Two U.S. Secret Service officers are under investigation, and another has been removed from President Obama's detail completely, for alleged sexual misconduct.
The allegations stem from a call made from the Hay-Adams hotel in Washington D.C. this past spring, reporting that a Secret Service agent was trying to force himself into a woman's room. That call sparked an internal investigation.
According to the Washington Post:
The disruption at the Hay-Adams in May involved Ignacio Zamora Jr., a senior supervisor who oversaw about two dozen agents in the Secret Service's most elite assignment — the president's security detail. Zamora was allegedly discovered attempting to reenter a woman's room after accidentally leaving behind a bullet from his service weapon. The incident has not been previously reported.
In a follow-up investigation, agency officials also found that Zamora and another supervisor, Timothy Barraclough, had sent sexually suggestive e-mails to a female subordinate, according to those with knowledge of the case. Officials have removed Zamora from his position and moved Barraclough off the detail to a separate part of the division, people familiar with the case said.
Lawyers for Zamora, Barraclough and the female agent declined to comment. Secret Service spokesman Ed Donovan also declined to comment on the allegations.
This isn't the first time the Secret Service has been embroiled in a sex scandal. Just last year, their reputation was marred when 13 agents and officers were implicated after an agent argued with a prostitute over payment during Obama's trip to Cartagena, Columbia.
In March, the president named veteran Secret Service agent Julia Pierson as the agency's first female director in an attempt to change the male-dominated culture of the service.
Here's hoping that makes a difference, because the scandal in the agency this past year has been real.
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