The Army has disciplined the two-star general who directed the Maryland training base where one of the Army's worst sexual harassment scandals was centered, Defense Department officials said on Wednesday.
The former commander of the Aberdeen Ordinance Center and School, Maj. Gen. Robert Shadley, was the highest-ranking of several officers to receive reprimands as a result of the scandal, in which drill sergeants preyed on young female trainees, the officials said.They said that Shadley, who was transferred earlier this year to the Army Forces Command at Fort McPherson, Ga., planned to contest the reprimand, which would probably end his career.
The decision to discipline the officers is expected to be announced formally on Thursday, when the Army is also scheduled to release the results of two studies into the service's handling of sexual misconduct in its ranks. Lawmakers who have been briefed on the results of the studies say that they found widespread evidence of discrimination by male commanders against female troops.
The Army has said that when it releases the reports, it will announce an "action plan" for dealing with sexual misconduct issues that will result in expanded screening procedures for Army drill sergeants, including psychological ex-am-inations and criminal-background checks, and new training guidelines intended to make troops more sensitive to the need to end sexual harassment.
The Army investigations prompted by the scandal at Aberdeen found that the current training system was so flawed that wife-beaters were allowed to become drill sergeants and that the enforcement of rules against sexual harassment varied widely from base to base.