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New rules for recruiters using networking sites

The Corps will soon roll out new rules allowing recruiters to use social networking Web sites to correspond with recruits, but will define what the Marines’ pages look like and allow commands to monitor their online activities.

Effective by the end of February, officials said, the new policy arrives just months after two male Marine recruiters were charged with having sexual relationships with underage females they met on the job in high schools. In both cases, authorities said the Marines used MySpace.com to arrange meetings with the teens.

“It’s not going to be the Wild Wild West, where everyone can do their own thing,” said Maj. Chris Devine, spokesman for Marine Corps Recruiting Command. “We want them to develop a difference between their own personal sites and their professional sites so they can do their duties as a Marine recruiter.”

The new rules aren’t aimed specifically at preventing inappropriate relationships or the use of social networking sites on the job, Devine said. Instead, it will give recruiters access to the sites on MCRC computers for the first time, but require them to use official Marine recruiter profiles with an approved template rather than profiles they have set up on their own.

Previously, MCRC had blocked access to social networking sites on its computer network, Devine said, leading many recruiters to use laptops not connected to the MCRC network to reach poolees and check profiles of possible recruits.

The goal is to create uniformity and more online communities where poolees can visit and invite friends, Devine said.

“It allows the poolees to get a lot more information about what the Marine Corps is and how they can become a part of it,” Devine said. “That’s a good management tool for our recruiting [noncommissioned officers in charge] to manage their pool online and to promote the Marine Corps.”

The new profiles also will allow recruiting officials at the national, district and individual recruiting station level to monitor online activity, improving the possibility of catching recruiters who act inappropriately.

In December, former Sgt. Victor Sanchez-Millan, 24, was sentenced to one year in prison and five years probation after pleading no contest to two felony counts of sexual intercourse with a minor and two misdemeanor counts of contributing to the delinquency of a minor.

He was working as a recruiter at a substation in Roseville, Calif., when he was arrested in August and accused of having a two-month long sexual relationship with a 17-year-old girl whom he met on the job at a high school job fair, police said. Sanchez-Millan was 23 at the time. The Sacramento Bee reported in August that the teen’s father learned of the relationship and turned in a stack of MySpace messages between Sanchez-Millan and his daughter.

Also in December, former Sgt. Arthur Pledger Jr., 27, was charged in Louisville, Ky., with two counts of third-degree rape for allegedly having sex twice with a 15-year-old girl, according to a spokeswoman for the Louisville police department. At that time Sanchez-Millan’s case was already national news.

According to court documents, Pledger allegedly met the teen while working at a high school and later began corresponding with her using his personal MySpace account. He arranged two meetings with the girl, picking her up once at a friend’s house and another time in a church parking lot, according to court documents.

Pledger pleaded not guilty Dec. 15. The Corps discharged him the same day.