There is a call for an investigation of the Air Force athletic department after a probe from The Colorado Springs Gazette found cadet athletes violated the academy's sacred honor code by committing sexual assaults, using drugs, cheating on tests and engaging in other misconduct at wild parties.
The Gazette reported Superintendent Lt. Gen. Michelle Johnson said the findings were so troubling that she has asked for the academy inspector general to investigate.
"These efforts will help in eliminating subcultures ... whose climates do not align with our institutional core values," Johnson said in a statement released to The Gazette. "Despite all of our efforts, I expect we'll still have issues with a few young people who will make poor choices."
The Gazette report includes information from documents that describe parties dating to 2010 where cadet athletes, including top football players, "smoked synthetic marijuana, drank themselves sick and may have used date-rape drugs to incapacitate women for sexual assault." The Gazette also reported "academy leaders canceled a planned 2012 sting out of concern that undercover agents and confidential informants at a party wouldn't be enough to protect women from rape."
The most stunning of the allegations stemmed from December 2011, when members of the school's Office of Special Investigations were informed of a party "where cadet athletes used spice, a synthetic marijuana, and allegedly engaged in gang rape," according to The Gazette. The OSI investigation of that event focused on 32 cadets, 16 of whom were football players. Of the 16, just seven made it to graduation, the Gazette reported.
Lt. Gen. Mike Gould, the AFA's superintendent lieutenant general during much of the reported misconduct, is a member of the College Football Playoff selection committee.
Johnson, who was hired to her post a year ago, told The Gazette "misconduct and preferential treatment at the academy will no longer be tolerated."
