As many as 12 US Secret Service agents preparing for President Obama’s trip to Cartagena, Colombia, apparently fell short of the service’s motto “Worthy of Trust and Confidence” and were sent back to the US, according to published reports, for excessive drinking and consorting with prostitutes.
According to staff at the Hotel Caribe, Secret Service staff drank heavily in the hotel, where White House staff and members of the press were also staying. A separate report said a prostitute complained to police after one of the agents failed to pay her.


The scandal may be one of the largest for the buttoned-up agency that’s known for its sunglasses-and-earpiece wearing men who protect the president, vice president, other top US officials, and visiting dignitaries. But it comes just two years after about 100 agents dished dirt about their jobs and the people they’ve protected over the years in “In the President’s Secret Service,” former Post reporter Ronald Kessler’s gossipy peek into the Secret Service’s inner workings.