Recruiting Abuses Mount as Army Tries to Meet Goals
Jared Guinther is 18. Tall and lanky, he will
graduate from high school in June. Girls think he's cute, until they
try to talk to him and he stammers or just stands there -- silent.
Diagnosed with autism at age 3, Jared is polite but won't talk to
people unless they address him first. It's hard for him to make
friends. He lives in his own private world.
Jared didn't know there was a war raging in Iraq until his parents told
him last fall -- shortly after a military recruiter stopped him outside
a Portland strip mall and complimented his black Converse All-Stars.
"When Jared first started talking about joining the Army, I thought,
`Well, that isn't going to happen,"' said Paul Guinther, Jared's
father. "I told my wife not to worry about it. They're not going to
take anybody in the service who's autistic."
But they did. Last month, Jared came home with papers showing that he
had not only enlisted, but signed up for the Army's most dangerous job:
cavalry scout. He is scheduled to leave for basic training Aug. 16.
Officials are now investigating whether recruiters at the U.S. Army
Recruiting Station in southeast Portland improperly concealed Jared's
disability, which should have made him ineligible for service.
What happened to Jared is a growing national problem as the military
faces increasing pressure to hit recruiting targets during an unpopular
war. Tracking by the Pentagon shows that complaints about recruiting
improprieties are on pace to again reach record highs set in 2003 and
2004. Both the active Army and Reserve missed recruiting targets last
year, and reports of recruiting abuses continue from across the country.
A family in Ohio reported that its mentally ill son was signed up,
despite rules banning such enlistments and the fact that records about
his illness were readily available.
In Houston, a recruiter warned a potential enlistee that if he backed out of a meeting he'd be arrested.
And in Colorado, a high school student working undercover told
recruiters he'd dropped out and had a drug problem. The recruiter told
the boy to fake a diploma and buy a product to help him beat a drug
test.
Violations such as these forced the Army to halt recruiting for a day
last May so recruiters could be retrained and reminded of the job's
ethical requirements.
The Portland Army Recruiting Battalion Headquarters opened its
investigation into Jared's case last week after his parents called The
Oregonian and the newspaper began asking questions about his enlistment.
Maj. Curt Steinagel, commander of the Military Entrance Processing
Station in Portland, said the papers filled out by Jared's recruiters
contained no indication of his disability. Steinagel acknowledged that
the current climate is tough on recruiters.
"I can't speak for Army," he said, "but it's no secret that recruiters
stretch and bend the rules because of all the pressure they're under.
The problem exists, and we all know it exists."
Military rules prohibit enlisting anyone with a mental disorder that
interferes with school or employment, unless a recruit can show he or
she hasn't required special academic or job accommodations for 12
months.
Jared has been in special education classes since preschool. Through a
special program for disabled workers, he has a part-time job scrubbing
toilets and dumping trash.
Jared scored 43 out of 99 on the Army's basic entrance exam -- 31 is
lowest grade the Army allows for enlistment, military officials said.
After learning Jared had cleared this first hurdle toward enlistment,
Brenda said she called and asked for Ansley's supervisor and got Sgt.
Alejandro Velasco.
She said she begged Velasco to review Jared's medical and school
records. Brenda said Velasco declined, asserting that he didn't need
any paperwork. Under military rules, recruiters are required to gather
all available information about a recruit and fill out a medical
screening form.
"He was real cocky and he says, `Well, Jared's an 18-year-old man. He doesn't need his mommy to make his decisions for him."'
When they asked Jared how long he would be in the Army, he said he
didn't know. His enlistment papers show it's just over four years.
Jared also was disappointed to learn that he wouldn't be paid the
$4,000 signing bonus until after basic training.
During a recent family gathering, a relative asked Jared what he would
do if an enemy was shooting at him. Jared ran to his video game
console, killed a digital Xbox soldier and announced, "See! I can do
it!"
"My concern is that if he got into a combat situation he really
couldn't take someone's back," said Mary Lou Perry, 51, longtime friend
of the Guinthers. "He wouldn't really know a dangerous thing. This job
they have him doing, it's like send him in and if he doesn't get blown
up, it's safe for the rest of us."
Steinagel, the processing station commander, told The Oregonian that
Jared showed up after passing his written exam. None of his paperwork
indicated that he was autistic, but if it had, Jared almost certainly
would have been disqualified, he said.
On Tuesday, a reporter visited the U.S. Army Recruiting Station at the
Eastport Plaza Shopping Center, where Velasco said he had not been told
about Jared's autism.
"Cpl. Ansley is Guinther's recruiter," he said. "I was unaware of any type of autism or anything like that."
Velasco initially denied knowing Jared, but later said he'd spent a lot
of time mentoring him because Jared was going to become a cavalry
scout. The job entails "engaging the enemy with anti-armor weapons and
scout vehicles," according to an Army recruiting Web site.
After he'd spoken for a few moments, Velasco suddenly grabbed the
reporter's tape recorder and tried to tear out the tape, stopping only
after the reporter threatened to call the police.
The Guinthers said that on Tuesday evening, Cpl. Ansley showed up at
their door. They said Ansley stated that he would probably lose his job
and face dishonorable discharge unless they could stop the newspaper's
story.
Ansley, reached at his recruiting office Thursday, declined to comment for this story. S. Douglas Smith, spokesman for the U.S. Army Recruiting Command, in
Fort Knox, Ky., said he could not comment on specifics of the
investigation in Portland. But he defended the 8,200 recruiters working
for the active Army and Army Reserve.
Last year, the Army relieved 44 recruiters from duty and admonished 369.
Jared Guinther is 18. Tall and lanky, he will
graduate from high school in June. Girls think he's cute, until they
try to talk to him and he stammers or just stands there -- silent.
