Disease Control and Injury
Prevention for the National Intimate Partner and Sexual Violence
Surveillance System. As a result of a survey to be performed under
that effort, DOD stated that it believes that in 2011, it will have a
reliable estimate of the annual extent of domestic violence committed
against women on active duty by their spouses or intimate partners and
against civilian wives by their active-duty husbands. During our
review, we received no details on the methodology of this survey, so
we cannot comment on it.
[7] Pub. L. No. 111-84, § 568 (2009).
[8] GAO, Military Personnel: Status of Implementation of GAO's 2006
Recommendations on DOD's Domestic Violence Program, [hyperlink,
http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-10-577R] (Washington, D.C.: Apr. 26,
2010).
[9] Department of Defense Instruction 6400.06, Domestic Abuse
Involving DoD Military and Certain Affiliated Personnel (Aug. 21,
2007). DOD adopted these definitions in 2004. Prior to 2004, a
distinction was not made between domestic abuse and domestic violence.
[10] [hyperlink, http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-06-540] and
[hyperlink, http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-10-577R].
[11] Department of Defense Instruction 6400.06, Domestic Abuse
Involving DoD Military and Certain Affiliated Personnel (Aug. 21,
2007); Department of Defense Directive 6400.1, Family Advocacy Program
(FAP) (Aug. 23, 2004); Department of Defense Manual 6400.1-M-1, Manual
for Child Maltreatment and Domestic Abuse Incident Reporting System
(July 15, 2005); and Department of Defense Manual 6400.1-M, Family
Advocacy Program Standards and Self-Assessment Tool (Aug. 20, 1992).
[12] Department of Defense Manual, 7730.47-M, Manual for Defense
Incident-Based Reporting System (Jul. 25, 2003).
[13] National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2000, Pub. L.
No. 106-65, § 594 (1999), codified at 10 U.S.C. § 1562.
[14] [hyperlink, http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-06-540].
[15] [hyperlink, http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-10-577R] and
[hyperlink, http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-06-540].
[16] GAO, Results Oriented Cultures: Implementation Steps to Assist
Mergers and Organizational Transformations, [hyperlink,
http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-03-669] (Washington, D.C.: Jul. 2,
2003).
[17] Because DOD gave us this matrix after our fieldwork had been
completed, we did not have time to evaluate DOD's actions in detail.
[18] DOD Instruction 6400.01, Family Advocacy Program; (draft provided
to GAO in Jan. 2010); DOD Manual 6400.01-M-V1, Family Advocacy Program
Standards (draft provided to GAO in Jan. 2010); DOD Manual 6400.01-M-
V2, Family Advocacy Program: Volume 2, Child Abuse and Domestic Abuse
Incident Reporting System (draft provided to GAO in Jan. 2010); DOD
Manual 6400.01-M-V3, Family Advocacy Program: Clinical Case Staff
Meeting and Incident Determination Committee (draft provided to GAO in
Jan. 2010); and DOD Manual 6400.01-M-V4, Family Advocacy Program:
Guidelines for Clinical Intervention for Persons Reported as Domestic
Abusers; (draft provided to GAO in Jan. 2010).
[19] [hyperlink, http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-03-669].
[20] [hyperlink, http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-06-540].
[21] [hyperlink, http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-03-669].
[22] According to this Defense Manpower Data Center official, data
contained in the Family Advocacy Program's Central Registry are more
reliable, but this database contains only cases reported to Family
Advocacy Program offices. In addition, we determined that the data
from the Family Advocacy Program's Central Registry were sufficiently
reliable for our purpose.
[23] [hyperlink, http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-06-540].
[24] [hyperlink, http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-10-577R].
[25] DOD and service policy require that cases reported to law
enforcement also be reported to the Family Advocacy Program. However,
DOD has no systematic method of matching the two databases to ensure
that this policy is consistently followed.
[26] DOD has emphasized that members of the reserve component who are
not on federal active duty are considered civilian.
[27] By formal protocol or informal practice, civilian law enforcement
agencies may report domestic violence cases to DOD. However, DOD has
no systematic method of ensuring that all civilian cases are reported.
[28] Nonjudicial punishment, pursuant to Article 15 of the Uniform
Code of Military Justice, could result in a number of punishments such
as reducing a members' grade, forfeiture of pay, adding extra duty,
and imposing restrictions on freedom.
[29] The Defense Incident-Based Reporting System similarly may not
contain Family Advocacy Program cases or information listed in items 2
through 6.
[30] According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, risk
factors are factors that are associated with a greater likelihood of
intimate partner violence victimization or perpetration. Risk factors
are contributing factors and may or may not be direct causes. Not
everyone who is identified as "at risk" becomes involved in violence.
[31] Department of Defense Manual 6400.1-M-1, Manual for Child
Maltreatment and Domestic Abuse Incident Reporting System (Jul. 15,
2005). This manual provides guidance related to the Family Advocacy
Program's Central Registry, which is the database that contains
information on domestic and child abuse cases reviewed by the
services' clinical review boards.
[32] Appendix I presents more detail on how we grouped participants
into those who were eligible to receive Family Advocacy Program
services and those who provided these and other responder services.
When speaking with potential users, we discussed issues with enlisted
males and females separately and male and female officers separately.
We tailored our questions to each group's role in providing or
receiving services.
[33] Draft DOD Manual 6400.01-M-V4, Family Advocacy Program:
Guidelines for Clinical Intervention for Persons Reported as Domestic
Abusers (draft provided to GAO in Jan. 2010).
[34] Omnibus Consolidated Appropriations Act, 1997, Pub. L. No. 104-
208, § 658 (1996), codified at 18 U.S.C. § 922.
[35] Department of Defense Instruction 6400.06, Domestic Abuse
Involving DoD Military and Certain Affiliated Personnel (Aug. 21,
2007).
[36] Army, Army: Health Promotion, Risk Reduction, Suicide Prevention,
Report 2010 (Jul. 2010).
[37] [hyperlink, http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-06-540].
[38] In appendix IV, DOD refers to this recommendation as
recommendation 3.
[39] In appendix IV, DOD refers to this recommendation as
recommendation 4.
[40] [hyperlink, http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-06-540] and
[hyperlink, http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-10-577R].
[41] [hyperlink, http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-06-540] and
[hyperlink, http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-10-577R].
[42] Violence Against Women Act of 1994, Pub. L. No. 103-322, § 40001
et Seq. (1994).
[End of section]
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