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GAO-10-577R 1 (2010-04-26)

handle is hein.gao/gaobaansf0001 and id is 1 raw text is: 

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AG A 0

        Accountabiity  Integrity * Reliabiity
United States Government Accountability Office
Washington, DC 20548

   April 26, 2010
   Congressional Committees
   Subject: Military Personnel: Status of Implementation of GAO's 2006
   Recommendations on DOD's Domestic Violence Program


   National estimates indicate that approximately 1.5 million women and 835,000 men are
   physically assaulted or raped by intimate partners in the United States annually.
   Congress, in the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2000, required the
   Department of Defense (DOD) to (1) establish a central database of information on
   domestic violence incidents involving members of the armed forces and (2) establish the
   Department of Defense Task Force on Domestic Violence. 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 of offenders, coordination among support-service
   providers, and recording of data on cases of domestic violence. To coordinate
   implementation of these recommendations, in January 2003, DOD established a Family
   Violence Policy Office to ensure that DOD and the services took appropriate actions in
   this area. This office was located in the Military Community and Family Policy Office,
   which is in the Office of the Under Secretary of Defense for Personnel and Readiness.
   DOD's Family Advocacy Program office, responsible for providing treatment for
   domestic violence victims and rehabilitation for offenders, is also located in the Military
   Community and Family Policy Office. In 2003, members of Congress requested that we
   assess DOD's progress in implementing the recommendations made by the Defense Task
   Force on Domestic Violence, and we subsequently issued a report in 2006 stating, among
   other things, that DOD had taken action on a majority of the task force recommendations
   but that DOD had not captured data from all law enforcement and clinical records
   involving domestic abuse cases and that until it had complete and accurate data, it could
   not fully understand the scope of the problem.2 The National Defense Authorization Act
   for Fiscal Year 2010 requires us to review and assess the progress DOD has made in
   implementing recommendations contained in our 2006 report.

   In our 2006 report, we recommended that the Secretary of Defense direct the Under
   Secretary of Defense for Personnel and Readiness to take the actions listed in table 1. In
   commenting on a draft of our 2006 report, the Office of the Secretary of Defense (OSD)


   1 Pub. L. No. 106-65, §§ 591, 594 (1999).
   2Military Personnel: Progress Made in Implementing Recommendations to Reduce Domestic Violence, but Further
   ManagementAction Needed, GAO-06-540 (Washington, D.C.: May 24, 2006).
   'Pub. L. No. 111-84, § 568 (2009).


GAO-10-577R DOD Domestic Violence Program


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