Peace Corps Hearing Details Abuse of Volunteers

On May 11, the House Foreign Affairs Committee held a hearing, “Peace Corps at 50.” The hearing recognized the 50th anniversary of the Peace Corps and examined reports of sexual abuse and violence toward women volunteers.

Chair Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (R-FL) acknowledged the efforts of the Peace Corps volunteers over the past 50 years who “help[ed] the poor in developing countries, thereby increasing understanding between diverse cultures. For many, these Peace Corps volunteers serve as the only American faces to visit faraway places in distant lands, and volunteers should be proud of their accomplishments, as there are many to celebrate.” However, Rep. Ros-Lehtinen also discussed the recent reports of sexual violence that have plagued volunteers in several countries: “Earlier this year, on January 14, the ABC television news program, 20/20, exposed the Peace Corps’ failures regarding the reporting of sexual assault and rape, which spurred many victims to come forward about the mishandling of their cases. According to dozens of disturbing affidavits received by our committee, the Peace Corps’ mishandling of rape and assault spans over four decades. Several of the affidavits are from volunteers currently serving in the Peace Corps. The affidavits received by the committee were obtained by First Response Action, a support group of volunteers who were victims of rape or assault. The affidavits establish five basic themes: volunteers are generally inadequately trained on sexual assault issues; volunteers are often placed in dangerous situations; the Peace Corps’ in-country response often fails to meet survivors’ needs; upon return to the United States, survivors often receive hostile, rather than supportive treatment; and institutional obstacles often prevent survivors from receiving long-term medical and mental health care.”

Ranking Member Howard Berman (D-CA) echoed Rep. Ros-Lehtinen’s remarks, saying, “[A]ll of us were deeply troubled by the recent ABC News 20/20 segment, which detailed the circumstances surrounding the murder of a volunteer in the West African nation of Benin, and the sexual assault of volunteers in a number of different countries. The Puzey family was not provided adequate support after the death of their daughter, from the manner in which they were notified to the way her personal effects were returned home. By failing to provide Ms. [Jessica] Smochek with the protection she had requested or removing her from her site, Peace Corps left her open to an attack that could have cost her life. By providing inadequate training to Peace Corps staff and volunteers on how to prevent and respond to sexual assaults, the volunteer community is left vulnerable to physical and psychological trauma. We have a profound obligation to our volunteers to do everything possible, not only to improve their safety and prevent these crimes from occurring, but to respond effectively in emergency situations. There is no excuse for failing to treat survivors with dignity and compassion, or for leaving families in the dark. Our job today is to identify the gaps and flaws in the current system and lay the groundwork for fixing them in a reasonable, bipartisan manner. The brave and selfless men and women who choose to spend more than two years of their lives as volunteers – often in some of the most remote places on earth – deserve nothing less.”

After detailing the events of her rape by the Peace Corps program director in Nepal, Carol Marie Clark, a former Peace Corps volunteer and current elementary school teacher, explained the lack of support and services available to her after being victimized. She said, “Weeks later, I realized that I had become pregnant with the child of my rapist. I was terrified and disgusted. I returned to Kathmandu, where I saw a nurse who confirmed my fears. She reported the pregnancy to the Peace Corps medical officer, who reported it to the country director and to Peace Corps’ headquarters in Washington, DC. The Peace Corps’ response was that I would need to choose immediately whether to terminate my pregnancy or terminate my service with the Peace Corps. So, if I chose to have the baby, neither the Peace Corps nor my parents would have me. Everyday I became more afraid of what I would do on my own, with the child of my rapist growing inside me. I had flashbacks of being raped while I lay helpless to stop it. I couldn’t endure it. I wanted to die. Feeling I had no other choice, I made a choice that went against everything that I was taught to believe: I chose to terminate my pregnancy.” She continued, “I was taught to never give up, and so I returned to Nepal, determined to hold my head up and to honor the commitment I had made to the Nepalese people and to the Peace Corps. But the Peace Corps did not honor the commitments I believe it had made to me. Not only did the Peace Corps allow the program director to remain in his position supervising volunteers even after I reported the rape, but before the Peace Corps would honor my request to be supervised by someone other than the program director who had raped me, I was forced to confront him, face-to-face, in front of the Peace Corps medical director. Forcing me to see this man again, to speak to him, and to convince the Peace Corps that he had violated me, was extremely traumatic. But, determined to continue my service, I did it…When I returned to my village, it was clear the program director had told others that my body was free for the taking. Anyone who wanted could have me with no questions or consequences. Soon after he left, a Nepalese government official and friend of the program director approached me. He offered me ‘fun, like [I] had with my Peace Corps friend’ and tried to forcibly abduct me. I broke free and ran into a local tea house.”

After her assignment to a village in the southern tip of Niger, Dr. Karestan Chase Koenen – a former Peace Corps volunteer and current associate professor at the Columbia University Mailman School of Public Health and adjunct associate professor at the Harvard School of Public Health who specializes in psychological trauma – was raped by an acquaintance of another Peace Corps volunteer. Although Dr. Chase Koenen described her treatment by the American in-country doctor following her attack as “positive,” she emphasized that the “in-country response” to her assault was “inadequate” and offered suggestions to improve it: “[T]he Peace Corps staff’s in-country response to rape survivors is vital to guiding both the physical and psychological recovery of survivors. Peace Corps’ in-country personnel need training on how to best respond to sexual assault survivors. Of course, a survivor’s safety must be the Peace Corps’ first priority. Once survivors are safe, the Peace Corps should inform them about and provide access to prophylactic treatment for sexually transmitted diseases and pregnancy. They should also provide survivors with access to a post-rape exam to preserve evidence that can be used in court. In-country doctors must be provided with the training and resources they need to do this. Research has shown that – done in a way that fully informs the survivors of the process – forensic rape exams can improve a survivor’s recovery. But, in addition to their duty to take the necessary physical precautions, Peace Corps’ in-country staff also have the opportunity to jump-start the recovery process by giving survivors the proper emotional and social support. They must treat the survivor with concern and respect. They should alleviate, rather than compound, the self-blaming survivors are prone to experience. They should provide the survivor with immediate access to an advocate, so the survivor doesn’t feel like she is navigating her recovery alone. The staff should also give the survivor information on the procedures for prosecuting her perpetrator in her country of service. Finally, survivors should be given the option of being accompanied back to the United States by a support person – whether another volunteer or Peace Corps staff member, rather than having to travel alone.”

Peace Corps Director Aaron Williams discussed the steps the Peace Corps has taken under his leadership to ensure the safety of, and support for, volunteers. He said, “We issued Peace Corps’ Commitment to Sexual Assault Victims, a set of core principles to ensure we provide timely, effective, and compassionate support to victims of sexual assault. The commitment makes clear that all volunteers must be treated with dignity and respect, and that no one deserves to be a victim of a sexual assault. We implemented new Guidelines for Responding to Rape and Major Sexual Assault that detail our victim-centered approach and the specific procedures posts must follow in order to respond promptly to an incident and provide proper support to a victim. We have also trained staff on the new Guidelines, which include the Commitment to Sexual Assault Victims. I tasked the agency’s Sexual Assault Working Group with developing a comprehensive sexual assault prevention and response program, and I appointed a former Peace Corps country director with expertise in rape crisis response to lead the working group. The Sexual Assault Working Group, which was created in early 2008, includes former Peace Corps volunteers and survivors of rape and sexual assault, as well as staff with expertise in trauma response. The Sexual Assault Working Group has examined best practices in the field and reached out to experts within and outside of government, including the Department of Defense’s Sexual Assault Prevention and Response Office, the Department of Justice’s Office on Violence Against Women, and Speaking Out About Rape (SOAR). We signed a Memorandum of Understanding with the Rape, Abuse, and Incest National Network (RAINN), the nation’s largest anti-sexual violence organization, to collaborate and share resources on sexual assault prevention and response. I created a new victims’ advocate position to coordinate victim support services, and hired a nationally recognized leader in victims’ rights to serve as the first advocate. The idea for this position was suggested by First Response Action, among others, and I thank them for it. Victims of crime will now be able to turn to a skilled, capable Peace Corps staffer who will make certain they receive the emotional, medical, legal, and other support they need during and after their service.”

Mr. Williams continued, “At the suggestion of Congressman [Ted] Poe [(R-TX)], who serves on the committee, I created the Peace Corps Volunteer Sexual Assault Panel, made up of outside experts and former volunteers who were victims of sexual assault. The individual members of this panel will assist the Peace Corps in the design and implementation of the agency’s sexual assault risk reduction and response strategies. Representatives of the Department of Defense’s Sexual Assault Prevention and Response Office, and the Department of Justice’s Office on Violence Against Women and Office for Victims of Crime, have agreed to serve on the Panel. Since last year, we have been developing comprehensive new training materials for Volunteers on sexual assault prevention and response. Starting this summer, we will implement new online training, which will be required for volunteers prior to departing the United States. This will be followed by additional in-country training both before and during their service. We have taken steps to improve the medical care we provide volunteers by giving our medical professionals at headquarters overall responsibility for hiring, credentialing and managing Peace Corps Medical Officers (PCMOs) at every post and by providing enhanced guidance to those PCMOs on how to handle serious medical issues. New Regional Medical Officers were hired to assist in the health care of volunteers and a Quality Improvement Council was established to monitor and report on ongoing health care issues. The Peace Corps, as an agency and as a family, is committed to providing the highest quality support and service to volunteers who have been the victims of sexual violence or other crimes. From the moment a volunteer first reports a rape or sexual assault we must be ready, willing, and able to provide compassionate and effective support and assistance. That is my commitment, and I believe that we have, as an agency, taken enormous strides in the past few years toward making it a reality, thanks in part to the productive conversations we have had with the broader Peace Corps community and outside experts.”

Jennifer Wilson Marsh, Hotline and Affiliate Service director for the Rape, Abuse, and Incest National Network (RAINN), discussed RAINN’s partnership with the Peace Corps and provided legislative recommendations to improve the Peace Corps’ response to sexual assault and rape: “On March 23, 2011, RAINN and the Peace Corps signed a memorandum of understanding (MOU) to collaborate and share educational resources and training tools on sexual assault prevention and response. Through this partnership, RAINN will provide the Peace Corps with expertise on [its] sexual assault prevention and response training for Peace Corps volunteers and staff. As part of this partnership, RAINN will provide the Peace Corps with guidance on the development of an enhanced sexual assault prevention and response program. In return, the Peace Corps will share information with RAINN on cross-cultural issues of sexual assault risk reduction and response in other countries.” With regard to RAINN’s recommendations, Ms. Wilson Marsh urged the committee to “enact legislation that will ensure that the Peace Corps adopts established best practices in victim response. This is especially important given the time-limited appointments that the Peace Corps places on its staff. While we believe the current director and other leadership staff at the Peace Corps are working towards improving their response to victims of sexual assault, we want to ensure that institutional knowledge regarding what is being done remains in place once the current director and staff have left.” She added, “The Peace Corps has made progress by hiring a dedicated victim advocate. We believe that the person in that role will be more successful with the addition of one or two deployable victim advocates, trained staffers who can immediately travel to the location of a volunteer who has been assaulted and provide direct, on-the ground help. While we recognize the difficulty of our current economic situation, having help on-site, as in the SART [sexual assault response teams] model I discussed earlier, will complement the help available from Peace Corps headquarters and ensure that victims receive the care they need. The presence of the victim advocate both on the ground with the victim in addition to a long-term support resource would strengthen the SART model they are working towards. These victim advocates will be activated when a Peace Corps volunteer is assaulted and will have the ability to fly to personally assist the victim through the process. The staffers in this position should be experienced in navigating foreign legal and cultural systems. Cultural and geographic issues can play a large role in the response provided to victims in the Peace Corps. A Peace Corps volunteer who is a victim of sexual assault will benefit from having a victim advocate who is familiar with the culture, legal environment, language, and resources unique to that victim’s circumstances.”

Jessica Smochek, a former Peace Corps volunteer, Lois Puzey, mother of slain Peace Corps volunteer Kate Puzey, and Kathy Buller, inspector general for the Peace Corps, also testified.