DOD APPOINTS REVIEW PANEL TO STUDY AIR FORCE ACADEMY MISCONDUCT ALLEGATIONS
May 27, 2003

Secretary of Defense Donald H. Rumsfeld today announced the names of the individuals who will serve on a seven-member panel to review sexual misconduct allegations at the U.S. Air Force Academy. Congress directed the panel on April 16, in Public Law 108-11, Emergency Wartime Supplemental Appropriations Act, 2003.

Rumsfeld, in consultation with the Chairmen of the Senate and House Armed Services Committees, named Tillie K. Fowler as panel chair. Fowler is a law partner with Holland & Knight law firm, a former Florida congresswoman and House Armed Services Committee member with expertise in defense policy and military academies.

Other panel members are Josiah Bunting, superintendent of the Virginia Military Institute; Amy McCarthy, United Airlines pilot and Air Force Academy graduate; Laura L. Miller, social scientist at the Rand Corp., former assistant professor of sociology at the University of California at Los Angeles and an expert in organizational behavior; Michael J. Nardotti, law partner, Patton, Boggs, LLP, a retired Army major general and formerly the Judge Advocate General of the Army; John W. Ripley, director of Marine Corps History Center and Museum, a U.S. Naval Academy graduate, and former president of Southern Virginia College; and Sally L. Satel, practicing psychiatrist at the Oasis Drug Treatment Center, Washington, D.C., with expertise in addictive behavior as it relates to sexual misconduct.

The panel will conduct a 90-day study of the policies, management, and organizational practices and cultural elements of the Academy that may have been conducive to alleged sexual misconduct, including sexual assaults and rape. A report of findings, conclusions, and recommendations will be submitted to the Secretary of Defense and the Chairmen of the Senate and House Armed Services Committees upon completion of the study.