Okay, thank you. My time has expired mr. Chairman, i just would like to pursue which at some point fiscal issue of trading because i think it has great bearing on what is allowed to happen. Thank you, mr. Chairman. Now recognize that children from north carolina, mr. Meadows, for five minutes. Thank you, mr. Chairman. Ms. Leonhart, youve been with dea for how many years . Thirtyfive. Thirtyfive years and as i understand it about five years in your current position . Since 2010. So you take this very seriously being part of Law Enforcement. I enjoy great relationship with Law Enforcement back home. And in the standards of which they take the standards that are violated by some within our ranks really paint a very bad picture for the rest to serve diligently, would you agree with that . Yes. These are, you know a few compared to the 4600 agents that work for dea. We are very proud of our agency ended its is hard. And it should hit you hard it sounds like you know you keep saying youre ap
Any agency. She doesnt have the right to fire people. Unless you change that law and get these people the ability to fire people sa merically when they were found in you know, a proper process and a speedy process to violate whether its sexual assault, sexual harass m, youll have this all these problems continue across the scope of all of our Civil Service systems. The only one exempt is fbi. Well get that on the record as some point i hope. Yield back. Recognize the Ranking Member mr. Lynch the gentleman from massachusetts, whos the ranking me. Thank you mr. Chairman. I want to thank the Ranking Member for allowing me to go in his place. How do you hold people accountable if you are not able to discipline them . The system in place, its the three tooered system. The inspectors who youre not answering me question. Briefly, how do you hold people accountable when you cannot discipline them when they do like okay, so, we got 15 to 20 sex parties. 15 to 20. Weve got all these allegations.
During this period . Part of the problem here and the frustration, i think, of the committee is that its taken so long because you had no policy to go up the chain of command. And so you can tell me, well this was 2003 and 2004, but i tell you if i was there, id want to know exactly what happened then so id make sure it wasnt happening now. One part of the investigation was to go through and audit and do just that. From that period . From that period . Yeah. To look at the books from that period of time. We understand, again, from one of these cooperating witnesses, he could obtain, this is a quote, prostitutes for agents from the dea bogota office. This is what the cooperating witness said. He would pay the girls to come to the parties, then the agents would pay the girls directly for any sex they wanted. He recalled getting prostitutes for at least 15 to 20 parties. Werent the dea agents in colombia there to crack down on the agents who were on the cartels who were given funds to pay
To see what happened back in 20002003 in columbia, to see what happened in 2009 with the agent in bogota, fantasy cartagena and then to see cartagena. This is our opportunity to make sure that this culture there is no doubt that employees know that this is unacceptable and see what will happen to them. That is why firing the three employees, agents after cartagena sets the tone for what happens from here on. Mr. Meadows it might if it wasnt reinforced in other ways. You keep coming back to cartagena. It may be the only time that there have been people that have actually been disciplined for Improper Conduct would you agree . You keep running back to this as a good example, but yet your directive didnt come out until two years after that event. You were bragging about your directive that you sent out did that go out in 2014 . Ms. Leonhart yes. Mr. Meadows so why, if you were concerned about the culture, would instnt it have gone out immediately or is it that the press has started to rep