thedrifter
11-29-05, 11:32 AM
December 05, 2005
Telling family first
Next of kin now get first access to report results
By John Hoellwarth
Times staff writer
When Melanie House finally found out the results of the investigation into her husband’s death, it wasn’t from the military. It was from the Los Angeles Times.
The newspaper’s Sept. 29 edition included a story saying pilot error was at fault in the Jan. 26 crash of a CH-53E Super Stallion helicopter in western Iraq, which claimed the lives of 30 Marines and one sailor — House’s husband.
“It’s really, really disheartening because I’ve just been waiting for [the report.] That’s something that’s very important to me, and I really don’t want to read it for the first time in a news article,” she told the Honolulu Advertiser after the article first appeared. “That’s not fair.”
A new Marine Corps policy aims to ensure that doesn’t happen again.
Under the policy, released Nov. 15 Corpswide, the results of a death investigation won’t be released to the public until next of kin has been briefed on the results.
The policy also applies to “any investigation requested by the media and any investigation that may result in local or national media interest,” according to MarAdmin message 540/05.
Previously, reports were released to all concerned parties simultaneously, meaning the releasing authority’s Civil Law section was required to send reports to next of kin, along with media outlets and private citizens who had requested them through the Freedom of Information Act.
In addition to briefing family members first, Corps officials also must advise families that the results will soon be released to the media.
“Under no circumstances” will an investigation report be released to “anyone other than next of kin” before the releasing authority has confirmed that the deceased’s family has been briefed on its findings and warned about looming media interest, according to the message.
“The Corps’ goal is always to ensure that families receive the proper level of support,” said Marine Corps spokeswoman Maj. Gabrielle Chapin. “This means that next of kin must have the opportunity to review the investigation, as well as be advised on when it may be released and who has requested it.”
Concerning results that have already been requested by media organizations, the message directs the releasing authority to coordinate with its public affairs office to make sure family members have been briefed before the articles appear.
The shift in policy and the increased coordination comes just two months after Los Angeles Times reporter Tony Perry broke a story about the results of an investigation into the Jan. 26 helicopter crash.
Investigators said pilot error and a “reduced visibility phenomenon” caused the crash that killed the 31 service members, which is what some or all of the families discovered Sept. 29 in the Los Angeles Times.
Damage control
But family members weren’t the only ones caught off guard by the report’s release.
Corps officials at the time scrambled to conduct damage control, a difficult task considering that not a single Corps spokesman from Washington, D.C., to Kaneohe Bay, Hawaii, knew the report had been released before it hit newsstands. It was the end of the business day at Marine Corps Air Station Miramar, Calif., before the first Marine Corps public affairs officer had the 400-page report in hand, Marine spokesmen said.
Public affairs officers were then forced to answer media queries following the initial story, armed with nothing more than the information in the article.
“I don’t know where he’s getting the information,” one Corps spokesman said at the time. “He’s citing a report I don’t know anything about. I don’t have anything; I don’t know anything.”
Marine spokesmen originally blamed Capt. Joshua Kirk, the FOIA officer at 3rd Marine Aircraft Wing, for releasing the report to the media before next of kin were notified and for leaving PAO out of the loop. Officials at Miramar set the record straight when they learned that Kirk did what he was legally obligated to do.
Kirk’s hands, and those of FOIA officers throughout the Corps, have since been untied by the recent policy message, which was greeted enthusiastically by Miramar officials previously stung by old procedures.
“There was an issue here a few months ago where a media outlet received a copy of an investigation prior to the families being notified about the results of the investigation. The MarAdmin takes good procedures and codifies them into policy to ensure something like that doesn’t happen again,” said 3rd MAW spokesman Maj. Curtis Hill.
“This is the right thing to do in order to continue to take care of our Marine families during times of tragedy.”
Telling family first
Next of kin now get first access to report results
By John Hoellwarth
Times staff writer
When Melanie House finally found out the results of the investigation into her husband’s death, it wasn’t from the military. It was from the Los Angeles Times.
The newspaper’s Sept. 29 edition included a story saying pilot error was at fault in the Jan. 26 crash of a CH-53E Super Stallion helicopter in western Iraq, which claimed the lives of 30 Marines and one sailor — House’s husband.
“It’s really, really disheartening because I’ve just been waiting for [the report.] That’s something that’s very important to me, and I really don’t want to read it for the first time in a news article,” she told the Honolulu Advertiser after the article first appeared. “That’s not fair.”
A new Marine Corps policy aims to ensure that doesn’t happen again.
Under the policy, released Nov. 15 Corpswide, the results of a death investigation won’t be released to the public until next of kin has been briefed on the results.
The policy also applies to “any investigation requested by the media and any investigation that may result in local or national media interest,” according to MarAdmin message 540/05.
Previously, reports were released to all concerned parties simultaneously, meaning the releasing authority’s Civil Law section was required to send reports to next of kin, along with media outlets and private citizens who had requested them through the Freedom of Information Act.
In addition to briefing family members first, Corps officials also must advise families that the results will soon be released to the media.
“Under no circumstances” will an investigation report be released to “anyone other than next of kin” before the releasing authority has confirmed that the deceased’s family has been briefed on its findings and warned about looming media interest, according to the message.
“The Corps’ goal is always to ensure that families receive the proper level of support,” said Marine Corps spokeswoman Maj. Gabrielle Chapin. “This means that next of kin must have the opportunity to review the investigation, as well as be advised on when it may be released and who has requested it.”
Concerning results that have already been requested by media organizations, the message directs the releasing authority to coordinate with its public affairs office to make sure family members have been briefed before the articles appear.
The shift in policy and the increased coordination comes just two months after Los Angeles Times reporter Tony Perry broke a story about the results of an investigation into the Jan. 26 helicopter crash.
Investigators said pilot error and a “reduced visibility phenomenon” caused the crash that killed the 31 service members, which is what some or all of the families discovered Sept. 29 in the Los Angeles Times.
Damage control
But family members weren’t the only ones caught off guard by the report’s release.
Corps officials at the time scrambled to conduct damage control, a difficult task considering that not a single Corps spokesman from Washington, D.C., to Kaneohe Bay, Hawaii, knew the report had been released before it hit newsstands. It was the end of the business day at Marine Corps Air Station Miramar, Calif., before the first Marine Corps public affairs officer had the 400-page report in hand, Marine spokesmen said.
Public affairs officers were then forced to answer media queries following the initial story, armed with nothing more than the information in the article.
“I don’t know where he’s getting the information,” one Corps spokesman said at the time. “He’s citing a report I don’t know anything about. I don’t have anything; I don’t know anything.”
Marine spokesmen originally blamed Capt. Joshua Kirk, the FOIA officer at 3rd Marine Aircraft Wing, for releasing the report to the media before next of kin were notified and for leaving PAO out of the loop. Officials at Miramar set the record straight when they learned that Kirk did what he was legally obligated to do.
Kirk’s hands, and those of FOIA officers throughout the Corps, have since been untied by the recent policy message, which was greeted enthusiastically by Miramar officials previously stung by old procedures.
“There was an issue here a few months ago where a media outlet received a copy of an investigation prior to the families being notified about the results of the investigation. The MarAdmin takes good procedures and codifies them into policy to ensure something like that doesn’t happen again,” said 3rd MAW spokesman Maj. Curtis Hill.
“This is the right thing to do in order to continue to take care of our Marine families during times of tragedy.”