White House
Secret Service agents reportedly told to protect home of
former director's assistant
May 23, 2012: U.S. Secret Service Director
Mark Sullivan testifies on Capitol Hill in Washington. (AP Photo/Charles
Dharapak)
Members
of a top Secret Service unit responsible for patrolling the perimeter of the
White House were reportedly pulled off their posts for several weeks in the
summer of 2011 and ordered to protect the home of the assistant to the agency's
then-director.
The
Washington Post, citing three people familiar with the operation, reported late
Saturday that the agents were sent to a rural area outside La Plata, Md. in
what was known as Operation Moonlight. The paper said that agents were told
that they were there because then-Secret Service director Mark Sullivan was
concerned that his assistant, Lisa Chopey, was being harassed by her neighbor
after an altercation.
Operation
Moonlight consisted of sending two agents from the so-called Prowler
surveillance team to monitor Chopey's home in the morning and evening. The
paper reported that the trips began on June 30 of that year and continued
through July before slowly tapering off in August.
In
addition to their work patrolling the mansion, members of the Prowler team also
monitor the southern side of the executive mansion whenever crowds gather to
watch the president and first family travel via motorcade or helicopter.
Agents
inside the Washington field office were concerned that the diversion of agents increased
security risks to the compound and the president, two people familiar with the
discussion told the newspaper. A spokesman for the agency told the Post that
the agents involved were not part of the president's protective detail and
therefore the operation had no impact on it.
Sullivan
left the Secret Service in 2013 nearly a year after a scandal involving members
of the presidential protection team hiring prostitutes ahead of a trip by
President Barack Obama to Colombia in 2012. In a statement to the Post,
Sullivan said a supervisor in his office authorized the visits to the
assistant's home without his knowledge, that they lasted only a few days and
that they were appropriate given the report of threats to an employee.
Two
agents put on Operation Moonlight thought the reassignment was a potentially
illegal use of government resources and were concerned enough about their own
liability that they kept records of their involvement and their superiors'
instructions, the Post reported. Some informed the inspector general for the
Homeland Security Department about the operation, the newspaper said.
White
House spokesman Jay Carney said the White House was not aware of the
allegations involving the president's protection and referred questions to the
Secret Service, according to the Post.
Secret
Service spokesman Ed Donovan confirmed to the paper that agents were pulled off
their White House duty to check on the safety of the director's assistant.
However, he disputed accounts that Operation Moonlight lasted for months,
saying agency records indicated that the assignment took place for only a few
days over the Fourth of July weekend.
Donovan
said the operation was part of the agency's standard response to potential
threats to an employee.
The
Associated Press contributed to this report
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