Air Force Colonel Eugene Caughey, charged with rape, found dead at home

DENVER - The Air Force says a high-ranking officer who was charged with rape​ has been found dead in his off-base Colorado home.

Colorado Springs police Sgt. Tim Stanke says officers responded to a report of a suicide when they found the body of Col. Eugene Caughey on Sunday. Stanke says police are awaiting autopsy results.

The 46-year-old Caughey had been vice commander of the 50th Space Wing at Schriever Air Force Base outside Colorado Springs. The unit operates key military satellite systems.

Caughey was charged with adultery, indecent filming or photography, dereliction of duty and conduct unbecoming an officer.

Caughey is accused of raping a woman at Schriever Air Force Base, also in Colorado, in late 2014 or early 2015 while “holding her against the wall and floor using physical strength or violence,” court documents stated.  

Prosecutors also accused him of photographing his exposed genitals while in uniform and groping women twice.

His court-martial was scheduled for Oct. 17.

The Colorado Springs Gazette reports he was an up-and-coming space officer whose responsibilities had included running a 22-nation missile defense wargame in 2014 for U.S. Strategic Command.

He is a survivor of the Sept. 11 terror attack on the Pentagon, according to a story on the Schriever Air Force Base website.

“I was a captain inside the Pentagon that morning when a plane crashed into the west side of the building,” Caughey wrote on the website.