How the Utah National Guard approaches sexual assault came into question last year when its top commander was dismissed after an Army investigation. Can a partnership with the child of a Holocaust survivor fix an 'ecosystem' of abuse?
University of Utah law professor Amos Guiora is collecting stories from guard members past and present to help the state force refine how it approaches abuse.
While instances of sexual assault are not new in the Utah National Guard, discussions about how the guard “We’ve always thought in terms of the perpetrator and not necessarily the people the culture around the perpetrator — who in different positions might have seen what was going on and didn’t say anything, or thought that was just so-and-so being so-and-so, that’s just how he always is,” Green said.
Over the past several years, National Guard units in Utah and nationwide have seen sexual assault reports on the rise. The number of reported sexual assaults in the Utah Guard jumped from three in fiscal 2021 to 18 in 2022. Thirteen were reported in 2023. Guiora is interviewing current and former members of the guard who are willing to share their stories. Utah’s assistant adjutant general said that those who reach out to the law professor will have anonymity, but he hopes that speaking with Guiora will help them feel empowered to seek accountability.promised to “never have anything in my conduct that would give you reason to question my integrity or my resolve,” and asked the same of the soldiers and airmen.
In the announcement of the partnership, you asked for members of the Utah National Guard to reach out to you about their experiences. Have you heard from anyone?The only way to address this issue is for me, as the outsider, to create these relationships with people. I’m the honest broker and I will present material to the guard and enable them to address these situations.
I may modestly suggest that I have three advantages: One, I am the person who’s written on this; two, I am the outsider; and three, that I also served in the military. So I understand the structure, I understand — what do they call it in the police, the “thin blue line.” The “thin blue line,” or whatever the military axiom would be, it’s protecting the brand, or the institution. If you were to hold the enablers in the ecosystem accountable, it’s sending a message to the most vulnerable that we understand that as bad as the perp was, it’s that’s responsible.
University of Utah law professor Amos Guiora, who has a partnership with the Utah National Guard to prevent abusive behavior within the force, sits for a portrait on Thursday, March 14, 2024. It’s a huge challenge because, for many legislators and jurists, the notion of enabler and bystander is a crime of omission rather than commission. And there’s a challenge here to convince. We established the Bystander Initiative at the law school, that’s a part of all this.
Shout out to the Utah National Guard for being willing to address this head-on. A lot of institutions duck and hide and, in less-elegant English, BS their way through it.
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