DHS Inspector General ‘Hid’ Reports of Officer Sexual Misconduct
A New York Times investigation claims Joseph V. Cuffari, the Department of Homeland Security’s inspector general, directed staff members to remove damaging findings from investigative reports on 10,000 cases of alleged domestic violence and sexual misconduct.
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Joseph V. Cuffari, the Department of Homeland Security’s Inspector General, alongside his top aides, directed staff members to remove damaging findings from investigative reports on domestic violence and sexual misconduct by officers in the department’s law enforcement agencies, reports the New York Times. An unpublished draft report dated December 2020 found that more than 10,000 employees of Customs and Border Protection, Immigration and Customs Enforcement, the Secret Service and the Transportation Security Administration had experienced sexual harassment or sexual misconduct at work.
In addition, the report described a pattern of the agencies using cash payments, with payouts as high as $255,000, to settle sexual harassment complaints without investigating or disciplining the perpetrators. Cuffari also directed his staff to remove parts of another draft report showing internal investigations had found that dozens of officers working at the agencies had committed domestic violence, but that they had received “little to no discipline,” The Times claims, adding that perpetrators were even allowed to keep their firearms, despite warnings that it “put victims and the public at risk of further violence.” Immigration and Customs Enforcement had an outsize number of reported incidents, with 445 sexual misconduct allegations and cases for an agency of fewer than 20,000 employees.
