Agents with the US Drug Enforcement Administration stationed overseas held “sex parties” with prostitutes that were paid for by drug cartels, according to a bombshell internal report issued by the justice department on Thursday. The parties were held in residences leased by the US government, the report said.  The sex parties were only one example of sexual misconduct or “high-risk sexual behavior” by federal law enforcement officers documented in the report, which was the result of an investigation launched after a 2012 scandal in which DEA agents in Colombia, were found to have procured women for US secret service agents in advance of a visit by President Obama.  The behavior of agents in some cases resulted in “possible significant security risks,” according to the report, issued by the office of the inspector general. The study also found “repeated incidents of sexual harassment and other misconduct” that had been improperly reported and resulted in minimal or no disciplinary action.  Alleged misconduct documented in the report included sexting, “romantic activity in an inappropriate location”, “improper sexual association with confidential sources”, “misuse of government vehicles to facilitate inappropriate relationships,” training instructors having consensual sex with students and “an inappropriate relationship with the common law spouse of a fugitive”.  The report studied incidents from 2008 to 2012 in the four law enforcement agencies attached to the justice department: the DEA, the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) and the US Marshals service.  In one incident, a high-ranking ATF employee “solicited consensual sex with anonymous partners and modified a hotel room door to facilitate sexual play”, the report found. The employee “admitted he had engaged in such conduct before”, it said.  A separate incident involved a deputy US Marshal (DUSM) on assignment overseas. “While in Thailand, one of the DUSMs was unavailable and, each time US State Department officials attempted to contact him, two women with heavy foreign accents answered the phone and stated the DUSM could not be disturbed,” the report said.  A State Department investigator later contacted one of the women and confirmed she worked as a prostitute, the inspector general said.  The report found proportionately fewer incidents of workplace sexual harassment, although the investigators did document “unwanted sexual advances” and instances of a “hostile working environment” inside the FBI and other agencies.  “We were particularly troubled by the multiple allegations” of drug-funded sex parties held by DEA agents in an undisclosed foreign country, the inspector general said. The parties occurred “over a period of several years”, the report said, and came to light based on a tip from local police officers.  “The foreign officers further alleged that in addition to soliciting prostitutes, three DEA [supervisory special agents] in particular were provided money, expensive gifts, and weapons from drug cartel members,” the report said.  Seven agents admitted attending parties with women who worked as prostitutes. The agents received punishments ranging from a two-day suspension to a 10-day suspension.  The investigators said they had been stonewalled by all the law enforcement agencies under examination, but especially by the FBI.  “The FBI initially stated they were unwilling to provide the [office of the inspector general] with information regarding such misconduct allegations until the [office of inspector general] formally initiated the review,” the report said.  It added in a footnote: “This refusal was puzzling to us, given that the OIG is an organization within the [Justice] Department.”
DEA agents overseas engaged in multiple instances of ‘high-risk sexual behavior’ and were involved in ‘repeated incidents of sexual harassment’, report finds