Letter to Bob Goodlatte, Chairman of the House Judiciary Committee and John Conyers, Jr., Ranking Member of the House Judiciary Committee - Sexual Assaults on Commercial Airline Flights

Letter

Dear Chairman Goodlatte and Ranking Member Conyers:

We write to you regarding recent media reports about sexual assaults that have taken place during commercial airline flights. The issue was discussed at the Transportation and Infrastructure Committee's April 9, 2014 markup of H.R. 4156. Two Members of the Committee have introduced legislation to address this issue. In March 2014, Delegate Eleanor Homes Norton (D-DC) introduced H.R. 4295, the "Protecting Airline Passengers from Sexual Assaults Act of 2014", which directs the Administrator of the Federal Aviation Administration to establish a program to collect and maintain data on the number of sexual assaults that occur on domestic air passenger flights. In April, Representative Eric A. Crawford (R-AR) introduced H.R. 4404, the "Sexual Assault Reporting on Aircraft Act of 2014", which directs the Attorney General to acquire data, for each calendar year, about sexual offenses, including rape, that occur aboard passenger aircraft.

We believe that sexual assault is a serious crime, and therefore data collected regarding sexual assaults on passenger aircraft is best collected by the Department of Justice, as opposed to the Department of Transportation. Given that the Department of Justice is not within the jurisdiction of the Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure, we request that the Committee on the Judiciary provide prompt review and consideration of H.R. 4404, the "Sexual Assault Reporting on Aircraft Act of 2014".

Thank you for your consideration.