In 1999, former Lincoln Police Department investigator Kathryn Bolkovac signed with DynCorp Aerospace, a British subsidiary of U.S.-based DynCorp International, to work as a human-rights investigator in Bosnia and Herzegovina. DynCorp held a $15 million UN-related contract to recruit and train police officers there. Bolkovac reported that fellow DynCorp personnel were paying for prostitutes, raping underage girls, and participating in sex trafficking. Her allegations implicated an accountability gap: UN contractors had immunity from prosecution in Bosnia, while local participants could be prosecuted.
After Bolkovac raised the allegations, DynCorp dismissed her and claimed she had falsified time sheets. In July 2001 she filed an unfair-dismissal action in Great Britain; on August 2, 2002, a tribunal unanimously ruled in her favor. Madeleine Rees, then the regional head of office for the UN human-rights commissioner, testified on Bolkovac’s behalf. In November 2002, an employment tribunal ordered DynCorp to pay £110,221 in damages. Some implicated officers reportedly resigned or left Bosnia, but the U.S. government continued its contract with DynCorp. The case later became the subject of the 2010 film The Whistleblower and a 2011 nonfiction book, keeping contractor oversight and sexual exploitation in peacekeeping operations under scrutiny.
