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Reported sex assaults in the US military have dropped. That reverses what had been a growing problem

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Reported sex assaults in the US military have dropped. That reverses what had been a growing problem

WASHINGTON (AP) — The number of reported sexual assaults across the military decreased last year, and a confidential survey found a 19% drop in the number of service members who said they had experienced some type of unwanted sexual contact, according to new figures obtained by The Associated Press. Both are dramatic reversals of what has been a growing problem in recent years.

More than 29,000 active-duty service members said in the survey that they had unwanted sexual contact during the previous year, compared with nearly 36,000 in the 2021 survey, according to several defense officials. The decrease is the first in eight years.

At the same time, 8,515 sexual assaults were reported last year involving members of the U.S. military, a decrease from 8,942 in 2022. And officials said the U.S. military academies also saw fewer reported sexual assaults in the school year that ended last spring versus the previous year.

Senior defense officials said the assault numbers are still far too high and there is much more work to do, but they expressed cautious optimism that the military could be turning a corner, with help from an array of new programs and increased personnel. Sexual assault reports in the military have gone up for much of the last decade, except for a tiny decrease in 2020, during the COVID-19 pandemic shutdown.

The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because the report has not been publicly released.

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While it’s difficult to point to any one reason for the recent decreases, the Defense Department has been making a series of changes over the past year that officials say may be contributing to the shift. The services are using an infusion of more than $1 billion in the last two budgets to improve programs and hire up to 2,500 personnel as part of a new “prevention workforce” and place them at military installations around the world. So far, more than 1,000 have been hired.

The Pentagon releases a report every year on the number of sexual assaults reported by or about troops. But because sexual assault is a highly underreported crime, the department does a confidential survey every two years to get a clearer picture of the problem.

The data for the fiscal year that ended Sept. 30 also suggests that a greater percentage of service members came forward to report sexual assaults, which has been a key goal for the Defense Department. About 25% of those who said on the survey that they had faced unwanted sexual contact reported it last year, compared with 20% in 2021, according to defense officials and documents reviewed by the AP.

Defense officials have long argued that an increase in reported assaults is a positive trend because so many people are reluctant to report them, both in the military and in society as a whole. Greater reporting, they say, shows there is more confidence in the reporting system and greater comfort with the support for victims, and results in a growing number of offenders being held accountable.

But the Pentagon and the military services also have come under persistent criticism and pressure from members of Congress to reduce sexual assaults and harassment in the military. Service leaders and lawmakers have all argued that the sexual assaults and harassment contribute to the military’s struggles to meet recruiting goals.

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Alarmed members of Congress have enacted a number of changes, including a new prosecution system that uses independent lawyers. Lawmakers argued that some commanders failed to take victims’ complaints seriously or tried to protect those in their units who faced accusations, making victims reluctant to come forward.

The services have long worked to develop programs to prevent sexual assaults, encourage reporting and bolster confidence in the system. The Army, for example, has a new training program for soldiers when they report to their first duty station that shows service members acting out dangerous situations and teaches troops how to respond.

The number of reported sexual assaults decreased across all the military services, which is a marked improvement over the 2022 fiscal year, when the number of sexual assaults in the Navy, Air Force and Marine Corps all shot up significantly. A 9% drop in Army reports in 2022 offset the increases in the other branches so that there was an uptick of about 1% for the whole military. The Army is the largest military service.

According to officials, the number of sexual assault reported in the Army decreased from 3,718 in 2022 to 3,507 last year, while the Navy went from 2,052 to 1,942 and the Air Force from 1,928 to 1,838. The Marine Corps had the smallest decline, going from 1,244 to 1,228.

Included in the 8,515 total were 541 service members who reported an assault that occurred before they entered the military and 612 civilians who said they were assaulted by a member of the military.

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At the military academies, the number of assaults dipped from 155 in 2022 to 124 in the 2023 school year. Service commanders are still working, however, to address what was a dramatic spike in 2022.

The latest survey also showed that nearly a quarter of all active-duty women said they’d faced sexual harassment, a decrease from the 28.6% in 2021.

One troubling area continues to be female service members’ satisfaction with the help they get when they make a complaint and their overall trust in the system and their leaders.

While a large percentage of victims seek out sexual assault response staff, fewer than 70% are happy with the services they get. And that hasn’t changed much over the past several years. Roughly the same percentage says they trust the military to respect and protect them and their privacy.

Officials said the hiring of more permanent, full-time workers will help improve that process.

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Likely Yemen Houthi rebel attack targets ship in Gulf of Aden as Eisenhower reportedly heads home

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Likely Yemen Houthi rebel attack targets ship in Gulf of Aden as Eisenhower reportedly heads home

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — A commercial ship traveling through the Gulf of Aden saw explosions near the vessel, authorities said Saturday, likely the latest attack by Yemen’s Houthi rebels attempting to target the shipping lane.

The apparent fire by the Houthis comes after the sinking this week of the ship Tutor, which marked what appears to be a new escalation by the Iranian-backed Houthis in their campaign of attacks on ships in the vital maritime corridor over the Israel-Hamas war in the Gaza Strip.

Meanwhile, U.S. officials reportedly ordered the USS Dwight D. Eisenhower, the aircraft carrier leading America’s response to the Houthi attacks, to return home.

The captain of the ship targeted late Friday saw “explosions in the vicinity of the vessel,” the British military’s United Kingdom Maritime Trade Operations center said.

“The crew are reported safe and the vessel is proceeding to its next port of call,” the UKMTO said, without elaborating on whether the ship sustained any damage.

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The Houthis, who have held Yemen’s capital, Sanaa, since 2014, did not immediately claim the attack. However, it can take the rebels hours or even days to acknowledge their assaults.

The Houthis on Friday released footage of one of their drone boats, the “Tufan,” or “Flood,” which they said targeted the Tutor.

The Houthis have launched more than 60 attacks targeting specific vessels and fired off other missiles and drones in their campaign that has killed a total of four sailors. They have seized one vessel and sunk two since November. A U.S.-led airstrike campaign has targeted the Houthis since January, with a series of strikes May 30 killing at least 16 people and wounding 42 others, the rebels say.

In March, the Belize-flagged Rubymar carrying fertilizer became the first to sink in the Red Sea after taking on water for days following a rebel attack.

The Houthis have maintained that their attacks target ships linked to Israel, the United States or Britain. However, many of the ships attacked have little or no connection to the Israel-Hamas war.

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Meanwhile, the U.S. Naval Institute’s news service reported, citing an anonymous official, that the Eisenhower would be returning home to Norfolk, Virginia, after an over eight-month deployment in combat that the Navy says is its most intense since World War II. The report said an aircraft carrier operating in the Pacific would be taking the Eisenhower’s place.

The closest American aircraft carrier known to be operating in Asia is the USS Theodore Roosevelt. The Roosevelt anchored Saturday in Busan, South Korea, amid Seoul’s ongoing tensions with North Korea.

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Hot tub death: Wife files wrongful death lawsuit, calls for 'accountability'

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Hot tub death: Wife files wrongful death lawsuit, calls for 'accountability'

A Texas woman has filed a wrongful-death lawsuit against two Mexican resort travel companies, seeking more than $1 million, after her husband tragically died after being electrocuted in a resort hot tub.

In the lawsuit, Lizzette Zambrano, from El Paso County, Texas, named vacation rental companies Casago LLC, Casago International LLC and High Desert Travel Inc., which operated Sonoran Sea Resort, where she was staying with her husband, Jorge Guillen.

Zambrano accused the companies of being “grossly negligent” and has called for the companies to “take accountability” for her 43-year-old husband’s death.

“I want somebody to take accountability for what happened to my husband and myself,” Zambrano told ABC’s “Good Morning America.”

MEXICO HOT TUB DEATH: US TOURIST WHO WAS ELECTROCUTED REMEMBERED AS ‘BIG FAMILY MAN’ WHO HAD ‘HEART OF GOLD’

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Jorge Guillen and Lizzette Zambrano are from El Paso, Texas, according to media reports. (GoFundMe)

The lawsuit paints a picture of the couple’s last moments together before being electrocuted in a hot tub while vacationing.

As soon as Guillen entered the tub, he was “exposed to an electrical current in the water,” it said.

“Jorge immediately keeled over into the tub and was taken under the surface of the water,” the lawsuit said. “Witnessing her husband immediately collapse, Lizzette sprang forward from the pool deck to try and grab Jorge’s body.”

Zambrano attempted to rescue him, but was also shocked. 

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She was eventually rescued by a bystander and taken to a hospital.

“Patrons attempted to assist, grabbing a shepherd’s cross and other items to attempt to get Jorge’s body,” the lawsuit said. “However, the metal from the objects carried the electrical current and began shocking the rescuers.”

The lawsuit said it took “ten painstaking minutes” before staff members “availed themselves and began to assist in rescuing Jorge.”

MAN KILLED AFTER GETTING ELECTROCUTED IN SEASIDE RESORT JACUZZI 

“At no time prior to this, did Defendants seek to engage the emergency shutoff for the jacuzzi or attempt any rescue of either Jorge or Lizzette,” it said. “Jorge was being electrocuted and drowned under water for 10 minutes.”

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Puerto-Penasco-Mexico

A beachfront at the popular tourist resort of Puerto Peñasco in the state of Sonora, Mexico. (AP Photo/Annika Wolters/File)

Guillen was remembered in a GoFundMe for having a “heart of gold.”

 

“Our best friends have experienced a horrible accident. Jorge had a heart of gold and was always there for family and friends. The love they shared was one for ages,” reads a GoFundMe page set up for the couple. 

In a comment to the New York Post, Casago denied responsibility. 

“The Sonoran Sea is a condo resort and the homeowners’ association is responsible for all common areas, including the maintenance of the swimming pool, hot tubs, and grounds,” they said. “Casago, a vacation rental company, is not involved in any management or maintenance of the resort.”

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Fox News Digital has reached out to Sonoran Sea Resort for comment.

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Israel will be the ‘ultimate loser’ in war with Hezbollah, Iran says

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Israel will be the ‘ultimate loser’ in war with Hezbollah, Iran says

Israel says it will soon ‘make the necessary decisions’ about confronting the Iran-allied Lebanese group.

Iran says Hezbollah is capable of defending itself and Lebanon, warning Israel that it would be the “ultimate loser” in an all-out war with the Lebanese armed group.

Tehran’s statement on Friday came as fears of a major Israeli offensive in Lebanon continued to mount.

“Any imprudent decision by the occupying Israeli regime to save itself could plunge the region into a new war, the consequence of which would be the destruction of Lebanon’s infrastructure as well as that of the 1948 occupied territories,” Iran’s mission to the United Nations said in a social media post.

“Undoubtedly, this war will have one ultimate loser, which is the Zionist regime. The Lebanese Resistance Movement, Hezbollah, has the capability to defend itself and Lebanon – perhaps the time for the self-annihilation of this illegitimate regime has come.”

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Israel also issued a threat to Iran-aligned Hezbollah on Friday with Foreign Minister Israel Katz saying “soon we will make the necessary decisions” about confronting the Lebanese group.

“The free world must unconditionally stand with Israel in its war against the axis of evil led by Iran and extremist Islam. Our war is also your war,” Katz said.

Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah said this week that if the Israeli military goes to war in Lebanon, his group will use its rockets and drones to hit targets across the entire territory of Israel. He warned Hezbollah would wage a war with “no restraint and no rules and no ceilings”.

Nasrallah also issued a threat to Cyprus, a European Union member that sits in the eastern Mediterranean west of the Lebanese and Israeli coasts. He said the group has information that Israel is conducting military exercises in Cyprus in terrain similar to southern Lebanon.

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Nasrallah added that Israel plans to use airports and bases in Cyprus for military purposes if its own infrastructure is targeted during a serious war.

“Opening Cypriot airports and bases for the Israeli enemy to target Lebanon means the Cypriot government has become part of the war, and the resistance will deal with it as part of the war,” he said without elaborating.

Cyprus said Nasrallah’s threat is not grounded in reality, stressing the country enjoys great relations with Lebanon.

Still, the Hezbollah statement exacerbated concerns about an even larger regional war that could spill beyond Lebanon’s borders and pull Iran-allied groups – if not Tehran itself – as well as the United States into the conflict.

Hezbollah started attacking military bases in northern Israel the day after the outbreak of the war on Gaza on October 7 in what it says is a “support front” to back Palestinian groups. Israel responded by bombing southern Lebanese villages and Hezbollah positions.

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While the near-daily clashes have displaced tens of thousands of people in Lebanon and Israel, they have been largely contained to the border areas.

But the violence has escalated in recent weeks, especially after an Israeli air raid killed a top Hezbollah commander in southern Lebanon last week.

On Friday, Hezbollah claimed several military operations against Israel, including a drone attack it said targeted Israeli forces at a coastal base on the western side of the border.

The US has pushed for a diplomatic resolution to the crisis while expressing concern about Hezbollah’s attacks. “We have made quite clear we do not want to see escalation of this conflict,” Department of State spokesperson Matthew Miller told reporters on Thursday.

For its part, Hezbollah has said it will continue operations against the Israeli military until Israel ends its war in Gaza, which has killed more than 37,000 Palestinians.

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Members of Hezbollah attend the funeral of a senior field commander [File: Mohamed Azakir/Reuters]

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