The Worthy Adversary

Category: Child safety

  • A bishop’s “epic fail” is a lesson to all of us: How to report abuse

    St. Louis Archbishop Robert Carlson has a lesson for all of us, and I don’t think it’s the lesson he intended.

    The situation: When asked by victims’ attorney Jeff Anderson in a recent deposition if he knew in the 1984 that child sex abuse was a crime, Carlson responded, “I’m not sure if I did or I didn’t.” The result: he didn’t report. Countless children were put at risk and many others were abused because he couldn’t pick up the phone and call the police.

    Which leads to the following question: Do YOU know how to report suspected or witnessed abuse?

    I am going to go into much greater detail on this subject in my upcoming book, but I feel that it’s necessary to post and repost this information as much as possible.

    First, some assumptions: I consider everyone a mandatory reporter. Child sex abuse is a crime with lasting consequences. There is a victim and an alleged criminal. If you see or suspect abuse, it’s an adult’s civic and moral obligation to report.

    If you are a mandatory reporter in the eyes of the law, your employer should provide you specific training on your reporting procedures. If you have not had that training in the past year, demand that your employer provide it to all mandatory reporters at your work.

    How to report child sexual abuse

    If you are a victim or witness abuse:

    1) If you are a victim of sexual assault, call 911. If it is not an emergency requiring immediate medical care, call your local police department and ask to speak to someone who can take a report of the sexual assault of a(n) child/adult. If you feel that it’s necessary to call 911, do it.

    2) If you see sexual abuse taking place, call 911. Treat the crime like a robbery, car accident or shooting. It’s a crime that needs immediate attention.

    NOTE: Do not rely on your institution (whether it be a church, school, university, community group, or your boss) to do the reporting for you. If you witnessed a shooting, you would call the cops, not your supervisor. Child sex abuse is the same. Plus, we have seen time and time again that institutions (especially churches and universities) are NOT in the abuse investigation business. Internal investigations do not protect victims and do not protect the rights of the accused. 

    If you suspect child sex abuse:

    1) Call the ChildHelpUSA national child abuse reporting hotline at 1-800-4ACHILD. They also have a website that is well worth your review now, before you encounter a situation where you need immediate answers. When you call the hotline, a trained crisis operation will talk to you about what you saw, what you suspect, and the next steps you should take. They will carefully walk you through the entire process.

    2) Call the specific agency in your state that handles the investigation of child sex crimes. You can read a list of them here. I suggest going over them now, before you are in a situation where you need to report.

    3) If you suspect that a child who is not your child is being abused and the parents are not the suspected abusers, talk to the parents. If you think that the parents will not take action and the child is in danger, call ChildHelpUSA. They will help you assess your suspicions and alert you of the next steps you should take.

    NOTE: You are not an investigator and you do not need to have “proof” of the abuse to report. That is the job of the police. Report your suspicions and let law enforcement do its job.

    Some red flags:

    1) Your employer says that you should report suspected abuse to them before calling the police or ChildHelp. (Think of it this way – if there was a shooting going on, you would call 911 without getting your supervisor on the phone, right?)

    2) If an employer or institution says that they “need to investigate this internally” before calling ChildHelp, the police, or social services.

    My take? Report anyway.

    And if you’re scared or reticent of “making a mistake” by reporting:

    Organizations like ChildHelp were founded to help people correctly report crimes. They also can tell a concerned adult when there is no crime to report.

    Now what?

    Most of us will never be in a situation where we need to report. But we will encounter people who need our help. Learn what sexual behaviors in children are healthy and which ones need direct attention. Learn the signs of abuse. Learn the signs of sexual grooming.

    Most importantly: Talk to your kids. Chances are they will listen.

  • Carlson plays the memory card … and loses

    Yesterday, attorneys for victims of child sexual abuse in Minnesota and Missouri released a recent sworn deposition of St. Louis Archbishop Robert Carlson. In the deposition, which can be read here and viewed in excerpts below, Carlson states 193 times that he “does not remember” various incidents regarding the sexual abuse of children.

     


    But one particular statement stuck out.

    From the Huffington Post:

    (Attorney for victims Jeff) Anderson went on to ask Carlson whether he knew in 1984, when he was an auxiliary bishop in the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis, that it was crime for a priest to engage in sex with a child.

    “I’m not sure if I did or didn’t,” Carlson said.

    Archbishop Carlson: taking "selective memory" to new heights
    Archbishop Carlson: taking “selective memory” to new heights

    So I did a little research into priests in Minnesota who were arrested for sexual abuse in the 1980s. As auxillary bishop of the archdiocese, Carlson would have intimate knowledge of the activities in his own and neighboring dioceses.

    I found some interesting material:

    1979 – St. Cloud priest Fr. Raoul Gauthier is charged with sexual assault on a 37-year-old developmentally disabled man. He fled the country before he could be tried.

    1980 – Duluth Diocese priest Dennis Puhl is convicted of 4th degree sexual assault of a 15-year-old boy. He was sentenced to 21 months, but a judge stayed the conviction. Puhl instead served five years probation on the condition he receive treatment in a church-run facility.

    1982 – Fr. Gilbert Gustafson of the St. Paul and Minneapolis Archdiocese pleads guilty to the sexual abuse of a boy. He serves 4 1/2 months in jail. Although convicted, he was not removed from the ministry until 2002, but still can be found doing leadership training for nuns in the state.

    1984 – In the Crookson diocese in the northern part of the state, Fr. Richard Boyd is convicted of the possession of child pornography. He is allowed to remain a priest until 2003. He claims that “innuendo and gossip” about his conviction have made it hard for him to be an effective minister.

    1987 – Fr. Michael J. Stevens of the St. Paul and Minneapolis Archdiocese pleads guilty to “sexual misconduct with a minor.” Like Gustafson, Stevens is allowed to remain in the priesthood until 2002.

    1989 – Fr. William Nicholas Garding of the St. Cloud Diocese pleads guilty to third-degree sexual assault of a minor and is given a stayed sentence of ten years. He eventually serves six months in jail

    Carlson knew full well that child sex abuse was a crime. He simply didn’t care.

     

  • Vetting and the board of the Vatican Bank

    Last week, Pope Francis sacked his entire Vatican “watchdog” board, replacing them with an international “who’s who” list of financial reform and investigation gurus.

    One of the names on the list surprised me: Juan Zarate. Zarate shot to prominence as the member of George Bush’s Treasury Department. He was a tenacious investigator who went after America’s enemies and other global terrorists where it hurt the most: their bank accounts. But that’s not the surprising part.

    The surprising part is this: Juan Zarate was a year behind me at Mater Dei High School in Orange County, California. The Vatican probably knew that, since Mater Dei gave Juan its “Ring of Honor” award in 2002. But did the Vatican vet Mater Dei?

    I didn’t know Juan very well in high school. But I did know this: he was an all-around awesome guy. He was friendly, outgoing, nice to everyone, smart and funny. In a school where it was very easy to fall into “cliques,” everyone seemed to know and like Juan. In fact, as he became more and more successful, everyone rooted for him. There was not a better, more hard-working or nicer guy out there. He has deserved every accolade he has received.

    But the high school he attended was a very dark place.

    Juan Zarate
    Juan Zarate

    Juan was a 1989 grad of Mater Dei, a school rife with priests and teachers who were molesting students with the tacit approval of school administrators. The principal during his first two years was notorious offender Msgr. Michael Harris, who has been credibly accused of sexual abuse by approximately 30 boys. Harris was well-known for inviting high school boys to his home to watch movies, swim, and dabble in his private upstairs wet bar.

    Victims—most of whom were classmates of Juan’s older siblings—began to come forward in the mid-90s, after at least one committed suicide. Church lawyers, who knew that Harris had molested the boys, forced these victims to be deposed for days, intimidated the boys, and did little to nothing to stop the cleric. Harris was finally removed from the priesthood in 1994, when he refused to obey Bishop McFarland’s orders to stay away from Santa Margarita High School events. In 2001, former Santa Margarita student Ryan DiMaria won a large civil suit against the Diocese of Orange and Harris, and by 2003, nine more boys had come forward.

    But that’s just the beginning of Mater Dei’s problems during Juan’s tenure … and before his time there … and after his graduation. Other credibly accused, arrested, or admitted abusers include track coach C.R. Richardson, Dean of Students Bernie Balsis, Vice Principal John Merino—all three sued by former students in 2003. There was Fr. Jerome Hanson, who was sent to Mater Dei after he was caught in a cemetery sexually abusing a boy. There was my perpetrator Thomas Hodgman, substitute priest Gus Krumm, basketball coach Jeff Andrade, and choral director Larry Stukenholtz. There was former Bishop G. Patrick Ziemann and priest Fr. Bertand Horvath … and who knows who else?

    Then, there are the enablers: administrators like Lucretia Dominguez, John Weling, and Greg Dhuyvetter, who knew about abuse and did nothing (all of whom are still employed in Catholic schools or administrative positions). Or folks like basketball coach Gary McKnight, who allowed an abuser back on campus with no punishment whatsoever. Then there is the current administration, who—for the past 20 or so years—allowed people like Andrade, Stukenholtz, and their protectors to escape jail.

    I wonder if the Vatican knows that.

    I realize that Juan is tasked with financial oversight. But in his case, terrorism was very close to home. Hopefully, he will remember his classmates who were hurt so terribly and use his position to shine sunlight on very dark and secret crimes that may be hidden in the Vatican accounts.

     

     

  • When a child is abused … by another child

    I have written on this subject before. But today’s story out of Sacramento is more tragic and upsetting.

    The mother of an eight-year-old sodomy victim has filed a lawsuit against the mobile home park where the crime happened in 2013. She charges that the management of Sacramento’s Park Royal Estates Mobile Home Park knew that a 15-year-old boy was raping and terrorizing resident children in key-access, monitored, and “secured” areas of the park. But instead of calling the cops and reporting their suspicions, staffers kept quiet.

    Fortunately, the boy immediately reported to his mother, who called the police. The 15-year-old is now in jail. He has allegedly raped at least one other child in the park.

    Why wouldn’t park staffers report what they knew or suspected? Maybe it was fear of the 15-year-old. Maybe it was fear of his parents. Perhaps staffers feared that parents would pick up their children and move out of the park if they knew what was happening. Maybe they just though it was “child’s play.” Whatever the rationale, it was wrong. It’s a cover-up as tragic as the clergy sex abuse crisis … especially since, like clerics who offend and are moved around, juveniles who offend get a “free pass” and no help to actually stop the behavior.

    But I am not here to talk about the legal aspects of this case. For this discussion, legal liability is irrelevant. I want to talk about the teen who abused.

    The sexual abuse of a child is horrific enough, but when the abuser is a minor, the consequences are far more tragic than what most people realize.

    Crimes by juveniles are some of the least likely to be reported, no matter how violent or traumatic they are to the victim.

    Why?

    • Parents of the perpetrator are likely to minimize the severity of the crime or deny the crime,
    • The perpetrator is likely the victim of a crime and/or suffering from extreme mental illness with no access to care,
    • The victim and the perpetrator are peers, in a sense. The terror of the abuse infiltrates a child’s social circles and peer groups,
    • The perpetrator is more likely to come from a violent home or the “system,” where intervention is difficult,
    • Parents of the victim are less likely to believe that a child can commit such a horrible crime,
    • Many adults believe that a child can easily fight off another child,
    • The crimes are often wrongly attributed to children’s sexual exploration or “child’s play,”
    • Other adults tend to romanticize their own childhoods, and can find it difficult to realize the severity of the abuse.

    So now, we have a victim who is totally terrorized, alienated from his/her peers, afraid to report, or not believed.

    But let’s say that the child DOES report, as in this case. Then we have a whole new tragedy.

    • The juvenile justice system is not equipped to treat sex offending children—mostly because society barely understands the problem,
    • The perpetrator receives little, if any, therapeutic help for his/her criminal behavior or the mental illness that caused the behavior,
    • If the juvenile is convicted, his/her record is sealed and his/her name does not appear on any registries,
    • If the minor offends again as a minor or an adult, it is difficult—if not impossible—for the victim to get access to the perpetrator’s history.

    I have worked with dozens of victims who have been abused by older siblings, baby sitters, camp counselors, neighborhood kids or teens at church of school. Their story is the same: they are more disenfranchised than many other victims of abuse. As they grow into adulthood, they find it difficult to get help or to reach out to friends and family, who simply can’t understand the severity of the crime.

    So now what do we do?

    • Talk to your kids about bullies and other children who threaten, hurt or terrorize other children,
    • Keep your eye out—does your child try to hide from other children out of fear, or does he make excuses to stay inside when he used to love to be with other kids?
    • Never push your child to play with kids that your child fears,
    • Listen to your child when they talk about the social dynamics of their peer group,
    • Don’t assume that girls are incapable of abuse,
    • Watch you child at play. Sometimes, abuse can happen right under your nose.

    Most importantly: report when you suspect a crime. The ChildHelp hotline is staffed 24/7 with crisis counselors and offers “crisis intervention, information, literature, and referrals to thousands of emergency, social service, and support resources. All calls are anonymous and confidential.” 

     

     

  • Friday Round-up: Aldana, Adrian, Arizona, and the AG

    It’s been an interesting week:

    Ricardo “Richard” Aldana is goin’ to the pokey

    Former JSerra High School teacher Richard Aldana was convicted on three felony counts of lewd acts upon a child. The victim was a 14-year-old student. Aldana faces up to eight years in jail.

    JSerra is an independent (not owned by the Diocese of Orange) Catholic High School in San Juan Capistrano, CA.

    Aldana: Convicted of lewd acts with 14-year-old, faces up to 8 years
    Aldana: Convicted of lewd acts with 14-year-old, faces up to 8 years

    When allegations against Aldana became public in 2011, students rallied around the former Spanish teacher, wearing “Free Aldana” t-shirts, setting up a Facebook page demanding school officials reinstate him, and harassing the victim.

    They disguised themselves as supporters, but were instead uninformed, attack mobs trying to silence victims. Fortunately, the police aren’t intimidated by a bunch of affluent high school punks.

    Which leads us to our next story:

    Adrian, Michigan: Taking victim harassment to a whole new level

    My May 15 post about admitted child sex offender Thomas Hodgman went viral. The post was viewed more than 10,000 times, shared on almost 1700 Facebook pages, and generated 82 comments.

    And the comments were nasty. Fortunately, with a huge public court win, tons of public documents and the truth on my side, the commenters did little more than show the sad, reckless and dangerous state of higher education in Michigan.

    But here’s what’s telling: Aldana was convicted of lewd acts with a 14-year-old. I fought for 15 years to expose the truth about a teacher who abused me starting when I was 15—just one year older than Aldana’s victim. When I got the truth I needed, Hodgman was out of the state with little hope of extradition. There is also a big question about whether the criminal statute of limitations in my case is still valid. But according to commenters defending Hodgman, I should have known better and need to let a “good educator” get on with his life.

    Sorry folks, but “good educators” don’t commit lewd acts with students. They should go to jail, especially when they admit to the crimes.

    Arizona: Where parishioners have (rightfully!) had enough

    Parishioners at St. Thomas the Apostle Parish and School in Phoenix have had enough. Their founding pastor was credibly accused of abuse. Another former pastor is in the process of being defrocked by the Vatican. A third priest assigned there was sentenced to 10 years in jail in 1992 for abusing minors.

    Now, we learn that a group of parents has presented a list of demands to the Diocese of Phoenix. Their number-one request: the immediate removal of current pastor, Fr. John Ehrich. They say that he has sexually harassed parishioners and acted inappropriately with children. Ehrich has since quit and the diocese refuses to make a comment, saying it’s “an internal matter.”

    Internal, indeed. Good for the parishioners. They deserve far better.

    The AG: Silence can kill, and not just in the auto industry

    My friend and colleague Mark Crawford has an op-ed in the May 24 New Jersey Star Ledger. In it, he calls on AG Eric Holder to “to vigorously investigate the actions of religious and charitable institutions for their criminal attempts to conceal and minimize dangerous predators — actions that included the sexual abuse of children in this country.”

    Because, he says, if the Department of Justice can investigate the possible criminal activity by automaker GM when it comes to faulty ignition switches, they can certainly investigate religious and charitable institutions (including colleges and universities) for the cover-up of child sexual abuse.

    I agree. Investigate them, punish them, revoke federal funding, and tax the lot of them. Need a sample case so that the Catholic Church won’t say they are being “unfairly targeted?” I got one for you: Adrian College.