but says the other agency is handling it. Although the Colonel's exact text is available, the IG,DOD interprets the Colonel's statement, adding elements the Colonel never said, and then concludes the amended statement is correct. The military can never admit the Colonel lied or even acknowledge that his statement was false without unraveling the fabric of their own credibility.

DENIAL OF INFORMATION

The military uses Freedom of Information exemptions to unreasonably withhold large portions of death reports. The military vaguely cites the reasons for the denial and then advises you of your right to appeal. Although legal, this tactic is inherently unfair as many parents can not navigate the FOIA system. For example, the Army released 4 of the SSI Report after my FOIA request and an additional 1⁄2 of the report after my FOIA appeal. Were the arguments contained in my FOIA appeal so compelling that the Army released 2 of the SSI Report on appeal or had 1⁄2 of the SSI been unreasonably denied on request?

When an individual makes a FOIA Request and the military withholds most of the death report, the military is effectively denying us the death report. We are not the Washington Post. How many people in our position are capable of drafting an effective FOIA appeal and how many of us have the means to go to Federal Court. The problems go beyond unreasonably withholding information to what I believe to be illegally withholding information. If my situation is indicative of others, then our military is operating outside the law.

The Army withheld 4 of the report without ever citing an exemption. The Army later claimed that these pages all originated from the State and they were not the release authority. It is my understanding that once these pages are made part of the SSI report, the Army is obligated by Law to either release the pages or claim a proper exemption. The Army did neither. • The Army usurped my right to appeal. The Army introduced another reason for denial during the appeals process. How can a person write an appeal based on the exemptions and specific reasons cited in the denial of the request if the Army is then going to introduce additional reasons during the appeals process? The reality is that it doesn't matter. The Army General Counsel refused to consider my appeal of their newly introduced exemption. • The Army fabricated a reason for the newly introduced exemption. The Army claimed it was predecisional to their decision not to conduct a criminal investigation. The documentation shows the Army had already made that decision on the morning of my son's death.

My FOIA efforts are far from over. I still have several outstanding requests, an action pending in Federal Court, and I have filed a complaint with the Office of the Special Counsel. In regard to the military's application or the FOIA Laws, do I epitomize the policy or the exception?

CONFLICTING INFORMATION PROVIDED TO SURVIVORS

The Department of Defense will tell you that problems arise when "information is provided to us, based on preliminary investigative efforts, which later is determined to have been inaccurate. When updated information is provided to the survivors as it becomes available, it is often taken as conflicting with the original notification information rather than as an update."

Apparently, the military aspires to make the release of misinformation an accepted practice. Using their logic, how can we ever have any assurance that what we are being told today is accurate, and will not be "updated" tomorrow? I can't accept that as an excuse for releasing misinformation and I would hope this committee would agree.

CLOSING STATEMENT

If our tone sometimes sounds angry, make no mistake, we are angry. We are outraged at being forced to fight an agency of our own Government to try to obtain a proper investigation of our children's deaths and access to the death reports. We have a military charged with defending this nation who has waged a war of betrayal and deception against its citizens and has demonstrated by their actions that they are answerable to no one. Where do they get their arrogance? How dare they treat us this way.

The military would want this hearing to be an issue of procedures. I say the problem is the procedures have been ignored. No where will you see a procedure to not properly investigate a death. No where will you see procedures saying when they

question you, ignore them, lie to them, malign them, and deny them information at every step along the way.

Our issue is a non partisan issue independent of party and ideology which should be embraced and supported by members on both sides of the aisle. I can't imagine any member of this committee who would stand before us, as an advocate of the military, and tell us we are wrong.

As a women and a mother, I was encouraged with the decisiveness that Congress displayed in handling the Tailhook situation. However, nobody died at Tailhook. There is no more important issue to a women than the death of her child.

In the past 3 years, I have written several hundred letters and I have spent tens of thousands of dollars. No parent should have to bear the time, energy, money, and stress to learn the circumstances surrounding their children's death. That should be a given.

Although the specific details of our cases will differ, there is an underlining theme that is too consistent to be discounted and too disturbing to be ignored. We have all been victimized by improper and inadequate investigations. We have all received ill treatment by the military once we dared question them. We have all faced great difficulty in trying to obtain information about the deaths of our children.

These situations must stop, our issues must be individually addressed and remedied, and finally the military officials that commit or condone wrongful actions must be held accountable for their actions.

Please allow us to grieve our losses and put our children to rest. We give the military our son's and daughters and all we demand in return is a proper accounting of their death. Are we entitled to anything less?

I swear under penalty of perjury that my testimony to the Senate Armed Services Subcommittee on Personnel is the truth as I know it to be.

PREPARED STATEMENT BY JAN BEIMDIEK, MOTHER OF HM3 SCOTT MICHAEL

BEIMDIEK, USN

Mr. Chairman and Members of the Subcommittee: On January 2, 1993, my 21year old son, Navy HM3 Scott Michael Beimdiek, stationed in Okinawa, wrote an unusually troubling letter home. The letter concerned his observations as a Hospital Corpsman on assignment December 29, 1992, a few days earlier. Scott's assignment had been to respond to the scene of the death of Air Force Staff Sergeant Brett Presnell, age 30 and father of two sons, whose mother, Ruthanne Presnell, is here with me today.

Because my own son, Scott, was found dead on January 25, 1993, a few weeks after responding to the call, I feel that his letter speaks quite directly to the reason our families are present today.

The letter reads as follows:

"That morning, I was half hour late to run Ortho day because we got a call at 0630 or so that another American was found hanging out in Kinville. was on the second ambulance that was dispatched after the Doctor pronounced the pt. (Before cutting him down) so that Naval Investigative Service could come investigate (get pictures and such). Apparently, this guy had been hanging for over an hour from a balcony outside a night club before we were notified. There are a number of suspicious things that stand out in this amateur investigator's mind that lead me to believe it was not suicide.

a. The guy had a dependents' card and an Air Force Reservists card which means he is probably from Kadena Air Base way south of here-why would he come all the way to Kin to commit suicide?

b. When I said another one-I meant it-I mentioned in a previous letter, I think, the guy that they found strangled in a cord of a speaker that speculation said he might have been stealing and had wrapped the cord around his neck (?) to prevent tripping while running away but somehow fell anyway and strangled (yeah right!) (this makes three).

c. The balcony had a railing on it that the individual would have had to climb over to hang himself but by the shade of his face it looked to me as if he died of strangulation vice broken neck.

d. Where did the rope-exactly the same as the Japanese Police use to set up their police line, come from?

e. Why were the JP so insistent that this was their jurisdiction and already mentioning the possibility of a post mortuary (autopsy).

f. Why was the body cut down without authorization after only one photograph and before the arrival of NIS?

g. How did all the prostitutes in the building across the way identify the victim's vehicle without seeing the victim? (He was covered in a sheet and police lines were set.)

h. Why did the clinic get notified at 0630 if they knew he had been hanging at 0530?

i. HOW did they know he had been hanging since 0530?

There were several other points, but suffice it to say I question the whole viability of the situation."

What my son did not know was that within hours after Brett Presnell's death, his family was advised that it was a suicide. He did not know that over $20,000 in Brett Presnell's "out" money was missing. He did not know that Brett had talked to his mother that day and that he was looking forward to seeing his small sons. He did not know that no knife was found to have cut the rope from which Brett was hanging. He did not know that Brett's neck was not broken from the fall. He did not know that Brett's glasses, wallet, dog tags and driver's license had disappeared. He did not know that Brett had been going with a girl in Okinawa who has since disappeared. Most certainly, my cheerful and inquisitive son had no inkling that less than a month later, he would be next and I would be asking all the same types of questions about the investigation of his death, as he had asked about that of Brett Presnell's.

On January 26, 1993, my family was notified that our son, Scott, had been found dead, hanging in a closet. Less than 2 weeks later, that information was followed in February by information that the death was accidental (self-inflicted) and a result of a sexual misadventure. We were shocked. However, we unequivocally accepted this finding because the United States Navy told us so and we had no reason to question their information.

Since then, the following information has come to us through years of chipping away at a stone wall-the Department of Defense. We have come to know that type B+ blood was found in the closet, to whom it belonged, we are likely never to know. Scott's blood type was AB+. We have come to know that Scott's room key was missing, and we believe someone locked the door from outside, upon exiting the room, with the key. We know that this locked door did what it was supposed to dodelying the finding of Scott's body, which it did, for 4 days. No determination of time of death has ever been made. We know that CID bagged Scott's hands for eventual fingernail scrapings, but that they were never tested by NIS. We know that the buckle of the belt from which he was hanging had caused a cut on Scott's chin which had not bled, because it probably occurred after death. We know that Scott had shin splints and that kneeling was the one thing he could not, nor would not try to do. We know that in numerous aspects, the scene at Scott's death is not typical of the type of activity he is alleged to have been engaging in. We know that statements were taken from individuals who had no idea who Scott was, when individuals who knew him were never asked for statements. We know that no one attempted to retrace his footsteps from the last time anyone remembered seeing him. We know that many of his personal belongings were never returned.

While this list could go on and on, what we know best is that there never was a proper investigation. DOD can call it what it wishes, but we were told by the Navy within days of his death precisely their view of the cause and manner of death, and believe me, whatever transpired then or since then, including the work of the Office of the Inspector General, has in no way resembled a professional investigation. It seems to have been directed at supporting the original determination which was made the moment Scott's body was found.

All of the verbiage from the Department of Defense, to me, to Ruthanne Presnell or to any of the other families-including the language contained in the Section 1185 A Report-is meaningless, because there seems to be no intent to do things differently. They have had an opportunity to at least make an effort, not make excuses. They have had an opportunity to make the deaths of these young men and women count for something in the future and instead, have chosen to develop a policy in the Department of Defense that will create a more impenetrable curtain of silence within which to operate.

I ask you, are we-the families-really the ones who are deluding ourselves? Are we really the ones in denial? We have been patronized and pitied. We have been called "distraught”, paranoid and accused of believing that there is a major conspiracy in our Government. We-the families-have become the subject of scrutiny, the topic of conversation and speculation-when the direction of such scrutiny should go to the investigations into the deaths of our children. Obviously, today, we hope that this simple fact will be recognized and acknowledged.

I have persevered for 3 years, because no one can answer my questions about Scott's death. It is imperative that the record be accurate, as it is the only way that

future generations will know of the life and death of Scott Michael Beimdiek. I will persist in the mission of sending out the message to criminals: "One cannot get by with murder in the military". My persistent effort is to recover Scott's honor and labor for a greater cause those young men and women, who have yet to join the United States Armed Services. Let those in the military know that the dark forces of evil cannot prevail in this country which, I know in my heart, is the land of the free and the home of the brave.

[Additional information is retained in committee files.]

PREPARED STATEMENT BY JERRY AND DONNA BRONKOWSKI, PARENTS OF DAN

BRONKOWSKI

A health assessment was done on Dan after he was transferred to Fort Riley. Even though Dan scored very low, there wasn't any treatment given. Colonel Fitzpatrick informed us that three people should have reviewed the assessment and he should have gotten treatment.

When Dan went AWOL, the MP's informed us that they would wait 30 days and then try to find him. It seems to me that the military should have more concern for their people. There should be an immediate attempt to find a missing soldier. Monday, September 20, 1993. The Riley County Police called Fort Riley Military Police to tell them that they were called to the Westwood Motel, in Manhattan, by the motel manager. He informed them that a boy who looked like a soldier had occupied a room there that was found empty with blood splattered on the bed, floor, and in the bathroom. The Fort Riley MP's made no attempt to investigate the incident even though this was the same day Dan had gone AWOL.

After we were informed that Dan was missing, we called back to see if he had taken his clothes with him since he had told us he might live off base. Captain Thompson, the company commander, informed us that Dan had taken all his clothes with him, except two pairs of fatigues. When we arrived at the base, we were taken to a room and his clothes were STILL there.

There were no blood tests done on any of the blood soaked linens that were found in the motel room. Also, there weren't any fingerprints taken from the articles left in the room. We believe there were others with him in the room because there were three different types of cigarettes there.

After Dan was AWOL for a week, my husband requested that his name be put on the NCIC. The Fort Riley MP's said they would do this. When we called to see if his name was entered, we found that it was never done. Finally, after pleading a third time, it was placed on the list.

After our son's body was found in Kansas City, Major Barrenture told the Kansas City Police not to accept any calls regarding Dan's death other than from the Major himself. We believe this was done to stop publicity.

Our son's body was found hanging deep in the woods. His belt was unbuckled and his fly was open. The papers from his billfold and his empty billfold were in separate pockets.

We don't believe that our son had the knowledge to tie the knot in the rope that was used in the hanging. These are a few of the reasons we feel that our son was a victim of foul play.

Dan's death was ruled a suicide without an investigation. My husband and I believe that the Kansas City Police was told to do so by the Army.

Dr. Alan Hancock and Dr. Bonita Peterson did the autopsy on our son's body. The autopsy was done poorly with a determination of suicide within 48 hours. There was no attempt to analyze body fluids, examine tissue, as well as other examinations that were left out.

There were inconsistencies on the psychological autopsy. We have tried to get the tapes used in the psychological autopsy and the Army has refused to send them.

PREPARED STATEMENT BY SYLVIA GLANDER, MOTHER OF S. SGT. THOMAS L.
BULLINGTON, USAF

My son, S. Sgt. Thomas L. Bullington, was found hanging in the garage of his living quarters at Holloman Air Force Base on May 22, 1988. The Air Force deemed his death a suicide. Thomas's family does not believe Tom committed suicide for the following reasons.

1. Tom's hands were chained behind his back (this is a Masked Art feat and Tom had no training in the Marshall Arts), his feet were on the floor and his legs were

bent like he had been in a sitting position. We were told that his children's pictures were sitting in front of him, but in the death scene photos there are no pictures. 2. When I was taken to talk to the person in charge of the autopsy (Brown is his name), Brown's superior officer took him aside and before I was allowed to talk with him. This was a very suspicious act as though there was something they were hiding.

3. No trace evidence examinations concerning wood, paint, rope fibers and the common origin of the pieces of rope were conducted as requested by Special Agent Darrel D. Slone.

4. Special Agent Darrel D. Slone told me they were only closing the case because he had run out of clues and if I ever received any suspicious telephone calls to let him know.

5. Tom had plans both immediate and long range plans. i.e., he was planning a fishing trip with his son and had even written his son a letter about it; Tom called me on Mother's Day and we made plans for him to come visit me over Memorial weekend; he had made plans with his friends just the night before his death for them to help him move, they even had planned to have a cook out.

6. Tom's co-worker stated that Tom's estranged wife called him everyday at work, but in her statement she said she had only talked to him three times on the phone since Easter.

7. Tom's estranged wife was living with another man. Tom had not had his life insurance changed, his wife was still the beneficiary. Her where abouts and her live in man friend's where abouts were never questioned.

8. Tom's friends and boss have never accepted that Tom took his own life, but in all the interviews, their statements were conducted in a way that would make a person think he was obsessed with the child support that he would have to pay, when in fact his children were very important to him.

Tom was very concerned about the religious aspect of divorce and what damage the divorce would do to his children. This is not a man that would take his own life.

Since Tom's death, his children, one son in particular who has been treated for stress was in the hospital and was refused a weekend pass because of his father's suicide and they were afraid the son would be suicidal too. This stigma is not fair to Tom's children.

Tom was very devoted to the Armed Service, I feel he deserves a better investigation than he got. No rock should go unturned to get to the truth. It is not fair to blame the deceased just because they are not here to defend themselves.

PREPARED STATEMENT BY CHARLES AND ANNETTE CASTO, PARENTS OF LCPL ANTHONY A. CASTO, USMC

Mr. Chairman and Members of the subcommittee reading this report:

WHO WAS Anthony Casto?

Our son was born in Muskogee, OK, 13 Jan 75, grew up in Oklahoma and Texas in a stable, conservative family oriented environment prior to enlistment in the USMC (age 19) in 1993 on a delayed enlistment plan for Mar. 1994. He was active in school, enjoyed sports, band, was an accomplished camper and Eagle Scout, a good student; worked part-time for spending money, a jet ski, motorcycle, and a truck. He was a "doer" and loved action. He had a quiet but outgoing personality and made friends easily and was always involved with whatever activity was going on. After graduation from high school, he attended a local community college before enlistment in the Marine Corps. He wanted to major in criminal justice and planned to use the Montgomery GI Bill with military experience as the cornerstone of his career. The decision to enlist was not made lightly nor without thought and the above rationale discussed with us. He wanted to be the best and selected the Marine Corps after several months of thinking about it. He thought the Marine Corps was the best-and it was for him! After having served for slightly over 1 year he died at the age of 20 years, 2 months, and 20 days. What a tragic waste of a young mans life who had his act together and was doing what he expressly wanted to do.

Our last contact with him was about 9 days before his death-his father talked to him about 30-45 minutes-he was upbeat and in good spirits; he was planning to buy a new truck and pay cash for it when he got back and asked for the weekend new car/truck advertisements to be sent to him-they were, on Monday, and subsequently returned to us after his death <UNOPENED>. He had also just bought and mailed gifts for a niece and nephew. During the time he was in the service, close contact with family and friends was maintained via telephone and letters.