To Profit-Driven Contractors: All Rape Cases Must Go Before the Law, Period

Posted by Sady Doyle, Comment Is Free at 1:30 PM on October 16, 2009.

Say, here's a concept: if you act to keep violent criminals out of jail, you are probably not working in your country's best interests, and shouldn't be called upon to defend it. It's a notion that was passed into law recently, with U.S. senator Al Franken's amendment to the defense appropriations bill stating that military contractors which prohibit their employees from taking rape and sexual assault cases to court would not receive funding or contracts from the U.S. government.

The impetus for the bill -- and the resistance against it -- sheds light on how rape can be excused or minimized and how the interests of corporations can take priority over human life.

In Baghdad in 2005, Jamie Leigh Jones claims, she was gang-raped by her colleagues at KBR, a former subsidiary of Halliburton. Her injuries, including torn pectoral muscles, tearing of her vagina and anus and ruptured breast implants, were confirmed by a physician, who said they were consistent with rape. He then handed the rape kit over to her employer, KBR. And KBR, according to Jones, locked her in a storage container, posted an armed guard outside of her door and denied her food and water.

The rape kit given to KBR disappeared, not to be seen again until 2007. When it resurfaced, it was missing doctors' notes and photographs -- which, along with the fact that Jones was drugged and could identify only one of her assailants, effectively annihilated her chances in a criminal case. KBR also denied her the right to take them even to a civil court, saying that what had been done to her was a mere "personal injury in the workplace," and could -- according to her contract -- be resolved only by arbitration.

Mandatory arbitration is common corporate practice. It protects corporations by channeling claims into a private system that can be kept confidential, is prohibitively expensive, and often works in favor of the corporations. It saves money. It was that -- money -- which KBR acted to protect. KBR isn't pro-rape, it's pro-profit. Mandatory arbitration allowed it to weigh the bruised and bleeding body of a woman and the sacredness of the law against its own revenue.

KBR has arranged, in the interests of profit, a working environment wherein its employees are beyond the reach of the law if they commit crimes, and unable to rely on the law if they are victimized. And, unsurprisingly, when employees can get away with crimes, they commit them.

Jones says that no fewer than 11 women have come to her to report similar assaults. It's exceedingly unlikely that KBR (or the other defense contractors for whom these women may have worked) could be less aware than Jones of the other assaults committed by their employees. In fact, if Jones's account is to be believed, KBR worked with disturbing efficiency to remove Jones as a threat and scare her into silence.

Now, thanks to Franken's amendment, If Halliburton and KBR continue to maintain policies that require arbitration in the case of violent crimes and discrimination, they will lose their government contracts. But that requires the people who are hurt or discriminated against to report the crimes in the first place.

Consider: Jones only got out of that storage container because she was able to get a mobile phone from a guard and called her father. KBR recently banned employee use of mobile phones.

Just corporate policy, of course. Just business.

Tagged as: rape, halliburton, al franken, kbr, jamie leigh jones