A US Air Force officer in charge of preventing sexual attacks has been arrested for assaulting a woman, police said Monday, in the latest setback for a force struggling to stem a pervasive rape problem.
Lieutenant Colonel Jeff Krusinski, head of the Air Force’s sexual assault prevention and response program, was drunk when he “approached a female victim in a parking lot and grabbed her breasts and buttocks,” according to a police report from Arlington, Virginia, just outside the US capital.
Krusinski, 41, was charged with sexual battery and held on a $5,000 bond, it said.
Air Force officials confirmed to AFP that Krusinski was head of the service’s prevention program and said he has been removed from his post.
The Air Force has come under severe criticism after a general recently tossed out a sexual conviction from a court martial against a fighter pilot, Lieutenant Colonel James Wilkerson.
And the Air Force has been reeling from a scandal at its main training center in Lackland, Texas, where more than a dozen training instructors have been accused of misconduct with recruits, including sexual assault.
Lawmakers have slammed the Air Force and the broader military over sexual assault cases, saying the Pentagon has failed to come to grips with the problem.
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