Secret Service Agents Face New Sex Scandal

A new scandal has engulfed the Secret Service amid claims that agents and supervisors have engaged in misconduct in 17 countries in recent years.

It comes 18 months after agents were caught spending nights with prostitutes in Colombia.

The Washington Post has reported accounts given by whistleblowers to a Senate committee that oversees the Secret Service.

Senator Ronald Johnson, on the Homeland Security committee, refused to give details of the allegations.

But the Post said two people briefed on the accounts said they include agents and managers hiring prostitutes and visiting brothels during official trips.

The agents allegedly had extramarital affairs on the road, and had one-night stands or long-term relationships with foreign nationals that were not properly reported, the Post said.

Mr Johnson said the accounts contradict assertions by Secret Service leaders that the agency does not tolerate sexually improper behaviour.

Earlier this week, the Post reported that two Secret Service supervisors assigned to the president's security had sent sexually suggestive emails to a colleague.

One of those disciplined, Ignacio Zamora Jr, also seemingly accidentally left behind a bullet of his service weapon after having drinks with a woman at the bar of a Washington hotel and going to her room.

Mr Johnson said that Mr Zamora had led an internal probe into the Colombia scandal, in which more than a dozen agents drank and caroused with prostitutes ahead of a presidential visit in the city of Cartagena.

Mr Johnson said that letting Mr Zamora investigate Cartagena amounted to "the fox guarding the hen house", the Post reported.

The new allegations do not suggest a breach of President Barack Obama's security, but they are likely to cause embarrassment to an agency still reeling from the Colombia scandal, which led to the dismissal of several agents.

The former Secret Service director, Mark Sullivan, apologised for the scandal and issued rule changes, including barring agents from bringing foreign nationals back to their hotel rooms and requiring that agents not drink alcohol within 10 hours of the start of a shift.

Mr Sullivan retired earlier this year and was replaced by career agent Julia Preston , who became the first woman to head the elite agency.