35 Air Force instructors fired in sex scandal

The Air Force said Monday that it has removed 35 instructors in San Antonio from their jobs in less than a year for a variety of reasons, including illicit sexual conduct.

The one-time head of the service's Security Forces command called the number "extraordinary."

"For that many people to have been removed from that program, in my knowledge and experience, is unheard of, because the numbers in that period of time are mind-boggling," retired Brig. Gen. Richard Coleman said Monday.

The 35 instructors make up about 8 percent of the 473 men and women who will train 36,000 recruits in San Antonio this year.

The Air Force revealed the removal number under a federal Freedom of Information Act request by the San Antonio Express-News, saying the instructors at Joint Base San Antonio-Lackland had been "temporarily or permanently removed from duty for unprofessional conduct" since last summer.

"I can say this," said Col. Polly Kenny, staff judge advocate for the 2nd Air Force in Biloxi, Miss. "A majority of the 35 were removed for things other than sexual misconduct."

The Air Force, which had refused to release the number, began removing the instructors after Col. Glenn Palmer, commander of the 737th Training Group at Lackland, took over July 1, the service's FOIA manager said in his letter to the newspaper.

Just a week before Palmer took command, Staff Sgt. Luis A. Walker was removed from his instructor's job over misconduct allegations. He is charged with having illicit sexual conduct with 10 women in basic and technical training, including intercourse with four of them.

But Walker, who faces a maximum sentence of life in prison, was only the start of a sex scandal that is the worst of its kind ever at Lackland, according to base officials, triggering a makeover in training for new instructors and warnings to recruits to be on guard against misconduct.

Walker, Staff Sgts. Kwinton Estacio and Craig LeBlanc, and Airman Peter Vega-Maldonado have been charged with sexual misconduct. The Air Force is studying cases against other instructors, but it won't say how many.

A former staff sergeant, Vega dropped a bombshell while testifying in an evidentiary hearing, revealing that he had been involved with 10 women - not just one, the number involved in his plea deal. The Air Force has given no details in the nine other cases.

Coleman, the retired general, wasn't sure if the widening scandal reflected a problem in the command climate, but he said an investigation was warranted.

One is under way. Asked about potential problems with poor leadership at Lackland, home of Air Force basic training, Gen. Edward Rice Jr. said it's "a part of an entire review" being done.

"I don't presume that there are command-climate issues, but it's not something that I am ignoring the possibility of either, and so this review will be comprehensive and will look at every aspect of basic military training to include the command structure," said Rice, head of the Air Education and Training Command.

The Air Force, in responding to the FOIA request, did not say how many instructors were yanked from their jobs for maltreatment, bad training or illicit sexual conduct. It also did not say why or when Palmer decided to remove each instructor.

Palmer, who invited the Express-News to a briefing he gave to new recruits in March, did not talk with the Express-News on Monday. But in a statement, he said some instructors were removed because they had medical, academic and "broader career issues" such as repeated tardiness, speeding or failing to meet uniform standards.

"Though there are (instructors) charged with sexual misconduct, to delineate which or how many (instructors) were removed for sexual misconduct violations would be inappropriate prior to the completion of an ongoing investigation," he said.

Coleman, a Lackland enlistee who retired 43 years later as Security Forces commander, said it didn't matter why so many instructors were booted out of the trainer corps.

"In my experience that's an extraordinary number of people to be removed from a program where you're supposed to hand-pick the cream of the folks that come here and perform that duty," he said, calling the scandal "a great embarrassment to the Air Force."