Arlington National Cemetery mismanagement controversy

The Arlington National Cemetery mismanagement controversy is an ongoing investigation by the United States Department of Defense

United States Department of Defense

The United States Department of Defense is the U.S...

into mismanagement, poor record-keeping, and other issues involving the burial and identification of U.S. servicemembers' graves at Arlington National Cemetery

Arlington National Cemetery

Arlington National Cemetery in Arlington County, Virginia, is a military cemetery in the United States of America, established during the American Civil War on the grounds of Arlington House, formerly the estate of the family of Confederate general Robert E. Lee's wife Mary Anna Lee, a great...

in Arlington, Virginia. Questions were raised in 2008, and the scandal peaked in the spring of 2010.

Background

Arlington National Cemetery is a military cemetery

United States National Cemetery

"United States National Cemetery" is a designation for 146 nationally important cemeteries in the United States. A National Cemetery is generally a military cemetery containing the graves of U.S. military personnel, veterans and their spouses but not exclusively so...

in the United States established during the American Civil War

American Civil War

The American Civil War was a civil war fought in the United States of America. In response to the election of Abraham Lincoln as President of the United States, 11 southern slave states declared their secession from the United States and formed the Confederate States of America ; the other 25...

on the grounds of Arlington House

Arlington House, The Robert E. Lee Memorial

Arlington House, The Robert E. Lee Memorial, formerly named the Custis-Lee Mansion, is a Greek revival style mansion located in Arlington, Virginia, USA that was once the home of Confederate General Robert E. Lee. It overlooks the Potomac River, directly across from the National Mall in Washington,...

. Veterans and military casualties from each of the nation's wars are interred in the cemetery, ranging from the Civil War through to the military actions in Afghanistan

War in Afghanistan (2001–present)

The War in Afghanistan began on October 7, 2001, as the armed forces of the United States of America, the United Kingdom, Australia, and the Afghan United Front launched Operation Enduring Freedom...

and Iraq. More than 300,000 people are buried at Arlington National Cemetery, including veterans, their dependents, other casualties of war, several American presidents

President of the United States

The President of the United States of America is the head of state and head of government of the United States. The president leads the executive branch of the federal government and is the commander-in-chief of the United States Armed Forces....

, famous sports legends, and various other dignitaries. About 125 burials occurred at Arlington each week in 2010.

Allegations of mismanagement at Arlington Cemetery were first raised in 2008. The widow of a United States Army

United States Army

The United States Army is the main branch of the United States Armed Forces responsible for land-based military operations. It is the largest and oldest established branch of the U.S. military, and is one of seven U.S. uniformed services...

soldier complained that the wrong headstone was on her husband's grave. A Pentagon

United States Department of Defense

The United States Department of Defense is the U.S...

investigation found that two servicemen had been buried in the same grave. Cemetery workers had also buried the cremated

Cremation

Cremation is the process of reducing bodies to basic chemical compounds such as gasses and bone fragments. This is accomplished through high-temperature burning, vaporization and oxidation....

remains of a servicemember in a grave which was already in use, but unmarked. The cremation error was discovered in May 2008 and the remains buried in an unused grave. However, Arlington National Cemetery officials may not have followed proper procedures in notifying the servicemember's next of kin about the reburial.

In November 2009, having learned of the cremated individual's reburial, United States Secretary of the Army

United States Secretary of the Army

The Secretary of the Army is a civilian official within the Department of Defense of the United States of America with statutory responsibility for all matters relating to the United States Army: manpower, personnel, reserve affairs, installations, environmental issues, weapons systems and...

John M. McHugh

John Michael McHugh is the 21st United States Secretary of the Army and a former Republican politician from the state of New York, formerly representing the state's 23rd congressional district in the United States House of Representatives.On June 2, 2009, President Barack Obama nominated him to...

ordered an investigation by the Inspector General of the Army. An article on Salon.com

Salon.com

Salon.com, part of Salon Media Group , often just called Salon, is an online liberal magazine, with content updated each weekday. Salon was founded by David Talbot and launched on November 20, 1995. It was the internet's first online-only commercial publication. The magazine focuses on U.S...

on July 16, 2009, began a year-long series of articles about problems at Arlington, which may have also prompted McHugh's actions.

A later Washington Post investigation found that the cemetery's administration had been subject to numerous US Army investigations over 20 years, but were unable to resolved recurring concerns with the management of the cemetery. One source of the problems appears to have been that overall oversight of the cemetery was shared by too many authorities, including the Military District of Washington, the assistant secretary of the Army for civil works, the assistant secretary of the Army for manpower and reserve affairs, and the cemetery superintendent.

In one case in 2004, the cemetery's budget director, Mr. Smith, questioned the contracts related to digitizing burial records. He warned an official from the Office of Management and Budget, which temporarily halted spending on the contract. Soon after, Smith said he was harrassed by his superiors and eventually suspended for three days without pay. Smith successfully appealed the suspension through his employees' union and retired with full benefits in 2007.

Media access controversy and termination

Until 2005, the cemetery's administration gave free access, with the family's permission, to the media to cover funerals at the cemetery. According to the Washington Post, over the past several years the cemetery has gradually imposed increasing restrictions on media coverage of funerals.

After protesting the new restrictions on media representatives, Gina Gray, the cemetery's new public affairs director, was demoted and then fired on June 27, 2008, after only three months in the job. Days after Gray began working for the cemetery and soon after she had spoken to the media about the new restrictions, her supervisor, Phyllis White, began requiring Gray to notify White whenever she "left the building." On June 9, White changed Gray's title from Public Affairs Director to "Public Affairs Officer." A few days later, when Gray took sick leave, White disconnected Gray's email BlackBerry

BlackBerry

BlackBerry is a line of mobile email and smartphone devices developed and designed by Canadian company Research In Motion since 1999.BlackBerry devices are smartphones, designed to function as personal digital assistants, portable media players, internet browsers, gaming devices, and much more...

. In the termination memo, White stated that Gray had, "been disrespectful to me as your supervisor and failed to act in an inappropriate (sic) manner." Thurman Higginbotham, deputy director of the cemetery stated that Gray's release from employment, "had nothing -- absolutely nothing to do with -- with media issues."

Secretary of the Army

United States Secretary of the Army

Pete Geren

Preston M. "Pete" Geren, III served as the 20th United States Secretary of the Army from July 16, 2007 to September 16, 2009...

, asked his staff to look into Gray's dismissal. Said Gray in response, "I am definitely encouraged by any investigation into the mismanagement at Arlington Cemetery." In July 2009 Gray filed suit against the US Army under the Freedom of Information Act

Freedom of Information Act (United States)

The Freedom of Information Act is a federal freedom of information law that allows for the full or partial disclosure of previously unreleased information and documents controlled by the United States government. The Act defines agency records subject to disclosure, outlines mandatory disclosure...

, stating that the US Army had refused to publicly release its findings from the probe into Gray's dismissal. In the suit, Gray claims that the probe found that Higginbotham had lied to federal investigators and that someone had illegally accessed Gray's government email account and sent an email in her name. The investigation reportedly had found that when the email was accessed from a cemetery office computer, only two employees, Higginbotham and a contractor, were present in the building.

Controversy

On June 10, 2010, a Department of Defense inspector general's report revealed that cemetery officials had placed the wrong headstones on tombs, buried coffins in shallow graves, and buried bodies on top of one another. According to the Associated Press

Associated Press

The Associated Press is an American news agency. The AP is a cooperative owned by its contributing newspapers, radio and television stations in the United States, which both contribute stories to the AP and use material written by its staff journalists...

, "[Army officials] said in some cases a grave marker was not placed soon enough after burial or records were not kept updated, resulting in uncertainty later about the identities of the deceased at some grave sites." In another case, laborers digging in what they thought was an empty grave discovered a coffin already there, and in another four burial urn

Urn

An urn is a vase, ordinarily covered, that usually has a narrowed neck above a footed pedestal. "Knife urns" placed on pedestals flanking a dining-room sideboard were an English innovation for high-style dining rooms of the late 1760s...

s had been unearthed and dumped in a landfill

Landfill

A landfill site , is a site for the disposal of waste materials by burial and is the oldest form of waste treatment...

. Defense Department spokespersons said they were uncertain how many graves might be affected, as records were so sloppily maintained. A CBS News

CBS News

CBS News is the news division of American television and radio network CBS. The current chairman is Jeff Fager who is also the executive producer of 60 Minutes, while the current president of CBS News is David Rhodes. CBS News' flagship program is the CBS Evening News, hosted by the network's main...

report said that as many as 200 graves might be affected. Army officials said that the mismanagement of graves and burials had gone on "for years".

The inspector general's report also accused cemetery officials of lying under oath and engaging in sexual harassment

Sexual harassment

Sexual harassment, is intimidation, bullying or coercion of a sexual nature, or the unwelcome or inappropriate promise of rewards in exchange for sexual favors. In some contexts or circumstances, sexual harassment is illegal. It includes a range of behavior from seemingly mild transgressions and...

. Deputy cemetery superintendent Thurman Higgenbotham was accused of illegally hacking into a cemetery employee's personnel files. An Army Criminal Investigative Command investigation (completed in May 2009) concluded Higginbotham had also lied to investigators about accessing the employee's files. A report which investigated whether Higginbotham had fired a whistleblower

Whistleblower

A whistleblower is a person who tells the public or someone in authority about alleged dishonest or illegal activities occurring in a government department, a public or private organization, or a company...

has not yet been released. The report said cemetery officials were also negligent in continuing to use a paper filing system instead of a computerized database to keep track of cemetery operations. A new burial management system was to have been installed which would have "triple verified" burial records, but implementation of the system had lagged significantly.

The same day, Army Secretary McHugh relieved Arlington National Cemetery's superintendent, John C. Metzler, Jr.

John C. Metzler, Jr.

John C. Metzler, Jr. , is an American civil servant who was Superintendent of Arlington National Cemetery in Arlington, Virginia, from 1991 to 2010. He achieved notoriety in the press at the end of his tenure due to the Arlington National Cemetery mismanagement controversy.-Early life:John C....

, of his position but requested that he continue to oversee cemetery burials and other operations until his planned retirement on July 2, 2010. Higginbotham was placed on administrative leave. (Earlier press reports indicated McHugh would fire both men.) Metzler, who had served for 19 years as cemetery superintendent, admitted some mistakes had been made but denied allegations of widespread or serious mismanagement. Metzler and Higginbotham subsequently retired with full benefits. A reprimand given to Metzler was removed from his personnel file once his retirement became effective.

McHugh also announced the creation of a new post, the Executive Director of the Army National Cemeteries Program, to implement the recommendations of the inspector general's report. Kathryn Condon, previously the most senior civilian in the U.S. Army Materiel Command

United States Army Materiel Command

The U.S. Army Materiel Command is the primary provider of materiel to the United States Army.The Command's mission includes the research & development of weapons systems as well as maintenance and parts distribution....

, was appointed to the position. Metzler was ordered to report directly to the new Executive Director, and a United States Department of Veterans Affairs

United States Department of Veterans Affairs

The United States Department of Veterans Affairs is a government-run military veteran benefit system with Cabinet-level status. It is the United States government’s second largest department, after the United States Department of Defense...

staff person assigned to assist him. McHugh also established a new Army National Cemeteries Advisory Commission to review Arlington National Cemetery's policies and procedures and provide additional recommendations. Former U.S. Senators

United States Senate

The United States Senate is the upper house of the bicameral legislature of the United States, and together with the United States House of Representatives comprises the United States Congress. The composition and powers of the Senate are established in Article One of the U.S. Constitution. Each...

Max Cleland

Joseph Maxwell Cleland is an American politician from Georgia. Cleland, a Democrat, is a disabled US Army veteran of the Vietnam War, a recipient of the Silver Star and the Bronze Star for valorous action in combat, and a former U.S. Senator...

and Bob Dole

Bob Dole

Robert Joseph "Bob" Dole is an American attorney and politician. Dole represented Kansas in the United States Senate from 1969 to 1996, was Gerald Ford's Vice Presidential running mate in the 1976 presidential election, and was Senate Majority Leader from 1985 to 1987 and in 1995 and 1996...

agreed to co-chair the commission. Patrick K. Hallinan, Director of the Office of Field Programs for the Department of Veterans Affairs, was named the Acting Superintendent of Arlington National Cemetery, effective upon Metzler's retirement. In June 2011, James Gemmell, former director of the Fort Snelling National Cemetery

Fort Snelling National Cemetery

Fort Snelling National Cemetery is a United States National Cemetery located in the city of Minneapolis in Hennepin County, Minnesota. It encompasses , and as of April 24, 2007 had 172,001 interments.- History :...

, was appointed as the cemetery's deputy superintendent.

On June 16, 2010, the Washington Post notified the cemetery's new superintendent, Patrick K. Hallinan, that the newspaper's staff had found discarded headstones, most still bearing names, in a stream adjacent to Section 28 of the cemetery. Arlington officials are investigating and stated that they do not know why the headstones were there. U.S. Army officials said they would begin inspecting some graves using ground-penetrating radar

Ground-penetrating radar

Ground-penetrating radar is a geophysical method that uses radar pulses to image the subsurface. This nondestructive method uses electromagnetic radiation in the microwave band of the radio spectrum, and detects the reflected signals from subsurface structures...

. Mary Bliss of Washington, D.C.

Washington, D.C.

Washington, D.C., formally the District of Columbia and commonly referred to as Washington, "the District", or simply D.C., is the capital of the United States. On July 16, 1790, the United States Congress approved the creation of a permanent national capital as permitted by the U.S. Constitution....

, whose son is buried at Arlington, was quoted as saying that the cemetery's problems "are a disgrace to the nation. I can't fathom how this could happen in this country."

Ongoing issues

Since the close of its investigation, the US Army has operated a call center to answer questions or concerns from family members of internees at the cemetery. Other workers are struggling, as of July 2010, according to the Washington Post, with reorganizing and untangling the cemetery's "antiquated" records system.

A Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs (SHSGA) subcommittee on contracting oversight is currently investigating contract issues related to a failed attempt to digitize the cemetery's grave management and remains cataloging system. According to the Washington Post, the subcommittee had found that the cemetery paid $5 million in government funds to contractors over 10 years for work on the system that was not completed and with which little progress was made. The contracts were reportedly managed by Higginbotham. Upon being notified that he was being called to testify before the committee, Higginbotham immediately submitted retirement papers, dated retroactively to July 2, 2010.

On July 27, 2010 SHSGA released documents criticizing the oversight of the cemetery by Army senior managers. The managers named included Claudia Tornblom, deputy assistant secretary of the Army for civil works, Edward M. Harrington, the Army's deputy assistant secretary for procurement, and Major General Richard Rowe, former commander of the Military District of Washington.

On July 29, 2010 Metzler testified before the SHSGA and took responsibility for much of the problems at the cemetery, but also assigned some blame to staff and budget cutbacks. Higginbotham declined to answer questions from the committee, citing the 5th Amendment, and was dismissed from the proceeding. SHSGA member Claire McCaskill

Claire McCaskill

Claire Conner McCaskill is the senior United States Senator from Missouri and a member of the Democratic Party. She defeated Republican incumbent Jim Talent in the 2006 U.S. Senate election, by a margin of 49.6% to 47.3%. She is the first woman elected to the U.S. Senate from Missouri in her own...

stated that up to 6,600 gravesites at the cemetery could be mislabeled or improperly marked.

In September 2010, the Army found two bodies buried in the wrong plots. The Army plans to check more plots.

In December 2010 the Army announced that it had launched a criminal investigation into the misplacement of remains at the cemetery. The investigation was initiated after the discovery in October 2010 of eight urns containing remains in a single grave marked "unknown." Some of the urns in the grave may have been previously discovered in other parts of the cemetery. The Army announced in March 2011 that three of the sets of remains in the urns could not be identified. In June 2011, it was revealed that the Federal Bureau of Investigation

Federal Bureau of Investigation

The Federal Bureau of Investigation is an agency of the United States Department of Justice that serves as both a federal criminal investigative body and an internal intelligence agency . The FBI has investigative jurisdiction over violations of more than 200 categories of federal crime...

had been asked to assist in the investigation into burial of the urns as well as into allegations of contract fraud at the cemetery.

On 16 December 2010 the US House passed a bill, previously approved by the US Senate, requiring the Army to provide Congress with an accounting of all 320,000 graves at the cemetery. The bill also requires a report on contracts issued to digitize the cemetery's records and a study on whether the cemetery's administration should be transferred to the Department of Veterans Affairs. The purpose of the bill was to formally establish congressional oversight into correcting the problems identified at the cemetery.

On 31 January 2011, the Northern Virginia Technology Council released the report of its three-month investigation into record keeping at the cemetery. The report concluded that, "Antiquated paper record-keeping and lack of oversight led to the mishandling of dozens of remains at the nation's most important military burial ground" and recommended that "the cemetery must digitize its records, improve its scheduling system and establish a rigorous chain of custody for remains as they move from funeral homes to burial."

In June 2011, 69 boxes of copied burial records which contained names, dates of birth, and social security numbers of deceased interred at Arlington were discovered in a private storage facility in northern Virginia. Army officials stated that the storage unit was rented by an employee of a contract company the cemetery had hired to digitize its burial records. The officials refused to identify the company or the employee.

Beginning in June 2011, the US Army assigned members of the 3rd US Infantry Regiment (The Old Guard)

3rd US Infantry Regiment (The Old Guard)

The 3rd United States Infantry Regiment is a regiment of the US Army. It currently has three active battalions, and is readily identified by its nickname, The Old Guard, as well as Escort to the President. The regimental motto is Noli Me Tangere...

to photograph every single grave marker in the cemetery. The cemetery plans to upload the images to a database and cross-check the information recorded with each one against paper records. The database will then be made publicly accessible.

In a status report given in September 2011, the US Army stated that progress was being made in reconciling burial records and in modernizing the cemetery's administration. One improvement was the implementation of a telephone voice-messaging system. Officials could not explain why the cemetery had not previously had a voice messaging or voice mail system.

External links

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