Female Soldier in Army Trial Tells of 8 Rapes
ABERDEEN PROVING GROUND, Md. — A 23-year-old soldier testified Wednesday that her drill sergeant repeatedly summoned her and raped her eight times in four months, controlling her as if she were a puppet on a string.
The woman, testifying at the court-martial of Staff Sgt. Delmar Simpson, said she did not report him out of “pride and embarrassment.”
The trial is the first to emerge from a sex scandal at Aberdeen that prompted a militarywide investigation of sexual misconduct.
Of the 12 Aberdeen soldiers charged with criminal sexual misconduct, Simpson, 32, is accused of the most serious offenses. He is charged with raping six women under his command.
The Army specialist who testified Wednesday was a trainee from September through December 1995, the time she said the alleged rapes took place.
“I felt like I was a puppet and I had strings attached to me in a marionette way telling me what I should do,” she said.
Simpson could get life in prison for a single rape conviction.
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