Three U.S. senators say the military justice system's "cloak of secrecy" needs to be lifted and records from sex crimes cases involving service members should be made readily accessible.
In a letter sent Tuesday to Defense Secretary Ashton Carter, Democrats Barbara Boxer of California, Kirsten Gillibrand of New York and Mazie Hirono of Hawaii cited an Associated Press investigation that found more inmates are in military prisons for sex crimes against children than for any other offense. Yet the public knows little about these cases.
The senators say the lack of transparency in military legal proceedings "calls into question the integrity of the institution and hides the system's shortcomings."
They urged Carter to make military trial records accessible through the same online filing system employed by civilian courts.
