From ICE

Human trafficking fugitive on ICE's top 10 list extradited to US from Mexico

Fugitive faces criminal charges in Eastern District of New York

NEW YORK — One of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement's (ICE) top 10 most wanted human traffickers was extradited from Mexico Tuesday to face criminal charges in the Eastern District of New York.

Paulino Ramirez-Granados, who had been on ICE's most wanted list since 2010, was arrested March 31 in Tenancingo, Mexico, following a joint investigation between ICE's Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) Mexico City, HSI New York and the Mexican Federal Police.

Ramirez-Granados was charged in the Eastern District of New York on Aug. 5, 2011 with sex trafficking, alien smuggling, money laundering and conspiracy to import aliens for immoral purposes. He is currently in Bureau of Prisons' custody and will be arraigned today in the Eastern District of New York before United States Magistrate Judge Ramon E. Reyes. The charges in the indictment are merely allegations, and the defendant is presumed innocent unless and until proven guilty.

“This extradition brings us one step closer to justice,” said ICE Director Sarah R. Saldaña. “I commend the Mexican government, the Eastern District of New York and the men and women of ICE who worked tirelessly to ensure this day would come.”

“This case is the latest chapter in this Office's multi-year effort to dismantle the Granados sex trafficking organization, a brutal group that promised their victims a better life and instead forced them into a life of sexual servitude through heinous acts of violence,” stated United States Attorney Robert L. Capers. “With our dedicated partners at Homeland Security Investigations and with the assistance of the Mexican authorities, we were able to locate this fugitive defendant and bring him to the United States to face charges. With this important development, we are one step closer to closure for the brave victims of the defendant's crimes.” U.S. Attorney Capers also expressed his thanks to HSI and the Mexican government for their assistance with the extradition and prosecution.

As set forth in extradition affidavits, between October 1998 and June 2011, members of the Granados sex trafficking organization, including Ramirez-Granados and others, illegally smuggled young women into the United States, where they were forced to work as prostitutes in New York City and elsewhere in the United States. The organization collected profits from the victims' activities. When victims refused to work or resisted, members of the organization beat and sexually assaulted the victims, and threatened the victims' family members in Mexico, including the victims' children.

HSI special agents identified and rescued over 20 additional victims – all Mexican nationals – and arrested over a dozen additional traffickers or smugglers, all members or associates of the Granados family. Several victims were sexually assaulted by their traffickers, while others were physically assaulted. All the victims said the traffickers threatened to harm their family members.

To date, 13 members of the Granados organization have been indicted in the Eastern District of New York on sex trafficking charges. Twelve have been arrested, and one – Raul Granados-Rendon – remains a fugitive.

Anyone with information about the whereabouts of Granados Rendon should immediately contact the local ICE office or call the national hotline at 1-866-DHS-2-ICE (866-347-2423) as soon as possible. From outside the U.S. and Canada, callers should dial 802-872-6199. Tips can also be submitted online at www.ICE.gov/tips.

http://www.ice.gov/news/releases/human-trafficking-fugitive-ices-top-10-list-extradited-us-mexico

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From the FBI

Operation Northern Spotlight

American-Canadian Partnership Combats Human Trafficking

The FBI joined law enforcement officials from across Canada in Toronto yesterday to announce the results of Operation Northern Spotlight, a human trafficking investigation that led to the recovery of 20 sexually exploited juveniles and the arrests of numerous individuals.

The Canadian operation—carried out by 40 police agencies and hundreds of law enforcement officers—was conducted as a parallel action with the FBI's Operation Cross Country, the results of which were announced earlier this month.

“Human trafficking investigations are complex and labor intensive, but entirely necessary,” said Scott Tod, deputy commissioner of the Ontario Provincial Police (OPP). He noted that human trafficking victims are often from susceptible populations, including immigrants, migrant workers, and at-risk youth. “And human trafficking victims rarely identify themselves to authorities,” he said.

“Human trafficking is a very serious criminal threat that often targets the most vulnerable—our children,” added Joseph Campbell, assistant director of the FBI's Criminal Investigative Division. The collaboration between U.S. and Canadian law enforcement to fight trafficking, he explained, is essential.

Operation Cross Country is part of the FBI's Innocence Lost National Initiative. Since its creation in 2003, the Innocence Lost program has resulted in the identification and recovery of approximately 4,800 sexually exploited children. And prosecutors have obtained more than 2,000 convictions of pimps and others associated with these trafficking crimes.

During last year's Operation Cross Country, Campbell said, “I met with our Canadian law enforcement partners, and we agreed that this mission was so critical and important that it should be a unified effort between our two countries.”

That collaboration resulted in parallel enforcement actions that took place across the U.S. and Canada in early October, with both countries sharing intelligence and best practices to run successful operations that led to the recovery of child victims from truck stops, hotels, clubs, and casinos. The Canadian effort led to charges against 47 individuals and the recovery of victims who were mostly under the age of 19—some as young as 14.

Yesterday's press conference in Toronto included law enforcement personnel from OPP, the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, Ottawa Police Service, and numerous other Canadian law enforcement agencies. Also on hand were representatives from a child advocacy center and a recovered victim of the sex trade who now advocates on behalf of those who are trafficked and sexually exploited.

“It is vitally important that we continue to mobilize to raise awareness about human trafficking and to enhance public safety at the community level,” Tod said.

Campbell agreed. “Operation Cross Country and Operation Northern Spotlight are so important because they maximize the impact in combating the threat and they draw attention to this serious problem. I am proud to stand here today with my Canadian partners.”

https://www.fbi.gov/news/stories/2015/october/operation-northern-spotlight/operation-northern-spotlight

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From the Department of Homeland Security

Combating Human Trafficking: The Blue Campaign's Efforts in North Dakota

The Department of Homeland Security, through the unified voice of the Blue Campaign, is committed to fighting the heinous crime of human trafficking. The unfortunate reality is that human trafficking occurs here in the United States and – as our public service announcement depicts – it is hidden in plain sight. After I learned about the growing human trafficking problem in North Dakota, particularly in the oil-rich Bakken region following the oil boom, I traveled to Fargo, Dickinson, New Town, and Bismarck to gain a better understanding of the situation on the ground. While there earlier this month, I engaged with federal, state, local, tribal, non-profit, and private sector stakeholders and explored meaningful ways to work together to raise awareness and fight human trafficking in this region. At Blue Campaign we believe that only through the sum of our collective efforts will we succeed in combating this terrible crime.

The Blue Campaign brings together the Department's diverse resources and capabilities and coordinates closely with the whole community to provide training, promote public awareness, and equip the American public to recognize and report any suspected human trafficking.

Embracing a victim-centered approach to combating human trafficking is a key facet of the Department's efforts to combat human trafficking. On Tuesday, October 6 th , I met with local partners providing vital services at the YouthWorks Shelter and the YWCA Cass Clay Shelter in Fargo. From them we learned about the robust local efforts to protect vulnerable youth and support victims of crimes, as well as other at-risk populations.

On October 7 th , I visited Dickinson, where I met with local stakeholders for a roundtable discussion that brought together the diverse perspectives of local law enforcement officers, city officials, victim advocates, and even a survivor of human trafficking. I heard first-hand accounts of the challenges the city of Dickinson is facing from human trafficking, and returned with a deeper understanding of the problem and how Blue Campaign can support local efforts through public awareness resources and training.

On October 8 th , I met with local advocacy groups and tribal partners from the Mandan, Hidatsa, and Arikara Nation to hear their stories and discuss the critical importance of victim-assistance efforts – particularly in tribal communities. Blue Campaign looks forward to a continued engagement with tribal partners to jointly deliver timely and effective public awareness resources to Native American communities.

On Friday, October 9 th , I hosted a roundtable discussion in Bismarck. There, I met with educators, city and law enforcement leaders, and local stakeholders to discuss special vulnerabilities of youth in local schools, as well as training resources available to educators, school resource officers, and law enforcement. Later that afternoon, I joined Senator Heidi Heitkamp to visit the YouthWorks shelter in Bismarck, where we learned about local human trafficking victims, the challenges service providers face in serving such a diverse population of victims, and how the Blue Campaign can best support their efforts.

The Blue Campaign is expanding our work in the public health sector through a new partnership with the North Dakota Public Health Association. This partnership will specifically promote the Blue Campaign's training and awareness materials throughout North Dakota's healthcare facilities.

North Dakota Public Health Association Executive Director Maylynn Warne spoke of the importance of our new partnership, saying “The goal is to get the materials into local hospitals and work with tribal communities where there's a disproportionate amount of members who are a part of the human trafficking ring in North Dakota. There's a large number of American Indian women affected so we want to be able to reach out to those communities and offer resources.”

Working with our range of invaluable partners – like Senator Heitkamp in North Dakota – the Blue Campaign will continue to spread awareness of human trafficking in order to assist victims and bring their traffickers to justice.

There is much more to be done to combat human trafficking, not just in North Dakota, but in cities and communities across the nation. We can't do this alone. I encourage you to visit www.dhs.gov/bluecampaign to learn more and see how you can get involved.

http://www.dhs.gov/blog/2015/10/23/combating-human-trafficking-blue-campaign%E2%80%99s-efforts-north-dakota

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Indiana

Anderson might avoid Indiana registry

by Virginia Black -- South Bend Tribune

Zachery Anderson, here with his parents, Lester and Amanda, this summer in Elkhart, might find his legal battle at an end after Indiana authorities apparently agree he should not be listed on that state's sex offender registry. Anderson was 19 when he met a 14-year-old Niles girl online and had sex with her in December. She admitted to telling the young man she was 17, but a judge sentenced him to jail, five years on probation and 25 years on Michigan's sex offender registry — which also landed him on Indiana's registry. A more lenient re-sentence last week begged the question of whether he would still be on Indiana's list. SBT File Photo

Indiana authorities seem to agree Zachery Anderson — the young Elkhart man whose sex case involving a then-14-year-old Niles girl who admitted lying about her age has drawn a national outcry — does not deserve to remain on this state's sex offender registry.

Anderson won a more lenient sentence from a second Berrien County judge last week, one that left him with two years of probation and keeps him off Michigan's sex offender registry. His original sentence last spring included five years on probation and 25 years on Michigan's registry. That, in turn, landed him on Indiana's registry for life.

After last week's re-sentencing, the question lingered as to whether Anderson would remain on Indiana's list, and early indications were that he would.

That apparently changed Friday, when defense attorney Scott Grabel said he received word from a staff attorney for Indiana's probation committee, who reviewed Grabel's legal arguments and Indiana's law on interstate compacts. She wrote in an email that she agrees with Grabel, and the Elkhart County probation staff will be notified. Anderson does not meet with local probation officials until Thursday.

Meanwhile, Zach Anderson filed a request with the Elkhart County sheriff's department Thursday, asking to be removed from that county's sex offender site. Although the family received no official response, they found his name missing there as of Friday afternoon.

"We even checked this morning to make sure it wasn't an error," Zach's father, Lester, chuckled Saturday.

Lansing attorney Grabel sat Saturday he is impressed by how quickly Indiana authorities have responded.

"I don't think they're going to put him on (the registry)," he said. "I am extremely, cautiously optimistic. I think this will be the last big hurdle."

Grabel is still angry about how Berrien County Prosecutor Michael Sepic tried to discount a polygraph and psychological report during Monday's re-sentencing hearing before Judge Angela Pasula, and what he considered Sepic's unfair characterization of his client's actions.

What those reports showed was that Zach, who was 19 at the time, "in his heart and in his mind, he thought he was engaging in relations with a 17-year-old," Grabel said. Sepic "tried to distort that, and that was wrong."

Sepic declined further comment after the sentencing Monday.

Meanwhile, Les Anderson said his family is still interested in campaigning against sex offender registry laws nationwide, after hearing similar horror stories from all over the country. He agrees with calls to make underage teens who deceive others about their age also accountable somehow.

"It's just unbelievable, the mountain to climb on this issue," he said. "As soon as you say 'sex,' that crime is magnified beyond anything else."

But mostly, relying on their faith and their renewed closeness as a family, the Andersons seek a return to normalcy.

"We just feel relieved," Les Anderson said, "and we want to move on with life."

http://www.southbendtribune.com/news/publicsafety/anderson-might-avoid-indiana-registry/article_108c2d93-7fcd-5ef0-a5db-1dde9197d4dd.html

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Programs help ministers establish 'boundaries'

by Allan Turner

The preacher knew that cheating on his wife was wrong. He prayed for strength, but the flesh is weak. Years passed; infidelities festered. When his lovers complained to church officials, the cleric lost his marriage - and his pulpit.

Today, in halting words, the one-time Houston-area minister tries to explain.

"This is not an excuse in any form," he says, "but, you know, the ministry can be a uniquely stressful occupation. Clergy are vulnerable to weakness like many humans are, even with their sense of calling and their best intentions."

The fallen clergyman is not alone.

While tales of sexual misconduct by men and women of God often focus on the Catholic church - one study found 4,392 American priests were targeted by accusations between 1950 and 2002 - Protestants are not immune to temptation.

Responding to the problem, Houston leaders of two mainstream denominations - the United Methodist and Evangelical Lutheran churches - this week will host sexual ethics training for hundreds of metro-area pastors.

In both cases, the sessions are part of ongoing educational efforts to alert ministers to the dangers of potentially career-ending, church-rattling and, in some cases, criminally prosecutable actions ranging from an inappropriate embrace to the sexual abuse of children.

Lutherans, said Michael Rinehart, bishop of the 112-congregation Gulf Coast Synod, have "zero tolerance" for sexual misconduct by clergy or church officials. "Fortunately," he says, "it doesn't happen very often."

In his eight years as bishop, Rinehart has headed four investigations - three involving male clergy and adult women, one involving pornography.

"In every case," Rinehart says, "the pastors no longer are serving as pastors."

Continual problem

Nationally, the United Methodist church, the largest American mainstream Protestant denomination, investigates 140 to 500 cases of clergy sexual misconduct annually, according to a 2010 report. More than three-fourths of Methodist clergy - men and women - and half of laywomen report suffering sexual harassment in the church.

"Our whole covenantal promise is that everyone is valued," said the Rev. Gail Smith, director of the 676-church UMC Texas Annual Conference's center for clergy excellence and an organizer of this week's training. "If you're not safe in church, where are you safe?"

News reports gravitate to the most egregious cases, often involving Catholic clergy.

In a 2004 church-sanctioned study by the City University of New York's John Jay School of Criminal Justice, researchers found 4 percent of priests active between 1950 and 2004 had been the subject of complaints that "were not withdrawn or known to be false."

Violation of trust

Responding to clergy-inflicted sexual abuse of children, Pope Francis in his September U.S. visit acknowledged that clerical miscreants had "violated that trust and caused them great pain." He begged forgiveness of victims and their families for church leaders who failed to adequately address abuse allegations.

In Houston, headline grabbing-cases include that of youth pastor Chad Foster, who in 2013 was sentenced to five years in prison after pleading guilty to charges that he used the Internet to solicit sex from a 12-year-old girl and engaged in sex with a 16-year-old.

The younger girl's parents sued Foster's former employers, Second Baptist Church and Community of Faith. The case was settled out of court earlier this year, said the family's attorney, Cris Feldman.

Foster, 36, was considered for, and denied, parole in August.

Most cases originate and are resolved in obscurity, largely affecting only the perpetrators, their victims, victims' families and the home congregation.

In an ongoing national study, Baylor University's Diana R. Garland School of Social Work reports that more than 3 percent of women who attend church at least monthly have been targeted by church officials' sexual advances.

Congregational bias

In a survey of 280 of the larger study's participants, said the school's associate dean, David Pooler, only 60 percent "strongly agreed" that they remained congregation members after their encounter; even less, just 9 percent, strongly agreed they had received adequate support from fellow church members.

"The average church attendee ... will side with the perpetrator," Pooler said. "The congregational response often is victim-blaming, not being willing to hear the story, pushing many victim/survivors out of the congregation. ... I was shocked and appalled. This is not who the church wants to be."

Another study examining 1,500 evangelical Protestant ministers - one-third of them Southern Baptists - finds that 13 percent of preachers leaving the ministry do so because of alleged "moral failure," a condition that includes sexual misconduct, alcohol or drug abuse, gamgling addiction and other significant personal impairments.

Clerics, church leaders say, are emissaries of God, and, as such, the power relationship between them and church members always favors the person in the pulpit. That's especially true when illness, job loss, divorce or other crises leave congregants vulnerable.

"Any time there's a boundary violation in which there's sexual harassment, sexual talk or an experience which a person in church finds intrusive, it's traumatic," Pooler said.

In sexual relationships involving clergy and church members, he added, "We don't even call it an 'affair.' We call it an abuse of power."

Nowhere to turn

The philandering Houston-area pastor who lost marriage and pulpit said he was racked by guilt during the course of his infidelity.

After multiple women brought complaints to church leadership, the former minister gave up his church rather than contest the allegations.

"There was a lot of guilt, a lot of turmoil. Absolutely," he said, speaking anonymously. "I prayed ... I did seek out a therapist to work it out on my own."

Nothing helped. He does not specify if his affairs involved church members.

Although his denomination typically offers counseling for troubled ministers, the erstwhile cleric said he felt uncomfortable baring his soul to church representatives.

Some errant clergy are sexual predators, but others simply blunder into dangerous situations.

"Sometimes," Smith said, "we may break boundaries we're not even aware of."

That's especially possible, she said, when clergy suffer from the stress of overwork.

"Isolation is a killer," added the Rev. C. Huston McComb, who runs a national program for "morally failed" pastors at Houston's First Baptist. "There are not many places that a pastor can go to relieve himself of what's going on," he said. "If he talks to Joe church member, Joe might just help him lose his job."

The aftermath

Regardless of the emotional travails facing clergy, church leaders say, victims of clergy abuse fare even worse. Often they blame themselves for what has occurred. Always there is collateral damage.

"I would say forgiveness is not my biggest problem," Rinehart said of incidents he's investigated. "I can forgive at the outset, but I still have to clean up the mess. There's forgiveness, but still resentment, anger and disappointment and a sense of lost possibilities. The congregation loses traction."

When faced with the removal of a pastor, Rinehart's Lutheran synod responds by assigning an interim preacher, who typically guides the flock for a year to express "grace and compassion."

"When a congregation recovers, and most of them do, they come back stronger, wiser and with higher expectations," he said.

Learning boundaries

The take-away points from this week's Lutheran and Methodist training sessions largely will be practical suggestions widely endorsed by contemporary Christian denominations.

Key to avoiding problems, suggests the Rev. Kai Ryan, canon to the ordinary at the Houston-based Episcopal Diocese of Texas, is for clerics to develop an awareness of their limitations. For a group viewed as God's spokesmen, that feat can be hard.

"Clergy are trained to do a certain type of work, and the type of counseling that addresses life's big hurts is something they are generally not trained to do long term," she said.

Church members needing intensive help are best handed off to mental health care professionals, she said.

Still more practical, said First Baptist's McComb, are tips such as: Don't meet privately with female church members. Don't share details of your personal life. Above all, keep it "professional."

"Pastors are held to higher standards," McComb said. "They have to have strong boundaries. When you are counseling with a woman, you can't cross those lines. The last thing you want to do is mess up your family life or jeopardize your position and reputation."

http://www.houstonchronicle.com/news/houston-texas/houston/article/Programs-help-ministers-establish-boundaries-6588751.php

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Ohio

Program Manager Makes an Impact With At-Risk Youth and Their Families

by Diane DiPiero

It is believed that more than 100,000 children in our country are at risk for human trafficking. The average age of children forced into trafficking is 13. Professionals trained to help youth most at risk -- the homeless and "throwaways" who have left because of abuse or neglect -- along with their loved ones provide necessary resources in a sensible and nonjudgmental manner.

For Karen McHenry, program manager of Bellefaire JCB's Homeless and Missing Youth Programs, this work involves supporting staff; providing training to the community and youth about the dangers of being on the streets; working as part of a team to let youth know they have not been forgotten; and partnering with organizations like A Place for Me, LGBT, Cuyahoga County Juvenile Court and local law enforcement to make sure everyone is screening for potential signs of sexually exploited youth.

"I make sure the programs are assessing the families' immediate needs to help them experience success," she explains. " I oversee the programs that have a 24/7 hotline and street outreach, including a drop-in on Saturdays at St. Paul's Community Church. Staff safety and exposure to secondary trauma are being discussed and assessed on a daily basis."

Anyone interested in providing services to at-risk youth would do well to partner with an employer that provides ongoing learning and professional development. McHenry, who has been with Bellefaire JCB since interning there in 1987, has found ways to continually grow her caregiving abilities. "I have had experience in residential treatment, in-home family therapy, unruly and domestic violence populations, and youth that have experienced unbearable trauma, loss and abuse," she says. Last year, McHenry was one of 12 professionals trained in the Recognize, Respect and Respond Program of the Federal Family and Youth Services Bureau, designed to increase awareness and understanding of human trafficking.

All of this training is put into play on a regular basis, especially when a crisis situation arises and a victim of sexual trafficking is in need of help. Forming bonds with other professionals in the community ensures that a victim will receive the proper care. "We work as a team with the sexual assault nurse examiners, law enforcement, rape crisis and the youth-identified support group," McHenry says. "The trauma and loss these boys and girls have experienced is painful to see, but with a strong team we help them become survivors."

The opportunity to bring awareness to adults about the plight of homeless youth is another impact that this type of program manager can make in the community. Last year, Bellefaire launched its "Take a Closer Look" campaign (http://www.bellefairejcb.org/campaign/youth-homelessness), in which mannequins dressed in hoodies describing their homeless situation were placed around Cleveland. "This was a rewarding campaign and experience that I will always remember," McHenry says.

In any type of social work, the drive to help others can be all-consuming, but the need to care for oneself is very real. "The most challenging part of my work is practicing self-care to make sure I am well emotionally to support the staff, clients and families," McHenry says. "I could not do this job without the support of my family; friends; my supervisor, Stephanie Senter; other co-workers; community members; and law enforcement."

Reaching out to others is necessary as well. "You need a bag of nurturing treats as a leader to help support staff, youth and others," she continues. "A cup of coffee for a police officer to say thank you, for example. I am a firm believer in paying it forward."

What it takes to succeed

Many professionals will tell you that keeping your sense of humor is necessary to make it through career ups and downs. That advice is imperative when your career tends to be intense and emotionally driven. "My dad taught me that humor is important and to smile often," McHenry says. At the same time, it pays to stay strong and focused on goals. "My mom taught me to be a leader and a self-driven woman," she adds.

An ability to connect with children who are in trouble or in need of guidance is of the utmost importance in this role. It leads to a deeper commitment to the overall goal. "Each story someone shares is a gift that I treasure to learn more about the resiliency of our youth," McHenry says. "This is what keeps me going."

http://www.cleveland.com/employment/plaindealer/index.ssf/2015/10/program_manager_makes_an_impact_with_at-risk_youth_and_their_families.html

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Minnesota

Childhood sexual abuse leaves 'invisible wounds'

by Kay Fate

Over the last three decades, our culture has invested a good deal of time teaching children about "stranger danger."

The sad fact is, though, more than 90 percent of reported child sexual abuse crimes are committed by someone the child knows. According to RAINN, the Rape, Abuse and Incest National Network, fully 80 percent of those perpetrators are a parent; 6 percent are other relatives.

The prevalence of child sexual abuse is difficult to determine. Experts agree that the incidence is far greater than what is reported to authorities.

Keeping that in mind, a 2010 report from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services' Children's Bureau found that 1 in 5 girls and 1 in 20 boys is a victim of child sexual abuse.

Lindsay Valentino, of Rochester, knows that all too well. Her stepfather, Donald Ray Phillips, sexually assaulted her for eight years, according to criminal charges filed in Olmsted County District Court. It began soon after he married her mother in 1983, when Valentino was just 3 years old.

Phillips, now 63, was convicted in May of one count of first-degree criminal sexual conduct. Had he committed his crime after 1995, Phillips would be in the fifth month of a 144-month prison term, the current mandatory minimum.

Instead, he was sentenced to 365 days in jail, with release for treatment and Sentenced to Service. Though it's nowhere near what Valentino thinks Phillips deserves, it was only through a temporary law that he was punished at all.

State legislators passed a bill in May 2013 that suspended the statute of limitations for survivors of child sex abuse. The Minnesota Child Victims Act offers a three-year window to allow victims to take their abusers to court. Though most notably associated with cases of abuse by priests in the Catholic church, it's not restricted to them.

In what is perhaps a commentary to the prevalence of abuse, Valentino learned about the new law from a friend who was also sexually assaulted as a child. She knows others, she said.

"There was no hesitation (about coming forward) after I learned about the law," she said. A police report was taken, and Valentino agreed to place a covert phone call to Phillips, who by then had divorced Valentino's mother and moved to Texas.

Phillips "anguished over the past," the criminal complaint against him says, and wished the incidents had never happened. His abuse included penetration, as well as other sexual contact.

It stopped, Valentino said, "when I got up the courage to say no." She was 11, and she stayed quiet for more than 10 years.

"I never thought I'd say anything to my mom," Valentino said, "because he was her whole world." Then her mother caught Phillips cheating in the marriage, and told Valentino she was going to forgive him.

"I said to her, 'before you decide to do that, I want to talk to you,'" Valentino said. Though Phillips admitted the abuse to his wife, the couple stayed married for another five years.

Valentino has been diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder, and talks about "invisible wounds." Though the choice to come forward and pursue a criminal case was hers, it wasn't without pain, she said.

Mark Ostrem, Olmsted County attorney, sees it often.

Many times, he said, for victims "to go back and seek justice seems so damaging that it's not worth it. Victims recognize the pain they're going to go through and sometimes beg us to stop. And we do."

The victims' welfare always comes first, Ostrem said, even if means allowing a sex offender to go unpunished and untreated.

Valentino shared the pain in her impact statement, read before Phillips was sentenced:

"I have an immediate, visceral reaction when I hear someone jingling change in a pocket," she wrote. "That sound was Don's way of telling me if I wanted to be able to do something with my friends ... I was going to need to perform a sexual act. (From the time) I was around the age of 5, I was forced to basically prostitute myself so I could do things that all kids should be able to do."

Now, Valentino said, "I have an overwhelming fear of being vulnerable, because I learned early in life if you need something from someone, you end up paying for it one way or another."

Despite all of that, she says now, her purpose has been twofold.

"A lot of it for me is about protecting others, but there isn't anything for me to be ashamed of. I want people to know," she said. "If telling this story lets somebody, somewhere, know they can do this, they can get some peace, then that's amazing."

Minnesota

Champlin Woman Charged With Threatening Neighbor's Children

by CBS News

MINNEAPOLIS (WCCO) — A 38-year-old Champlin woman has been charged with allegedly sending anonymous threats to neighbors regarding their children.

On Friday, Carrie Pernula was charged, via summons, with one gross misdemeanor count of stalking and one misdemeanor count of disorderly conduct in connection with the series of events that began on Sept. 27.

According to police, Pernula sent the anonymous threats to her neighbors because she was upset that the children had made noise and left items in her yard. The first anonymous threat arrived Sept. 27 by mail. The two short sentences said, “The children look delicious. May I have a taste?”

Terrified, the family called the Champlin Police Department and posted on a Champlin community Facebook page, saying in part, “Opened our mail today to this letter. Obviously my stomach started doing somersaults.”

Then, the family began to received magazine subscriptions.

“Instead of a name on the address label it said things like ‘tasty children' along those lines,” Champlin Deputy Police Chief Ty Schmidt said.

Champlin police traced the magazines and last Friday arrested Pernula and say she admitted to the threats.

Pernula was released from jail Monday and is believed to be back at her home. Champlin police say it's disturbing someone would create such fear.

Pernula's first court appearance is scheduled for Dec. 8, 2015 at 8:30 a.m.

http://minnesota.cbslocal.com/2015/10/23/champlin-woman-charged-with-threatening-neighbors-children/

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Utah

Utah Coalition for Protecting Childhood focuses on preventing abuse

by Marjorie Cortez

SALT LAKE CITY — It's not that Division of Child and Family Services director Brent Platt necessarily wants to work his way out of his job. But he does wish that an emphasis on prevention will mean fewer cases of child abuse and neglect.

On Friday, Platt and Deondra Brown, co-founder or the Foundation for Survivors of Abuse, launched the Utah Coalition for Protecting Childhood during a meeting at the Devereaux Mansion.

The gathering brought together health, domestic violence, prosecution, human services professionals and advocates to work in a collective impact model to improve prevention efforts statewide.

Platt, who has served as DCFS director for five years, said the agency tends to direct its resources and personnel to respond to allegations of abuse and neglect as they are reported.

"We're not upstream enough. We're not upstream," Platt said, referring to prevention efforts.

"What can we do to support families before they are broken?" That is one of the aims of the coalition, said Brown, a member of the classical piano sibling quintet The 5 Browns and a survivor of child sexual abuse.

While there are many government agencies, nonprofit organizations and faith-based groups that work in prevention, their efforts are not aligned for maximum impact, she said.

"It's a dream of mine to see people from all across the state coming together to battle child abuse. There are so many wonderful organizations and individuals doing great work but they all work independently of each other. Nobody's aware what everyone else is doing. If we all can work together in such a way with specific goals in mind, we can really tackle the problem of child abuse head on and there can be some real change," said Brown.

The coalition will take a "collective impact" approach, meaning a steering committee of stakeholders will identify goals to be implemented by "backbone" committees.

The coalition plans to focus on primary prevention by supporting activities that prevent abuse before it occurs, Platt said.

In Utah, children newborn to age 5 account for 38 percent of child abuse victims, according to the Utah Attorney General's Children's Justice Center.

In nearly 40 percent of cases, the perpetrator are adults ages 18-30. Roughly 73 percent of perpetrators are victims' parents and 15 percent are other relatives, according to the center.

"The stigma of abuse is so terrible people don't want to talk about it, much less admit that it happens in their families and that continues to breed the problem," Brown said.

"As a coalition we hope to raise awareness, keep these discussions happening and really start to tackle things point by point."

http://www.deseretnews.com/article/865639793/Utah-Coalition-for-Protecting-Childhood-focuses-on-preventing-abuse.html?pg=all

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I watch child pornography to prosecute sex crimes. The kids' silence is deafening.

If they're not crying, we assume they must not be hurting.

by Sarah Chang -- Sarah Chang is a federal prosecutor who specializes in child exploitation crimes.

During my first week as a federal prosecutor of sexual abuse crimes against children, one of my colleagues told me her chief coping mechanism: Turn the sound off when you have to watch a video multiple times. This advice scared me. I imagined children screaming, crying and shrieking in pain — the stuff of nightmares.

My office is responsible for investigating and prosecuting such crimes, namely the production, possession and trafficking of child pornography. My first case file contained multiple CDs and DVDs showing a young girl being sexually abused by her father, who filmed his crimes with a handheld camera. Despite my colleague's warning, I knew I couldn't remain deaf during my first pass at the evidence. I went to our forensic computer lab and braced myself.

But all I heard was silence. The 5-year-old girl said nothing — not even a sob. Disturbed, I continued to watch each video with the sound on. I tried to beat back the silence by turning the volume up as high as it could go. The quiet was too deafening, too defeating to accept. Surely, these children must make a sound?

But in video after video, I witnessed silent suffering. I later learned that this is a typical reaction of young sexual abuse victims. Psychiatrists say the silence conveys their sense of helplessness, which also manifests in their reluctance to report the incidents and their tendency to accommodate their abusers. If children do disclose their abuse, their reports are often ambivalent, sometimes followed by a complete retraction and a return to silence.

The helplessness these children feel is rooted in the breach of trust they've experienced. Often, their abusers are people they expected would protect them. More than 80 percent of sexual abuse offenses against children are committed by people they know — parents, relatives, day-care providers and other trusted adults, according to the Justice Department. Studies show that children in those cases, particularly those abused by a parental figure, are more likely to recant their stories of abuse, if they report them at all.

Abusers often use explicit coercion or promises to compel children into silence. I see this dynamic often: A father, an uncle or a teacher, for instance, tells the child that the sexual abuse is an act of love and should remain secret. It's an effective tactic. A 2014 study found that a child is more likely to maintain his or her promise to keep a parent's secret if the child has a high degree of trust in the parent and believes that keeping a secret demonstrates trustworthiness. For children abused by someone they trust, this is particularly problematic. When familial intimacy and relationships of trust engender silence, children may not even realize that they are being abused.

But even when they do, loyalty keeps children from coming forward. Two years ago, I prosecuted a case in which a man in his late 30s sexually abused his daughter from ages 9 to 13. The truth came out only when his daughter befriended a school counselor — an adult she trusted outside of her abusive home. In her first interview with law enforcement, recorded on video, her speech was hesitant and her affect was shy. She repeatedly told officers that she didn't want to talk about it, and she feared getting her father in trouble. He had told her that he would go to jail if she told anyone what they did together. Eventually, he confessed and pleaded guilty, receiving a sentence of 27 years.

The scope of this problem is enormous. The National Center for Missing and Exploited Children has reviewed more than 147 million images and videos of child pornography. About 9,600 victims have been identified (often, multiple images or videos exist of each child), though there are probably millions more suffering in silence. Technology has made it easier to match newly discovered pornographic images to known cases, so we know whether the abuse is ongoing or an old case in which the victim has been rescued. But even with advanced technologies and large databases, not every child can be identified. The perpetrators often scrub the images of all distinguishing information before they are distributed — no GPS coordinates, no date stamps, no make and model of the camera used, nothing.

While silence in the face of such horrific abuse often prevents its discovery, too much speech can cause its own problems. In the 1980s and 1990s, a series of failed prosecutions, such as the infamous McMartin Preschool case — in which day-care workers near Los Angeles were charged with raping and sodomizing dozens of small children, largely based on the children's coerced, fabricated stories — drove researchers to examine the production of false memories in sex abuse cases. That research has been inconclusive, with some studies finding that children are very susceptible to suggested sex abuse memories and others concluding that this dynamic is rare.

Still, defense lawyers often accuse children who disclose abuse fluently and unflinchingly of being coached by law enforcement. It's true that child sex abuse victims are rarely candid when they first talk about their experiences, but after repeated interviews — which are necessary in the criminal investigatory process — they can become well practiced and fall prey to accusations of having been coached. Unfortunately, this has come to have the opposite effect of the McMartin Preschool case, causing legitimate cases of abuse to be discounted.

In a case I prosecuted two years ago, I met a survivor about a year after she disclosed her father's crimes against her. By then, she was a 15-year-old expert on how to speak with adults about sexual abuse. The criminal justice process, especially on the federal level, is slow and often asks victims to provide the same information in multiple settings to different investigating agencies. In contrast to her first recorded interview, she gave matter-of-fact answers in our meeting. I didn't need to ask sensitively phrased, progressively more comprehensive questions. She knew how she was expected to identify the sex act: He put his penis inside her vagina. Her answers to questions were unfeeling and almost clinical.

Child sex abuse victims face a dilemma. To be recognized as victims, they cannot remain silent, but they must be silent enough to seem authentically hurt.

When I began prosecuting these crimes, I had to close the door to my office after viewing images of children being sexually abused. The images were devastating, leaving me visibly shaken. On some days, I had to look at 50 images, and on others, I viewed 300. Occasionally there was video, which I came to dread the most. Not only were the children silent, but also, in both the photos and video, their eyes were dead. I don't know if that's a result of survival, accommodation or fear. Maybe it's all of those things.

We think silence can't indicate that something hurts. Without an expression of pain, we assume there's no injury. The pain scale at the doctor's office displays a smiling face over a zero to represent no pain, while the worst pain, a “10,” is represented by a face crumpled in agony and tears falling. Too often, our society implicitly uses this scale to judge abused children's emotional pain. If they're not crying, if their faces are expressionless, we assume they must not be hurting. We refuse to hear silence as anything but a vacuum of feeling, a void in experience.

But in reality, a voiceless cry is often the most powerful one. Even though I encountered silence on many of the videos recorded by abusers, I decided that I would leave the sound on. Shielding my ears from the horrific acts done to these children would mute their pain and diminish my ability to give them a voice. One girl didn't scream because her brother threatened to kill her. Another didn't say anything because her father told her to keep it a secret. Regardless of what prompted it, the silence is deafening. It makes audible the psychological hold an abuser has over a child. Silence can be the most devastating evidence of sexual abuse; it can be the sound of pain itself.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/posteverything/wp/2015/10/23/how-society-silences-sexually-abused-children/

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Forget about the free-range kids. Children in America still aren't safe enough.

Crime, traffic and parental neglect are serious dangers for too many kids.

by David Finkelhor -- David Finkelhor is the director of the Crimes against Children Research Center and a professor of sociology at the University of New Hampshire.

Just how instructive is the story of Silver Spring, Md.'s free-range kids? Here, one walks home with her mother, Danielle Meitiv. (Sammy Dallal for The Washington Post)

The story of the kids taken into police and child protection custody just for walking home unaccompanied in the Washington suburbs has provoked a lot of debate about parenting practices. The way it's been told and retold, the saga of the Meitiv children — ages 10 and 6 — is the ultimate expression of the impulses behind helicopter parenting, highlighting the degree to which we have become paranoid about stranger kidnapping to the point of depriving our children of the opportunity to play outdoors and become self-reliant and independent.

But in a country as diverse as ours with long-standing and persistent child welfare problems, we shouldn't overgeneralize too much from this case or a few others like it.

It is true that stranger kidnapping is relatively rare, and that children are considerably more at risk at the hands of family members and close acquaintances than strangers (who commit only 10 percent of all violent crimes against juveniles). But streets and public areas in America are far from the safe places they should be, and the risk greatly depends on the locale. There are neighborhoods where by-standing children get shot or see fights, drug dealing and other crimes. On the streets and in the playgrounds, children in public get bullied and harassed by peers and older youths. Of the million violent crimes against juveniles that get reported to the police year each, about 250,000 occurred outdoors or in commercial areas. And there are indeed serious traffic dangers in our many suburban and urban environments that are poorly designed for young pedestrians and bicyclists; each year, almost 15,000 pedestrians under 16 are injured. So some safety concerns are, in fact, quite justified — even if they don't apply to kids walking home from a park in the suburbs.

Another tenet of the free-range story is that stranger-danger anxiety is depriving children of needed outdoor time. Children may indeed be spending less time outdoors in free play with other children. But this trend isn't only caused by irrational angst. The main culprit is the engagement of children in the new electronic environment, which is where they now want to spend their free time and connect with their friends. Other factors? The disappearance of neighborhood schools in walking distance of home. The declining birthrate and suburban sprawl, which mean there are fewer kids of the same ages around in the neighborhood to play with face-to-face. And the rise of organized and instructional activities, which occupy more and more of kids' time. Outdoor free play is great, but changing patterns of childhood activity are not necessarily driven by parental paranoia.

The worry about independence is overdrawn as well. In today's networked environment, children go to lots of unfamiliar places and do lots of challenging things they never could have previously (for example, write book reviews on Amazon); in this new domain, the predominant concern appears to be that they do not receive enough close supervision. The fact that children carry around cellphones means that parents can give them a much longer leash, because they can check in about their activities and be available for help if needed. Children typically crave independence and are quick to protest and grab it when deprived. Running away is one indicator of children who feel overly constrained by parental restrictions, but that has actually been in decline.

Finally, have our child protection agencies gone overboard with ridiculous standards for parenting? It seems pretty apparent that the Maryland authorities over-reacted to a family whose parenting resources and skills seem quite competent. But neglectful parenting is a most serious problem in America, with 540,000 substantiated cases in 2013. Neglect, not abuse, is the culprit in a majority of the child maltreatment fatalities (almost 1,000 a year), and is a peril that has not declined in recent years. The most frequent incarnations are young children left unattended at home or in cars for egregiously long periods, children with serious medical conditions that are untreated, and children who have access to patently unsafe environments like meth labs. To try to help these children, we have child abuse laws that mandate that professionals — and in some states all citizens — report on children whom they just “suspect” might be neglected or abused.

But we cannot have a sentinel system that flags children in true danger without also mistakenly flagging some children who are in no danger at all, like the Meitivs. These false alarms are intrinsic to any “detection” system, from mammograms to 911 switchboards. A good system encourages vigilance but is quick to recognize the false alarms and minimizes their side effects. That was the real problem in the Meitiv case — not that a neighbor or police officer wanted to check to make sure that the kids were safe, but that the whole thing wasn't resolved with a quick phone call.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/posteverything/wp/2015/04/22/forget-about-the-free-range-kids-children-in-america-still-arent-safe-enough/

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

New Mexico

Training summit aims to tackle child abuse in New Mexico

by IKatherine Mozzone

ALBUQUERQUE (KRQE) – It's a statewide problem. New Mexico is ranked last when it comes to child abuse, topping the charts when it comes to maltreatment and neglect of our children. Yet, one partnership is looking to change that. This weekend, they'll hold a series of workshops for professionals and parents from across the state.

For three years, New Mexico Child Abuse Prevention Partnership has saved money to hold this conference. Their goal is to provide an opportunity for everyone from healthcare professionals to teachers to connect and, ultimately, come together to combat child abuse.

Psychologist Dr. Susan Miller has a saying.

“I believe we can prevent child abuse. It's 100% preventable. It is a choice people make. It is not a disease,” said Miller.

But in New Mexico, it's a choice many have made. In 2013, New Mexico had nearly 32,000 referrals for child abuse and neglect. That's according to the Child Welfare League of America.

Just last month, a daycare worker was charged with child abuse, caught on camera shaking a six-month old. Earlier this year, a mother and two of her friends were accused of beating her 14-month-old baby to death. Cases like these are why New Mexico ranks last when it comes to child abuse.

“We do not need to be number 50, I would love us to be the best,” said Miller.

The executive director of New Mexico Child Abuse prevention partnership is passionate about her cause, confident New Mexico can turn the tables on the statewide problem through education and awareness.

Miller's mission began when she worked in the inpatient rehab unit at UNM Hospital.

“We saw the worst of the worst child abuse cases on our unit and when I asked- these are babies, they have no voice, they can't tell anybody stop- and when I went to my boss and I said, ‘please, is there anything we can do to prevent this? They said, ‘why don't you do it?' And I went, ‘oh, okay,'” explained Miller.

Her solution is simple.

“Just caring. It takes everybody to look and see what's happening,” Miller said.

Several years later, New Mexico CAPP has grown to include 210 organizations throughout the state.

“We are just a group of people who care. We all volunteer,” said Miller.

Now, many of those people are coming together to share their role in the fight against child abuse.

“We want to see what you're doing so that when I get stuck in what I'm doing I can say, ‘oh, I remember her,' and I can give you a call and we can consult,” Miller explained.

New Mexico CAPP's Train the Trainer Summit will feature 30 workshops, each hosted by an expert in his or her field. It's a seminar three years in the making, one Miller hopes will be another step in breaking the cycle of child abuse.

“It's a dream come true,” said Miller. “It's a dream come true. I'm so excited.”

The conference kicks off Friday with opening remarks from CYFD Cabinet Secretary Monique Jacobson.

http://krqe.com/2015/10/23/training-summit-aims-to-tackle-child-abuse-in-new-mexico/

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Wisconsin

Proposed Rules For Reporting Child Abuse Meet Opposition

Law Enforcement Says Early Intervention By Police Is Needed, Some Social Workers Disagree

by Gilman Halsted

A package of bills aimed at cracking down on parents who abuse or neglect their children is facing stiff opposition from state social workers.

The proposals mandate child welfare workers to report all child abuse and neglect complaints to law enforcement. Attorney General Brad Schimel said if police get involved early, they can prevent abuse from being repeated.

"It's time for us to provide stronger tools to address physical abuse and neglect of children to break that cycle," Schimel said.

The manager of Child Protective Services for Dane County, Julie Ahnen, said social workers share that goal but not how it's being proposed.

"The way to do that is not through punitive measures," she said. "Research has shown that change happens through ... addressing people's underlying needs."

Ahnen said there is a need for more collaboration between child protection workers and police, but the focus should be on providing parents with treatment and support, not making it easier to prosecute them.

State Sen. Lena Taylor, D-Milwaukee, also opposes the idea of having police involved earlier in child abuse investigations. She said too many parents are themselves children of abusive parents who need help to overcome that trauma rather than more punishment. Taylor is also calling for police who work on child abuse cases to get more training in cultural competence so they can deal more effectively with families of color.

The bills have strong support from district attorneys across the state. However, the state public defender's office is calling for changes in language that they said broadens the definition of abuse and neglect too much, making it easier to convict parents for relatively minor things like failing to make sure their child wears a bicycle helmet when riding in the neighborhood.

During my first week as a federal prosecutor of sexual abuse crimes against children, one of my colleagues told me her chief coping mechanism: Turn the sound off when you have to watch a video multiple times. This advice scared me. I imagined children screaming, crying and shrieking in pain — the stuff of nightmares.

My office is responsible for investigating and prosecuting such crimes, namely the production, possession and trafficking of child pornography. My first case file contained multiple CDs and DVDs showing a young girl being sexually abused by her father, who filmed his crimes with a handheld camera. Despite my colleague's warning, I knew I couldn't remain deaf during my first pass at the evidence. I went to our forensic computer lab and braced myself.

But all I heard was silence. The 5-year-old girl said nothing — not even a sob. Disturbed, I continued to watch each video with the sound on. I tried to beat back the silence by turning the volume up as high as it could go. The quiet was too deafening, too defeating to accept. Surely, these children must make a sound?

But in video after video, I witnessed silent suffering. I later learned that this is a typical reaction of young sexual abuse victims. Psychiatrists say the silence conveys their sense of helplessness, which also manifests in their reluctance to report the incidents and their tendency to accommodate their abusers. If children do disclose their abuse, their reports are often ambivalent, sometimes followed by a complete retraction and a return to silence.

The helplessness these children feel is rooted in the breach of trust they've experienced. Often, their abusers are people they expected would protect them. More than 80 percent of sexual abuse offenses against children are committed by people they know — parents, relatives, day-care providers and other trusted adults, according to the Justice Department. Studies show that children in those cases, particularly those abused by a parental figure, are more likely to recant  their stories of abuse, if they report them at all.

[How child abuse hotlines hurt the very children they're trying to protect]

Abusers often use explicit coercion or promises to compel children into silence. I see this dynamic often: A father, an uncle or a teacher, for instance, tells the child that the sexual abuse is an act of love and should remain secret. It's an effective tactic.  A 2014 study found that a child is more likely to maintain his or her promise to keep a parent's secret if the child has a high degree of trust in the parent and believes that keeping a secret demonstrates trustworthiness. For children abused by someone they trust, this is particularly problematic. When familial intimacy and relationships of trust engender silence, children may not even realize that they are being abused.

But even when they do, loyalty keeps children from coming forward. Two years ago, I prosecuted a case in which a man in his late 30s sexually abused his daughter from ages 9 to 13. The truth came out only when his daughter befriended a school counselor — an adult she trusted outside of her abusive home. In her first interview with law enforcement, recorded on video, her speech was hesitant and her affect was shy. She repeatedly told officers that she didn't want to talk about it, and she feared getting her father in trouble. He had told her that he would go to jail if she told anyone what they did together. Eventually, he confessed and pleaded guilty, receiving a sentence of 27 years.

The scope of this problem is enormous.  The National Center for Missing and Exploited Children has reviewed more than 147 million images and videos of child pornography. About 9,600 victims have been identified (often, multiple images or videos exist of each child), though there are probably millions more suffering in silence. Technology has made it easier to match newly discovered pornographic images to known cases, so we know whether the abuse is ongoing or an old case in which the victim has been rescued. But even with advanced technologies and large databases, not every child can be identified. The perpetrators often scrub the images of all distinguishing information before they are distributed — no GPS coordinates, no date stamps, no make and model of the camera used, nothing.

While silence in the face of such horrific abuse often prevents its discovery, too much speech can cause its own problems. In the 1980s and 1990s, a series of failed prosecutions, such as the infamous McMartin Preschool case — in which day-care workers near Los Angeles were charged with raping and sodomizing dozens of small children, largely based on the children's coerced, fabricated stories — drove researchers to examine the production of false memories in sex abuse cases. That research has been inconclusive, with some studies finding that children are very susceptible to suggested sex abuse memories and others concluding that this dynamic is rare.

Still, defense lawyers often accuse children who disclose abuse fluently and unflinchingly of being coached by law enforcement. It's true that child sex abuse victims are rarely candid when they first talk about their experiences, but after repeated interviews — which are necessary in the criminal investigatory process — they can become well practiced and fall prey to accusations of having been coached. Unfortunately, this has come to have the opposite effect of the McMartin Preschool case, causing legitimate cases of abuse to be discounted.

In a case I prosecuted two years ago, I met a survivor about a year after she disclosed her father's crimes against her. By then, she was a 15-year-old expert on how to speak with adults about sexual abuse. The criminal justice process, especially on the federal level, is slow and often asks victims to provide the same information in multiple settings to different investigating agencies. In contrast to her first recorded interview, she gave matter-of-fact answers in our meeting. I didn't need to ask sensitively phrased, progressively more comprehensive questions. She knew how she was expected to identify the sex act: He put his penis inside her vagina. Her answers to questions were unfeeling and almost clinical.

Child sex abuse victims face a dilemma. To be recognized as victims, they cannot remain silent, but they must be silent enough to seem authentically hurt.

When I began prosecuting these crimes, I had to close the door to my office after viewing images of children being sexually abused. The images were devastating, leaving me visibly shaken. On some days, I had to look at 50 images, and on others, I viewed 300. Occasionally there was video, which I came to dread the most. Not only were the children silent, but also, in both the photos and video, their eyes were dead. I don't know if that's a result of survival, accommodation or fear. Maybe it's all of those things.

We think silence can't indicate that something hurts. Without an expression of pain, we assume there's no injury. The pain scale at the doctor's office displays a smiling face over a zero to represent no pain, while the worst pain, a “10,” is represented by a face crumpled in agony and tears falling. Too often, our society implicitly uses this scale to judge abused children's emotional pain. If they're not crying, if their faces are expressionless, we assume they must not be hurting. We refuse to hear silence as anything but a vacuum of feeling, a void in experience.

But in reality, a voiceless cry is often the most powerful one. Even though I encountered silence on many of the videos recorded by abusers, I decided that I would leave the sound on. Shielding my ears from the horrific acts done to these children would mute their pain and diminish my ability to give them a voice. One girl didn't scream because her brother threatened to kill her. Another didn't say anything because her father told her to keep it a secret. Regardless of what prompted it, the silence is deafening. It makes audible the psychological hold an abuser has over a child. Silence can be the most devastating evidence of sexual abuse; it can be the sound of pain itself.

To protect our children, we teach them about stranger danger, valuable lessons because the danger is real.

But the greater threat is much more frightening. One in ten children will be a victim of sexual abuse, the large majority of them girls, victims of an assault they cannot fend off or understand because eighty percent of child sexual abuse perpetrators are someone the child knows and trusts.

Rachel Webster, a survivor of child sexual abuse. She was five years old the first time she was sexually abused by her uncle. Rachel was brave and told her parents, but the response was familiar to many child victims.

"No one ever really talked about it again, other than to say let's not talk about this," she said.

That leaves a child alone and confused. The majority of young victims of sexual abuse never report the crime because of fear, feelings of shame or guilt. They believe that somehow they were to blame.

And the long term effects on adult survivors range from physical issues like eating disorders, and chronic pain, to emotional struggles with anxiety and low self-esteem... the haunting feeling that something is wrong but you don't know what it is.

If you are someone you love is a victim of child sexual abuse, there is help available.

Help:

http://www.mcedsv.org/help.html

http://www.mcedsv.org/help/find-help-in-michigan/directory/search.html

National Domestic Violence Hotline: 1-800-799-SAFE (7233)

Rape Abuse and Incest National Network (RAINN): 1-800-656-HOPE

Call toll-free 24 hours a day anywhere in the U.S. RAINN provides confidential counseling and support for survivors of sexual assault. The hotline automatically routes calls to the rape crisis center nearest the caller by reading the area code and prefix of the caller's phone number.

http://www.clickondetroit.com/lifestyle/family/help-for-child-sexual-abuse-victims/35944474

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

California

No Such Thing As A Child Prostitute

by Helen Zhao and Ivana Nguyen

Withelma Ortiz Walker Pettigrew was born into foster care. She says the abuse she suffered made her especially vulnerable to the proposition of an older man.

“At the age of 10, I met a man who promised me he was gonna love for me and care for me and do everything I wanted someone to do because I had no one,” Pettigrew said.

That's when she was sold into child sex trafficking.

“From the ages of 10 and 17, I got exploited right here in the western United States — here in California all the way down the coast to El Cajon Blvd. in San Diego all the way up to the state of Washington,” Pettigrew said.

She was then charged with solicitation and prostitution and placed in juvenile hall.

Los Angeles County Sheriff Jim McDonnell says that won't happen to another victim of child sex trafficking in Los Angeles County.

“Particularly juveniles are not capable of consenting to sex,” he said. “Therefore it's inappropriate to book them for prostitution. Rather we're treating them as victims of statutory rape, and looking at them as a victim in need of resources, in need of options.”

On Tuesday, the LA County Board of Supervisors unanimously approved a motion that ensures abused juveniles are treated as victims, not criminals.

McDonnell says 70% of these victims come from foster care and the average age is between 12 and 14, but as young as eight.

On Wednesday, the Human Rights Project for Girls launched the No Such Thing Campaign, asserting there is no such thing as a child prostitute — an initiative supported by the LA County Board of Supervisors and California Endowment.

Their goal is to remove the term child prostitute from our conversations, the media and the legal system, saying it implies consent and criminality where there is none.

“These children should not be treated as anything other than victims of child sex abuse. Remove the labeling,” LA Supervisor Sheila Kuehl said.

McDonnell says the LAPD has renovated its approach to addressing child sex trafficking, with what they call the Law Enforcement First Responder Protocol.

“Our three-pronged approach is going after the traffickers, the pimps, and to the fullest extent of the law, holding them accountable,” he said. “Going after the johns who are actually pedophiles and predators."

“Going after them not with a citation for soliciting prostitution as in the past, but rather for statutory rape and child molestation. And for the victim, treating them as a victim and providing them services to get them away from that life.”

The LA County Board of Supervisors says 32 child victims of sex trafficking have been identified in Los Angeles in the last nine months and received community support and medical and mental health screening. 70% “currently remain stable.”

They say law enforcement have arrested and prosecuted many “high-profile exploiters.”

The protocol first started in Compton and Long Beach, places with high rates of sex-related crimes.

McDonnell says child sex trafficking is prevalent in Los Angeles County as well.

“It happens in abandoned RVs on the side of the road, motels and hotels, in any location —abandoned homes, any location available for this type of activity — it's being exploited,” he said.

“The street gangs have gotten into this because it's so lucrative and it's been relatively low risk. It's all done over the Internet and cell phone so its not conspicuous.”

Pettigrew is now 26 years old and a junior in college studying communications, with dreams of becoming a broadcast journalist.

She serves as a policy consultant for ending domestic child trafficking, making Time Magazine's 2014 “100 List of the Most Influential People in the World” and receiving Glamour Magazine's 2011 “Woman of the Year.”

Pettigrew gave a Ted Talk earlier this year on exploring sexuality after trauma. She says she has since reclaimed her sexuality — an important part of the recovery process she says is often left out of victim treatment plans.

“Being a victim of child sex trafficking, choking was being used as a form of torture… to completely overpower me,” she said. “To make me succumb to that. Now something I enjoy in my sexuality as an adult is something like breath play. Which really incorporates the idea of trust. It incorporates the idea of therapeutic breath. It incorporates the idea of liberation.”

http://www.atvn.org/news/2015/10/no-such-thing-child-prostitute

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Indiana

Phones for Survivors

Coburn Place partners with Colts for cell phone drive

by Amber Stearns

What may seem like just anther way to get rid of old junk lying around your house may actually serve as a huge step toward independence for a domestic violence survivor and her family.

October is Domestic Violence Awareness month and the Indianapolis Colts are encouraging fans to bring old cell phones, tablets, and other wireless devices to Sunday's home game against the New Orleans Saints. The collection drive is a part of Verizon's Hopeline campaign. Phones donated by fans are recycled for cash grants, while Verizon provides new phones to shelters for survivors to use.

Residents of Coburn Place Safe Haven will benefit from the donation program.

"These phones make a huge difference, " says Lara Chandler, vice president of mission advancement for Coburn Place. "We actually provide them to all sorts of our clients to have so that they can be able to access employment, resources, doctor's appointments, things they wouldn't have access to because their abuser has taken their phone away."

Communication is a necessity that many of us take for granted, but for those who are in volatile situations, access to the world is often cut off and controlled. More often than not, domestic violence survivors escape with not much more than what few items they can carry out with them. Domestic abuse is often about control of everything, which can include finances and time as well as possessions and belongings. Getting a new cell phone not only goes toward establishing a new life, but is also severs another tie to the abuser.

Coburn Place maintains 35 apartments in Indianapolis for families who are transitioning out of their violent situation and working toward a safer life. The facility also provides services and resources to those families to help in every aspect of their transition to safety, including self-defense classes, therapy support groups, financial literacy workshops and other resources. In 2014, Coburn Place provided support services and resources to 335 adults and children escaping their domestic violence situations.

Colts' tight end Dwayne Allen spent an afternoon at Coburn Place playing basketball and doing crafts with the kids residing at the facility. Allen is one of nearly two dozen NFL players involved in the "Say No More to Domestic Violence and Sexual Assault" campaign. The public service announcements feature athletes and sports celebrities bringing attention to the issue of domestic violence. Domestic violence among NFL players fell under intense media scrutiny after the Ray Rice incident involving his then-fiancée Janay in 2014. The NO MORE campaign kicked off during the NFL season with PSAs airing during games. Allen became the Colts representative in that campaign.

The mild-mannered well-spoken pro football player spent an afternoon tossing the football and making Halloween crafts with the kids at Coburn Place. But his message for the to the public was simple and sincere.

"The Hopeline — their goal is to do three things,: said Allen. "Number one, to prevent by providing resources to different domestic violence organizations; number two, to educate everyone about domestic violence and the different signs that you can pick up on to help prevent and stop domestic abuse; and number three to empower them by providing cell phones to the organizations and those survivors as a safeline to resources and family and friends."

This is the third year the Colts have partnered with Verizon for the cell phone drive and Allen's second year representing the program.

Any and all cell phones, tablets, and accessories will be accepted in any or in no working order.

http://www.nuvo.net/indianapolis/phones-for-survivors/Content?oid=3574575

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Australia

1k suspected child abuse cases unreported in Qld schools

A review into Queensland's education department has found that almost 1,000 cases of suspected child abuse in schools went unreported as a result of a system upgrade glitch.

by Asha Barbaschow

Two senior bureaucrats from the Queensland Department of Education have been sacked over a system upgrade glitch that prevented almost 1,000 suspected child abuse cases in the state's schools from being reported to police.

Director-General Jim Watterson announced on Wednesday that an assistant director-general and an executive director have both been stood down over the OneSchool reporting failure, effective immediately.

Additionally, Watterson said another departmental staff member has been issued a show cause notice, and contractors directly responsible for coding and testing the OneSchool upgrade have also had their contracts terminated.

The OneSchool system was updated in January, and was designed to allow school principals to report suspected child abuse directly and simultaneously to Child Safety Services and Queensland Police (QPS).

Since the upgrade, whenever reports were filed by principals, an "IT error" prevented the reports from being delivered to the agencies. It meant category three, or lower-tier, reports of suspected abuse never reached police.

In August, Deloitte Australia was appointed by the Queensland government to undertake an independent investigation into the system failure, charging the auditor with the task of looking into the decisions, procedures, and accountability systems that led up to the failed implementations of the OneSchool update.

The government is adopting all 21 recommendations of Deloitte's review.

"The report found that processes, governance, and organisational factors contributed to the failure," Watterson said. "I am firmly committed to ensuring the safety and welfare of all students under the department's care continues to be my highest priority."

Education Minister Kate Jones has also attributed blame to deputy opposition leader John-Paul Langbroek, who served in her role in the former government.

Jones said Langbroek was responsible for the shift to online reporting, and needed to explain why his government sacked 230 IT workers during the transition period.

When the glitch was initially found, Jones blamed it on the department not carrying out proper tests when the update was implemented.

"Since the error was discovered, departmental officers have been working with QPS to assess the cases," she said. "Action was immediately taken to fix OneSchool, and the technical problem has been resolved."

The OneSchool upgrade was implemented in January, when the previous government was in caretaker mode before the election, but was not live tested. Jones said the Deloitte report found serious flaws in the risk assessment undertaken prior to the implementation of the major software update.

The opposition, however, has claimed the government is using the Deloitte report to shift attention away from its ongoing controversies surrounding embattled crossbench MP Billy Gordon.

"The Department of Education did not receive one cent of the AU$406 million the Newman government spent on child protection reforms, and Langbroek needs to explain why he accepted no funding for a department that was the second-largest reporting agency when it comes to child abuse," Jones said.

She said Queenslanders deserve to know why Langbroek never held meetings with the QPS to discuss the change to the way principals, teachers, and school staff report cases of suspected child abuse.

"Langbroek diaries show he never met with the department's Child Protection Implementation Committee to discuss what action his department was taking to ensure the safety of Queensland children," she said.

"He was a minister responsible for more than 770,000 students across Queensland, but he couldn't even be bothered to be in Parliament when the child protection legislation was debated."

It was initially thought that 644 reports were lost in the system, but manual checks later revealed the number was closer to 1,000.

"I am advised that there is no evidence that children suffered further harm as a result of the IT failure," Jones said. "Like all Queensland parents, I want to be certain such a failure does not happen again, and that's why we will implement the recommendations of this report in full."

http://www.zdnet.com/article/deloitte-1k-suspected-child-abuse-cases-unreported-in-qld-schools/

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Arizona

Child adversity, abuse in Arizona costs country $23 billion

by Perry Vandell

A family member in prison. A mother who was treated violently. Emotional or physical neglect. Even simply growing up with just one parent.

These are examples of "adverse childhood experiences," and they are ravaging Arizona. A national survey released last year found that 44.4 percent of Arizona children ages 12 to 17 suffered two or more such traumatic experiences, far surpassing the national average of 30.5 percent.

On Thursday, a follow-up to that report will be unveiled by a coalition of child-advocacy groups, this one showing the economic impact of each adverse childhood experience.

The numbers are sobering. According to the economic analysis, every first-time incident of child maltreatment costs the U.S. economy approximately $1.8 million, and the number of maltreatment cases in Arizona costs the country $23 billion through lost wages, impact on the criminal-justice system, and other factors. In addition, those with a traumatic childhood are more likely to become alcoholics, suffer from heart disease and attempt suicide.

The economic analysis for the report released by the Dion Initiative for Child Well-Being and Bullying Prevention at ASU, Phoenix Children's Hospital and the Arizona Adverse Childhood Experiences Consortium was performed by the Perryman Group, an economic and financial analysis firm that develops economic impact models for various situations. Its clients include the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, ExxonMobil and MasterCard, according to the firm's website.

Bradley Snyder, director of ASU's Dion Initiative for Child Well-Being and Bullying Prevention, said children aren't the only victims of child maltreatment — it hurts everyone.

“We know what this (trauma) means to the lives of the children that experience it, but what does it mean for our greater economy — to the businesses?” Snyder asked. “And so we've been looking at other people's analysis of the economic data."

Fighting childhood trauma is an uphill battle. According to a study by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, the number of reported child victims has grown from 3,803 in 2009 to 13,171 in 2013. That's a 246.3 percent increase.

In that study, with some children suffering multiple types of abuse, neglect was 79.5 percent of maltreatment, followed by physical abuse at 18 percent in 2013. Sexual abuse and psychological maltreatment accounted for 9 percent and 8.7 percent of cases respectively. Abuses listed under “other” such as “threatened abuse,” “parent's drug/alcohol abuse,” or “safe relinquishment of a newborn” accounted for 10 percent of cases.

However, the study doesn't account for every adverse childhood experience. Experiences such as growing up with a family member in prison or in a single-parent family weren't included in the study, but they can be traumatic.

Snyder said reports often use different terms with varying definitions, so the consortium chose a report focusing on child maltreatment to base the economic analysis on.

“Sometimes reports talk about trauma, sometimes they talk about child maltreatment and sometimes they talk about adverse childhood experiences,” Snyder said. “So we're really working to get kind of a universal language for this. All child maltreatment is an adverse childhood experience, but not vice-versa.”

Bryan Pahia, a public information officer for the Arizona Department of Child Safety, said the increase in child victims could originate from a number of different factors.

"For example, socioeconomic challenges faced by many families could be a contributing factor to the increase, as is substance abuse and substance dependence, which often causes additional stress to the family or may result in an inability to provide child care services," Pahia said.

Pahia noted he would need additional time to properly analyze the report.

Rebecca Ruffner, executive director of the non-profit organization Prevent Child Abuse Arizona, said children who've experienced adverse childhood experiences can recover with proper care and nurturing.

“...Children, if they are reported abused and neglected and removed from their parents' care, then they need nurturing and perhaps counseling with their caregiver and they need help healing from those situations,” Ruffner said. “Again, that's a loss, even though that parent might have been abusive or neglectful, it's still a loss and it's hard for children to heal from those things without a lot of adult help.”

While experiences like enduring a divorce or being involved in an accident aren't as preventable as abuse or neglect, Ruffner said support and nurturing from parents or caregivers are similarly vital.

“The family needs support at that time so that the people closest to the child can help the child to feel safe again and to recover from the loss,” Ruffner said.

Ruffner recommends that parents and caregivers seeking more information check out educational programs such as the Positive Parenting Program, or Triple P. The program teaches parents how to properly deal with their child's emotional and behavioral problems if and when they arise. She said the evidence-based program has seen success in multiple states and that California poured additional funding into it to broaden its availability.

The Arizona Adverse Childhood Experiences Consortium has also created eight workshops in the state that help spread the word about childhood trauma, its damaging effects and what can be done to prevent it.

http://www.azcentral.com/story/news/local/arizona/2015/10/22/arizona-child-adversity-costs-country-23-billion/74356030/

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Virginia

Free training offered to identify, stop child sexual abuse

CHRISTIANSBURG – NRV CARES, in partnership with Christiansburg Aquatic Center, is offering Stewards of Children free to all interested community members.

Two training sessions are offered 9:30 a.m. to noon and 6 to 8:30 p.m. Nov. 4 at the Christiansburg Aquatic Center. Registration is required and seating is limited. Contact Keli Lichty at 540-381-8310 or keli@nrvcares.org.

Stewards of Children , a community-based training program created by Darkness to Light, provides information and resources to people in an effort to empower community members in the identification and reporting of child sexual abuse in the New River Valley. The training is 2½ hours, and includes class facilitation, manuals and workbooks.

“The prevention of child sexual abuse in the New River Valley happens when communities know what signs to look for and how to respond,” says executive director Laura Guilliams. “Keeping our children safe is a community responsibility and NRV CARES is working diligently to engage our community in this task.”

NRV CARES is a private, non-profit organization dedicated to protecting children from abuse and strengthening families through education, advocacy and community partnerships. Serving Floyd, Giles, Montgomery and Pulaski counties and Radford, NRV CARES strives to improve the lives of the smallest and most defenseless members of our society while helping to support an environment where families can thrive.

Darkness to Light (D2L) has championed the movement to end child sexual abuse since its founding in 2000. With affiliates throughout the U.S. and in 16 countries, D2L provides individuals, organizations and communities with the tools to protect children from sexual abuse. To date, the D2L network of 6,000 authorized facilitators has trained more than 500,000 parents, youth serving professionals and organization volunteers in D2L's award-winning Stewards of Children child sexual abuse prevention program.

http://www.southwesttimes.com/2015/10/free-training-offered-to-identify-stop-child-sexual-abuse/

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Indiana

Show displays progress at horse therapy center

by Zach Spicer

SEYMOUR, Ind. -- Any time Tommy Tharp III hops up on a horse at Reins to Recovery Inc. Therapeutic Riding Center, rides around the arena and participates in activities, his whole demeanor changes.

His grandmother, Teresa Coomer, said he's more talkative afterward and sleeps better that night than any other day of the week.

"The thing that we notice so much about it is when he gets on the horse, it's like somebody flips a switch in him, and he becomes a completely different child," Coomer said.

The 16-year-old from Austin has autism. Since beginning equine therapy two years ago at the Seymour facility, Coomer has seen a lot of positive changes in her grandson.

"Trying to talk to him is really difficult, and for him to express himself is hard because autism is a communicative disorder," she said.

"But to watch him on the horse, he takes command," she said. "Because he has been here long enough, he can command the horse, he can do right turns, left turns, he can pull her into a square, pull her back out, he can make her trot. For him to have command of anything in his life, it's worth every dime we've spent."

At Reins to Recovery, children and adults with social, emotional, psychological or physical disabilities, along with at-risk youth and victims of violence or abuse, ride horses as part of their therapy. There are 10-week sessions in each of the four seasons, and riders take lessons once a week.

During those sessions, parents often sit and watch their child interact with the horses and staff.

Since Reins to Recovery started in 2008, the staff has conducted a fun show each fall, giving clients' family members and friends a chance to sit in the arena and see a session up close. This year's show was Saturday with a World of Disney theme. Clients and staff members had an opportunity to dress up as their favorite Disney character, and music from Disney movies played while they rode around the arena.

Throughout the day, 20 clients participated in eight stations, including bowling, ring toss and beanbag toss. At the end, each received a trophy and could have pictures taken with their family.

Calli Johnson, executive director of Reins to Recovery, said only a handful of clients participated in the first fun show seven years ago, so it made her proud to see 20.

"We get to see our riders work so hard all year long; and a lot of times, not all of the family gets to come and see them in the barn on the horse," Johnson said.

"This is an opportunity for them to be able to invite friends and family, and we just try to make it extra special for them," she said. "To get that trophy, that's the big deal for them. They finally are a part of something where they get to take home the trophy and have something to cherish that they worked so hard for."

Johnson said she likes seeing the clients' family members attend the event.

"For the families, especially the ones that can't make it out here (during a regular session), to be able to at least know that they have a date to look forward to come and see their rider, I think it's special for them," she said. "Just to get to see their rider get the trophy, I think, is a really neat opportunity."

The staff members and volunteers also look forward to the fun show.

"This is about the only day of the year I can ask for volunteers at 7:30 in the morning, and they are signing up because they know they get to decorate the horses and make them pretty," Johnson said.

"A lot of us are on different shifts, but we're all kind of this barn family. So to be able to come together in one whole day and work together as a unit is fun," she said. "Some of the volunteers don't get to see the other riders from the other nights. Just to be able to have a day of it all is really cool."

The clients' parents said they are grateful to have a facility such as Reins to Recovery.

Mickey King of Columbus said her son, Dylan King, 8, has made a lot of progress in two years. Dylan has cerebral palsy.

"The very beginning, he was really nervous. He was scared. We were scared with him being on a big horse," she said. "But now, he asks to come every week, and he looks forward to it throughout the whole week. He walks a little better, he's getting a lot better balance. So we think it's helping a lot from what we've been able to see him doing."

King said she liked watching her son participate in the show.

"It's a great feeling to see him smiling and enjoying himself and really having fun," she said. "It's really good for him to be able to show everybody what he has learned and how good he's doing on the horse."

Coomer said the benefit her grandson has received from Reins to Recovery is immeasurable.

"If we could afford it, he would ride every day," she said, smiling.

"The horses that they have are phenomenal because they are tolerant. They allow the kids with disabilities to take command of them," she said. "He has been on four different horses, and Tommy has had four different trainers since we've been here, and every one of them have been different but phenomenal. They are talking about possibly that he'll advance to be able to be an actual rider. That's something that you can't put a price tag on."

http://www.dailyherald.com/article/20151022/news/310229949/

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Caribbean

Commentary

Violence towards children

by Felicia Browne

The Convention on the Rights of Children states that children have the right to live in environments free from violence. These fundamental rights provide social and political protection for children. However, in many Caribbean societies, child abuse has created serious developmental challenges for children and young adolescents. Young children are increasingly becoming victims of abuse, especially in domestic violence cases.

Over the past few months, the Caribbean Mentorship Institute has been alarmed by the number of children that have died due to abuse. Child fatalities due to abuse and neglect are still underreported. One report on national child abuse and neglect deaths estimates that approximately 50 percent of deaths reported as “unintentional injury deaths” are reclassified after further investigation by medical and forensic experts as deaths due to maltreatment or physical abuse.

It is often more difficult to establish whether a fatality was caused by neglect than it is to establish a physical abuse fatality. Although there has been a public outcry for those young lives, our policymakers continue to condone corporal punishment in public schools and homes, which signals indifference to physical violence inflicted by big people on small ones.

Although effective parental education is being provided to new parents, not enough is being done to guard against excess force being inflicted on children. As a result, civil society and public organizations should play an active role in advocating for the victim's rights.

For instance, the Children's Act provides specific guidelines for the accepted norm of physical punishment of children by their parents and guardian, however, the Act takes little consideration for the psychological and mental trauma that children may suffer due to physical punishment. And it falsely supposes there is a need for any physical punishment of young children.

Children should be protected by the state. We must work effortlessly to ensure their safety in their homes, schools and public spaces. We should provide continuous parental education on peaceful parenting techniques that will provide parents and guardians with knowledge of child safety and development. Additionally, our policymakers should ensure that there are no contradictions where children safety is concerned.

If the state provides parents and guardians with the authority and autonomy to punish their children physically, then why isn't consideration given for the psychological care of children. Physical abuse and punishment have been known to trigger psychological and emotional trauma for young children. It is critically important that such laws and parental rights be revised to afford the holistic development of children.

The safety and protection of children are their fundamental human rights; we should all be responsible for their safety.

Illinois

Help for child sexual abuse victims

by ClickOnDetroit news staff

To protect our children, we teach them about stranger danger, valuable lessons because the danger is real.

But the greater threat is much more frightening. One in ten children will be a victim of sexual abuse, the large majority of them girls, victims of an assault they cannot fend off or understand because eighty percent of child sexual abuse perpetrators are someone the child knows and trusts.

Rachel Webster, a survivor of child sexual abuse. She was five years old the first time she was sexually abused by her uncle. Rachel was brave and told her parents, but the response was familiar to many child victims.

"No one ever really talked about it again, other than to say let's not talk about this," she said.

That leaves a child alone and confused. The majority of young victims of sexual abuse never report the crime because of fear, feelings of shame or guilt. They believe that somehow they were to blame.

And the long term effects on adult survivors range from physical issues like eating disorders, and chronic pain, to emotional struggles with anxiety and low self-esteem... the haunting feeling that something is wrong but you don't know what it is.

If you are someone you love is a victim of child sexual abuse, there is help available.

Help:

http://www.mcedsv.org/help.html

http://www.mcedsv.org/help/find-help-in-michigan/directory/search.html

National Domestic Violence Hotline: 1-800-799-SAFE (7233)

Rape Abuse and Incest National Network (RAINN): 1-800-656-HOPE

Call toll-free 24 hours a day anywhere in the U.S. RAINN provides confidential counseling and support for survivors of sexual assault. The hotline automatically routes calls to the rape crisis center nearest the caller by reading the area code and prefix of the caller's phone number.

http://www.clickondetroit.com/lifestyle/family/help-for-child-sexual-abuse-victims/35944474

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California

Ex-victim aims to end domestic violence

Self-defense instructor Michelle Winder of Carlsbad has invented a product to benefit abuse survivors

by Pam Kragen

CARLSBAD — Michelle Winder isn't ashamed to admit that from early childhood to her early 20s, she was a victim of physical and sexual abuse. The Carlsbad mother of two uses her past as a cautionary tale when teaching other women who are caught, like she was, in the cycle of domestic violence.

For the past 15 years, Winder has counseled and taught self-defense and -awareness classes to girls and women at schools, churches and military centers in North County. And this fall, she and her husband, Bill, are launching a hair product to benefit domestic abuse survivors. The ScrewUp, a modified chopstick-style hairpin, is marked with the “NO MORE” logo, an aqua-blue circle that's the national symbol for the campaign against domestic violence. Now in its final design phase, the ScrewUp should be ready for market in January and virtually all proceeds will go toward abuse victim programs.

“I designed ScrewUp because there was nothing out there to hold long, fine hair like mine,” said Winder, 57. “Then I realized if we could put the NO MORE (logo) on the end, we would have a useful product that was always a way to raise awareness and funds for ending domestic violence.”

Winder grew up in San Diego where she said she was physically and sexually abused by a perpetrator she declines to name. By the time she was in high school, she said the shame and loss of self-worth she felt made her an easy target.

“When it starts early like that, you get the victim mentality. You're like a magnet to predators and it becomes your reality,” she said.

She went from one violent relationship to another with controlling older men, was nearly raped by a college professor and was assaulted late one night after work while walking to her car. Finally at age 22, she met a group of Christian men and women from North Coast Calvary Chapel in Carlsbad who treated her with respect and she began to feel a sense of purpose and self worth. One of her new friends was her future husband, Bill Winder. Happily married for 29 years, the couple has two children, Billy, 27, and Aubrey, 23.

Although she was in a healthy relationship and had a successful career in real estate, Winder said she was still having nightmares about being attacked well into her 30s. So at 34, she signed up for a karate class and gradually worked her way up to a third degree black belt. Fifteen years ago, she started teaching martial arts classes and was shocked to learned that some of her women students were themselves victims of domestic abuse.

After researching the statistics on domestic violence, she decided to revamp her classes to focus on self-defense. According to the National Coalition Against Domestic Violence, a woman is assaulted or beaten every 9 seconds in the U.S., and 1 in 3 women (1 in 4 men) have suffered physical violence by their partner.

Thirteen years ago, she quit her job to focus full-time on her new program, Survival Under Pressure, which teaches practical self-defense and personal safety. She has taught the course to children and adults at schools, churches, gyms and businesses throughout the region. Since 2013, she has also served on the county's sexual assault and domestic violence response teams.

Besides martial arts training, the S.U.P. program teaches self-esteem and has a biblical foundation. Winder said she believes angels intervened to save her life more than once from dangerous situations.

“I always encourage people to talk about it and bring it back to the Lord,” she said. “We have a purpose, we are valuable and we are all unique.”

Mark Foreman, lead pastor at North Coast Calvary Chapel, has known the Winders for nearly 18 years. He said the Winders have led a marriage ministry program and Michelle has been a teacher in the Sunday school and annual children's games events. She also taught self-defense to teens on a missionary trip in Nicaragua.

“She moves so easily from people of faith and not of faith,” Foreman said. “Her driving force is that she sees everyone in the image of God and because of that she treats everyone with a high degree of dignity and she wants them to see themselves with that same dignity.”

Bill Winder, a 68-year-old semiretired real estate lender, said the more he learned from his wife about domestic violence, the more he wanted to help. While she regularly meets with women who have been abused, he has taken on the difficult task of counseling male perpetrators of violence. In most cases, he said, the men tell him they were abused or witnessed abuse as children.

“It's the most satisfying thing to be able to support her,” he said. “I realized that for every woman assaulted there's a man with guilt and shame who needs help, too.”

The ScrewUp device was born after Winder said other hair ties continually fell out of her hair during martial arts classes. It looks like a chopstick, but with a corkscrew in the middle to lock it in place. Although the materials and details will vary, each ScrewUp will sport the NO MORE symbol (called a “vanishing zero” to represent the goal of zero domestic violence). The Winders have invested more than $13,000 in developing a prototype and they've launched a $23,000 Kickstarter campaign to finish bringing the product to market.

Winder said she hopes to sell the ScrewUp for $14.95. All but a tiny portion or proceeds will go toward the No More campaign as well as local programs like Break the Silence and No Silence, No Violence.

“It's time to say no more,” she said. “The statistics on domestic violence are shocking and widely unknown because most people don't talk about it. That needs to change.”

http://www.sandiegouniontribune.com/news/2015/oct/20/michelle-winder-screwup-business-profile/

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India

Opinion

Why death penalty or lowering the juvenile age won't stop rapes of children

If implemented, such measures will actually further deter reporting. We need to focus on what can really make a difference to child safety and help prevent rapes and punish the culprits.

by Kavita Krishnan

For the past week, the issue of rapes of children has been the subject of intense discussions and protests, following news of three cases reported from Delhi. Public discourse – shaped by political parties, media, and even some of the protestors – on the issue of sexual violence and child sexual abuse, tends to steer far away from the heart of the problem. It stays focussed on the “safer” terrain of outrage over stranger rape, political control over police, recommendations and promises of closed circuit television surveillance and the question of capital punishment.

While Indian media focuses on the competitive posturing of the Central and Delhi governments over Delhi Police, the international media uses these incidents as a peg to talk about “India's rape problem”, “Indian culture” and "how things have not changed since December 16".

Meanwhile, the Central government – and now the Delhi government too – is seeking to treat juvenile rape-accused the same as adults and introduce death penalty for child rapes.

Not only do such responses keep the conversation at a very superficial level, such measures will actually further deter reporting of child rapes, particularly if the rapist happens to be a close family member. They also effectively drown out the demands for steps that can really make a difference to child safety and help prevent and punish rapes of children.

In order to address the issue of child sexual abuse and rape seriously, we first need to understand some facts about it and learn from the experience of activists working among child rape survivors.

When 'protectors' are the perpetrators

What we need to admit first about child sexual abuse is that rape by strangers represents a minuscule percentage of a very vast problem.

The perpetrators overwhelmingly tend to be close family members, neighbours, or persons in authority (teachers, religious figures, etc). At 53%, more than half of children in India have faced some sexual abuse or domestic violence. The slogans and sound bytes against rape by strangers contrast oddly with the ringing silence around the taboo subject of rapes and abuse of children by family members. Is the repeated rape of a two or three-year-old child by her father or uncle for several months, or even years, any less heinous than the gang rape of a child by strangers?

Why, then, is there so much public discussion and outrage on the latter but virtual silence on the former, which is much more widespread?

Flavia Agnes, feminist activist lawyer and founder of Majlis, a group working on sexual violence cases in Mumbai, recently pointed out:

“In the 241 FIRs filed in Mumbai between March 2014 and '15, 12% cases involved rapes by fathers and stepfathers, while rapes by strangers in public places were 3%. Yet our discussion on girl safety revolves around street lighting and CCTV cameras.”

What is true of Mumbai is equally true of Delhi. Rukmini S, in her study of nearly 600 rape cases in Delhi that came to trial, found that a substantial number involved slum-dwelling men assaulting the minor daughter of his neighbour “either by luring her while she was playing outside or taking her to his house”. One of the recent cases in Delhi also falls in this category. In the majority of such cases, Rukmini S found, the courts tended to convict the accused . But does that mean that most child rapes are reported and punished? Far from it.

The NDTV Truth vs Hype programme titled "The Invisible Reality of Rape in India" quoted a detailed study by Majils which pointed out that “within the ambit of acquaintance rape, rape by a friend, neighbour or trusted person was nearly double that of rape by a family member. But this may also be because abuse by family is the hardest to report. ”

The intimate enemy

Child sexual abuse shares the same intimate space that domestic violence does. Most perpetrators of child rapes are not "abnormal", "perverted" strangers who are "animals". They are men we are likely to know, trust and even love. Child rapes happen most in the familiar milieu of the patriarchal household – the kind that demands obedience and subservience from children and women. Another point to remember is that not only girls but also boys are victims of child sexual abuse It is worth quoting Flavia Agnes at length:

“ Rape has been on our mind since December 2012. We've discussed it, protested against it, demanded more stringent laws and even got them. But the focus, the discourse and the concern has been restricted to rape by strangers. We don't take to the streets when a girl accuses her own father of rape over several years because this threatens to shake the very foundation of our society, the unit held most sacred – the family.

“A patriarchal society has to protect the patriarch, whatever the cost. That's why rape or sexual assault within the family, by a father, is a sure shot conversation killer. Bring it up anywhere and a hush descends, discomfort rises. It's a story India doesn't want to hear. But don't be fooled by the silence around it. It doesn't mean that these incidents are rare. The silence is a conspiracy ? to protect the alleged rakshaks even if they are, in reality, bhakshaks.”

Child sexual abuse within families is hugely under-reported. One reason is that children themselves may be persuaded by such perpetrators that the abuse is "loving", a "special secret" or "a game" – they may not recognise the abuse as abuse even if they are uncomfortable or in pain. Or they may be intimidated by the perpetrator into silence. The culture that demands children's absolute obedience to adult authority figures deters the child from reporting unwanted, uncomfortable touch or even prolonged abuse. When children do report violence by a loved, trusted family member, they may be disbelieved and silenced.

In many cases, it is the child's mother who recognises the abuse and reports it. If the child is older (say, a teenage girl), they may report it themselves. But often mothers and daughters of victims, economically dependent on and socially subordinate to the perpetrators, succumb to the pressure to withdraw the complaints and turn hostile.

A mother who reports the abuse of her child and names her husband or some other male authority figure as a perpetrator also faces the same kind of social hostility that women who report domestic violence do. In other words, mothers are accused of using children to level "false allegations" for property or for "revenge" on husbands.

This is what seems to have happened in the case of the French diplomat in Bengaluru who was accused of raping his three-year-old daughter. In spite of medical evidence that the child had faced prolonged sexual abuse, the dominant media discourse turned his wife into the accused – alleging that she had fabricated charges to frame her husband. This is also true of scores of such cases that are less known.

Police and courts

The Delhi Police chief has claimed that since most perpetrators are known or related to victims, there is nothing the police can do to prevent such crimes. But the police cannot be let off the hook so easily.

The fact that the perpetrators are known or are family members ought to make matters easier for the police. Instead, the police themselves lead the charge of those who disbelieve complainants, delay FIRs and deter reporting.

Let me recount two instances from the experience of the activists of the All India Central Council of Trade Unions who have had to develop a working knowledge of tackling child rape cases. In one such case in Wazirpur, where a man had raped the daughter of a neighbour from his own village, the police, in spite of pressure from activists, could not register the case all night and it took several hours in the day time before the First Information Report could be registered. The reason was that the law requires that the child's statement be recorded in the presence of a policewoman and an activist from a non-governmental organisation. The police force is short of policewomen and none such was stationed in the local police station – so it too hours to get one from elsewhere. The NGO member also had to be from an NGO recognised by the police. This member took long to arrive, and when she did, she was more inclined to act in tandem with the police rather than as an advocate of the child's rights and interests.

Finally, the closest hospital had no dedicated space to examine rape survivors – and so the child had to wait hours at the hospital for a room to be cleared for the examination to take place. Meanwhile, the child's family was under pressure from persons from their village and community – abetted by the police – to withdraw the complaint. Eventually, the man was arrested thanks to the efforts of the activists, but was let off on bail subsequently because the police did not seriously oppose grant of bail.

In another case, a woman worker had complained to the police when she discovered that her father-in-law and brother-in-law had been systematically raping her three young daughters for years. Her husband supported her in this complaint. The children's grandfather was arrested. But the police refused to act against the uncle, who continued to intimidate the children. The woman and her husband were forced to withdraw the children from school and miss work in order to protect their children. When one of our activists went to speak to the police about the case, the Station House Officer openly told him, “It's a false case, the woman is lying to get property from her in-laws, and her daughters [children between 5-12 years of age] are prostitutes.”

Pratiksha Baxi's book, Public Secrets of the Law: Rape Trials In India , in a chapter titled "The Child Witness on Trial", speaks of how courtrooms are hostile to the child rape survivor. The defence lawyers cannot bring in the character or past sexual history of a child rape survivor. But instead, they can – and do – introduce the "character" and past sexual history of the child's mother – to suggest that the child's testimony is coached by the mother for some ulterior motive.

Victim blaming, in such cases, takes the form of blaming and shaming the mother of the victim. Such blaming is enabled by a larger milieu and discourse that discourages reporting of domestic violence and brands domestic violence cases as "false cases" filed by greedy women for money or property.

What Needs To Be Done?

The wrong way to frame this question is to ask, "What punishment do child rapists deserve? What punishment will instil fear and deter such rapes?"

The real problem, as we have seen from the experiences detailed above, is not that punishments are inadequate. The real problem is that the crime is under-reported and rendered invisible – with children suffering in silence for years on end, often in the custody of the rapist. And when such cases are discovered and reported, the system of policing and trials itself can work to deter justice, leaving victims alone to resist the pressures of bribery and intimidation and emotional blackmail.

What we need to ask, then, is: What are the measures that can prevent child rapes and sexual abuse, and encourage reporting of such rapes and punishment?

The first thing to do is to bring the issue of child sexual abuse out of the shadows, and enable children to respect the boundaries of their bodies, tell "good" from "bad" touch, and safely report sexual abuse. The article by Flavia Agnes begins by narrating how a 13-year old girl, following a counselling session on sexual abuse in her school, wrote to her class teacher to tell her that her father had been raping her for six years since she was seven, and her mother was not helping.

Such sessions, in schools and communities, can help enable children to recognise and report sexual abuse. It can't be stressed enough that be it in families or in schools, the culture of unquestioning obedience to adults and elders needs to be consciously undone – for it is an invitation for abuse of power including physical abuse and sexual abuse.

Children in slums with working-class parents also badly need crèches or child-care centres to ensure that there are safe spaces available for them while their parents are away.

Sexual abuse of children cannot be addressed in isolation from domestic violence faced by women inside their homes. Survivors of such violence need structured support to enable and empower them to approach the police and courts.

Public campaigns are also needed to educate the wider public about consent, autonomy and bodily integrity of women and children. Look around you – have you ever seen advertisements or other campaigns by governments or public institutions that explain concepts of sexual consent and autonomy? Hardly ever, right? Yet, those are the public campaigns that are most needed, not banalities about protecting women and the girl child from stranger-predators.

All the above measures can well be implemented by the Delhi government, with the powers already at its disposal.

What about the police? Certainly, the sensitivity and accountability of the police to child sexual abuse and domestic violence needs to be ensured. As such, bringing the Delhi Police under the purview of the Delhi government will not only promote accountability of the police, but it is also needed in order to be able to hold the Delhi government properly and fully accountable. Delhi government should not be able to evade responsibility and accountability by pleading lack of power over the Delhi Police.

Misguided measures

The Delhi government has responded to the three recent child rapes by proposing that death penalty be introduced for child rapes and the juvenile justice age be reduced to 15 years to allow trial of rape-accused minors as adults. It is important therefore to address the question: Will death penalty act as a deterrent?

Even in rape in general, death penalty is no deterrent. The December 16 rape convicts have been condemned to hang, as also the Shakti Mills rape convicts – but that has not stemmed the tide of rapes.

But especially in the case of rapes by fathers or relatives, death penalty for rape will only serve to further deter reporting of such rapes. As Flavia Agnes puts it:

“There is also need for concerned citizens to rethink their stock demand of death penalty for rapists after every gruesome case that comes to light. No daughter will come forward if she knows that her father will hang.”

What about lowering the juvenile justice age – a measure on which Central and Delhi governments are in agreement?

As Mrinal Satish and Rukmini S point out, a recent study of rape cases in Delhi's district courts showed that the largest category of cases – 40% of all cases that were fully tried – "dealt with elopement and consensual sex between young couples, and the girl's parents filing rape charges against the boy". The cases of rape by strangers or unknown juveniles are minuscule and cannot be assumed to be the norm on the basis of which laws can be framed. Mrinal Satish and Rukmini S point out:

“What happens if a 17-year-old boy indulges in a consensual sexual act with a 15-and-a-half-year-old girl — a common occurrence especially in rural parts of the country? Under the proposed new JJ Act, if the Board determines that he should be tried as an adult, he will be tried by a sessions court, which has no option but to sentence him to a minimum of ten years in prison.

“Rape is a violation of a woman's sexual autonomy. Increasing the age of consent and decreasing the age of juvenility does not enhance sexual autonomy but restricts it, since it negates the agency of the woman to choose a partner, by instead facilitating filing of criminal cases against her partner.”

The arguments against lowering the age of juvenility in “heinous” criminal cases are summarised by me in an article written when the Modi Government first proposed it.

Lip Service to Justice Verma recommendations

It is indeed unfortunate and ironic that the Aam Aadmi Party's Delhi government claims to “be the first to implement the Justice Verma Committee recommendations” but in fact flouts its specific recommendation rejecting both death penalty and lowering of the juvenile justice age.

The AAP's Ashish Khetan, in a television debate, claimed to have read the Verma Committee report carefully and misinformed the viewers that the report had recommended death penalty for repeat offenders. In fact, the Justice Verma Committee report categorically concluded, after detailed and patient deliberations:

“In our considered view, taking into account the views expressed on the subject by an overwhelming majority of scholars, leaders of women's' organisations, and other stakeholders, there is a strong submission that the seeking of death penalty would be a regressive step in the field of sentencing and reformation. We, having bestowed considerable thought on the subject, and having provided for enhanced sentences (short of death) in respect of the above-noted aggravated forms of sexual assault, in the larger interests of society, and having regard to the current thinking in favour of abolition of the death penalty, and also to avoid the argument of any sentencing arbitrariness, we are not inclined to recommend the death penalty.”…

Based on a detailed study of international covenants as well as experiences of other countries, the Committee stated: “we do take note of the argument that introduction of death penalty for rape may not have a deterrent effect.”

On the question of amending the Juvenile Justice Act to lower the age of juvenility in rape cases, too, the Justice Verma Committee report's observations are worth quoting:

“We have heard experts on the question of reduction of the age of a juvenile from 18 to 16 for the purpose of being tried for offences under various laws of the country. We must confess that the degree of maturity displayed by all the women's organisations, the academics and a large body of thinking people have viewed this incident both in the criminological as well as societal perspective humbles us.

Quoting extensively from international experience, the Justice Verma report concludes, "We are of the view that the material before is sufficient for us to reach the conclusion that the age of ‘juveniles' ought not to be reduced to 16 years.”

For Ashish Khetan to claim that the Kejriwal government is committed to implementing the Justice Verma recommendations but is preparing merely to “add” something to those recommendations is rather misleading in this context. In fact, the Justice Verma report categorically rejects both these draconian proposals. It does not do so lightly, but comes to this conclusion after careful expert appraisal of all available facts and experiences. We hope that the Kejriwal government will show the same maturity that the Justice Verma report admired in women's organisations and other concerned citizens on this subject.

Stop the blame game

So what should be blamed for this problem? "Culture" and "mindset"'? Or socio-economic structures that discipline and control women and children?

Finally, it is important to challenge the glib manner in which child sexual abuse and rape in India are blamed by both Indian and international media on "Indian culture" and backward "mindsets".

In fact, we need to recognise that Indian families and Indian state are no different from global capital and market in so far as they all demand disciplined, docile and obedient bodies of women and children. Indian families as well as the Indian state seek to control women's sexuality, reproduction, and household labour. The global market also wants obedient women and child labourers for providing docile labour in multi-national corporations factories and reproductive supplies and services for the global industry of commercial surrogacy, and for allowing their bodies to be subjected to large-scale violence in the name of sterilisation and population control.

We have seen, again and again, how the moral policing, violence and restrictions on women's autonomy inside homes is reproduced in schools, colleges/universities and factories/workplaces too. Women and children who learn to defy patriarchal authority and speak out against domestic violence, "honour" crimes and child abuse are also likely to be rebellious in educational institutions and in factories. If families discourage and punish the assertion of autonomy by women and girls, so do schools/colleges and factories/workplaces.

Hanging a handful of rapists or jailing a few juveniles won't do a thing to promote the autonomy of women, girls and all children. In fact, by bolstering the myth that violence against women and children are perpetrated by "evil strangers" outside the "safe haven of the home", such measures help tighten the restrictions on autonomy inside homes – and in all other arenas as well.

The Delhi government has a real opportunity to make a difference and introduce effective measures that can actually make women and children safer. Will it show maturity and do so? Or will it choose to play with emotions and push draconian laws and surveillance while avoiding the measures that are actually needed?

Kavita Krishnan is a politburo member of the Communist Party of India (Marxist-Leninist) Liberation and secretary, All India Progressive Women Association.

http://scroll.in/article/763833/why-death-penalty-or-lowering-the-juvenile-age-wont-stop-rapes-of-children

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Missouri

Neglect the leading complaint to Missouri Child Abuse and Neglect Hotline

by Alisa Nelson

More calls to Missouri's Child Abuse and Neglect Hotline are reporting neglect than any other complaints. Children's Division Director Tim Decker says thousands of such calls are received each year.

“About 60% of our calls to the hotline are allegations of neglect. Then there's a percentage of calls that come in around physical and sexual abuse,” said Decker.

He said a growing number of children are in foster care because their parents are dealing with substance abuse.

“When parents are using substances, it can create not only neglectful but also harmful situations for children,” said Decker. “Babies and young children are especially vulnerable but all populations can be vulnerable in their own way. Some of the challenges we've had in our communities around substances abuse begin to cause challenges for the child welfare system.

About 13,000 children are in Missouri's foster care system with less than 6,000 foster families serving them.

http://www.missourinet.com/2015/10/21/neglect-the-leading-complaint-to-missouri-child-abuse-and-neglect-hotline/

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Florida

Police: Mother of murdered Florida baby did not prevent abuse

by WTSP

NORTH PORT, Fla. -- The mother of a Florida baby believed dead didn't intervene as the child's father repeatedly struck him, according to police.

Florida authorities last week said they think they have found the body of 9-week-old Chance Walsh, who has been missing since Sept. 9, buried in North Port, a central Florida city near the state's Gulf coastline.

His parents, Kristen Bury and Joseph Walsh, were arrested on Florida child abuse charges in South Carolina. Bury was later charged with first degree murder, and Walsh was charged Tuesday with first-degree felony murder, according to the Sarasota County Sheriff's Office.

Authorities say they became involved when Chance's grandmother called them Oct. 4, concerned about the baby's well-being.

Arrest documents say Bury told investigators where they could find the baby's body, reports the station. A body believed to be the infant was discovered Thursday in a dense, wooded area about 13 miles from the child's home.

According to a probable cause affidavit, Bury told investigators that the infant had died Sept. 16 at their North Port home. That morning, she said, she and Walsh got into an argument. Walsh, she said, began repeatedly hitting the child, at one point telling her he was going to bash the child's head into the ground, according to the affidavit.

According to the document, Bury told Walsh, "You are going to break his f***ing neck." However, police say the woman didn't call 911 or attempt to prevent Walsh from hurting the boy.

Walsh, the boy's father, allegedly told police Bury told him she didn't want to call dispatchers because she didn't want to lose both people she loves in the same day, according to the affidavit, which is partially redacted.

The child was placed in his crib after his death and left to decompose, according to the document. Bury allegedly told Walsh that the smell was overwhelming and he had to do something with the body. Walsh then allegedly wrapped the infant's decomposing remains in numerous garbage bags and placed him in the closet of the bedroom.

On Sept. 25, the two allegedly dug a shallow grave, and later brought the child's body there in their car and buried him. According to the affidavit, Bury told police Walsh was wearing blue "hospital gloves" as he dug the hole, but the gloves were damaged by the shovels and fragments were likely left behind.

The two then drove to South Carolina on Sept. 27 and were involved in a car crash in Hardeeville. When asked why they left Florida, Walsh allegedly said they were going to start a new life somewhere else.

According to CBS affiliate WTSP, investigators say the two gave various conflicting accounts of what happened to the child -- that he was ok; that he died in a car crash; and that they gave him away.

Records show a cadaver dog alerted authorities to possible human remains at the family's North Port apartment. There they found blood on the bed, and the walls, door, mirror and light in the bathroom, the station reports.

The couple has since been extradited back to Florida.

On Oct. 15, according to the affidavit, Bury led investigators to the location in North Port where a decomposed child's body was discovered, covered only in a diaper. Investigators also discovered a fragment of a blue surgical glove inside the grave, the affidavit says.

Walsh is being held on a $150,000 bond for the child neglect charge.

California

Op-Ed

Don't let time shield sex predators

by Joelle Casteix

W hen I was between the ages of 15 and 17, I was sexually abused by one of my high school teachers in Orange County. By the time the abuse ended, I was pregnant and had a sexually transmitted disease.

It took me years to understand the extent of my abuse and recover enough to come forward, but by that time, the criminal and civil statutes of limitations had expired. Even though I had evidence that my choir director had sexually assaulted me, there was nothing I could do to stop him from targeting other vulnerable teens.

California has abysmally complicated sex crime statutes. Child victims abused before Jan. 1, 2015, have until age 28 to file criminal charges and 26 to use the civil courts (with some exceptions for those who meet a high burden of proof). Minors abused after that date (or who didn't hit the time limit by that date) have until 40 to file criminal charges and 26 for civil charges, again with exceptions.

For adult sexual assault victims, there is no limit for aggravated sexual assault — that is, when the assailant uses a weapon or there are multiple assailants. For "normal" sexual assault, adult victims usually have 10 years to file criminal charges, unless there is DNA evidence, which can give victims more time. The limit for sexual assault civil cases is two years from the date of the occurrence.

In my own case, my deadline for criminal charges was age 24. I could use civil law only until my 19th birthday.

These relatively short time frames mean that wrongdoers like my teacher, and far more famous people accused of abuses, such as Bill Cosby, can avoid seeing the inside of a courtroom. Some of the women who accused Cosby of sexual assault have run up against the time limit and have turned to defamation suits as an alternative way to obtain some modicum of justice.

Why are victims of sexual abuse given arbitrary — and downright confusing — deadlines for coming forward? How many predators are roaming our neighborhoods, unknown to us because their victims have been denied the right to hold their abusers accountable?

At least the solution is easy: California should comprehensively eliminate time limits for prosecuting sex crimes. Law enforcement shouldn't have to refer to a graph to determine whether a victim of sexual assault has legal rights. Victims should have no deadline.

Other states have moved in this direction. Delaware, for instance, eliminated the criminal statute of limitations for child sexual abuse victims in 1992, and eliminated the civil equivalent in 2007. The same can be done for adult victims.

California's lawmakers seem aware that the current system makes no sense.

In 2003, in the wake of the Catholic clergy sex abuse scandal, the Legislature gave child victims a one-year window to come forward, no matter when the abuse occurred. Why would they have done that unless they recognized that deadlines are bad policy?

The "window" meant that victims like me had the right to use the civil courts. I exposed my abuser and was able to publicly release documents from my case, including my abuser's signed confession stating that he had sexually assaulted me and at least two other girls.

In 2013, the Legislature revised the 2003 law to give victims who missed the window an additional two-year grace period. The bill passed both houses, but Gov. Jerry Brown, at the behest of the California Catholic Conference, vetoed it.

I'm grateful that I had the opportunity to file suit against my accuser, but livid that other victims are denied the same.

According to the California Coalition Against Sexual Assault, it can take victims decades to become strong enough to report. Reasons for delay can include shame, self-loathing and fear of not being believed.

I spent 15 years blaming myself for my abuse. My peers, my parents and school officials convinced me that I had not been raped because I didn't go to the police right away. They convinced me that I "wanted it," not realizing that I had been carefully groomed for abuse. I hated myself for a decade; I thought I was a bad person. But eventually I came to understand that no child from an alcoholic home stands a chance against an adult sex predator.

Adult victims need time too. Consider the Cosby scandal. Until the spate of news stories in 2014, who would have believed that "America's Dad" might be capable of such crimes? What woman could have the strength, and the bankroll, to take on one of Hollywood's most beloved figures? Now that the public's ready to believe, these women's access to the courts is severely limited.

Opponents of reform are quick to say that, over time, evidence is lost, witnesses move away and memories fade. But no one's arguing that sex abuse victims shouldn't have to prove their accusations — they should just have the right to try. If there is truly no evidence, the courts can refuse to hear the case.

Joelle Casteix is the volunteer Western regional director of SNAP, the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, and the author of the book "The Well-Armored Child: A Parent's Guide to Preventing Sexual Abuse."

http://www.latimes.com/opinion/op-ed/la-oe-1019-casteix-sex-abuse-statutes-20151019-story.html

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India

Why we all need to come together to end child sexual abuse

by Rajeev Chandrasekhar

Two incidents rocked Delhi's social conscience last weekend. Two children, a toddler aged all of 2 and half years and another aged 5 were brutally gang raped. The reactions that poured through during the weekend underscored the culture of denial that exists around child sexual abuse – with many wrongly characterizing this as a “women's safety” issue. Twitter, for instance, has been deliberating on the issue through the hashtag #MakeDelhiSafe, assuming, almost, that this is a localised, city specific issue, exclusively prevalent in the national capital.

It is important for us to recognize how this debate is being distorted and to acknowledge the pervasiveness of child sexual abuse in our society, and then collectively raise our voice against the problem. Having engaged in detail on the issue over the last 18 months, I have had a first-hand window into the reluctance of most in government and also the citizenry to talk about the issue. This is exactly why, despite being a member of Parliament, I have started a change.org petition, requesting Prime Minister Narendra Modi to commit to a time-bound roadmap to end child sexual abuse. In less than 4 weeks, the petition has drawn nearly 1.15 lakh signatures, and is encouraging more people to speak up. The start-point of any change is mass mobilization, and in the absence of this, no government shall be receptive to taking action against these crimes.

India has the ignominy of being home to the largest number sexually abused children in the world. In a sample study conducted in 2007, the Ministry of Women and Child Development reported that 53% of all Indian children had been subject to some form of sexual abuse. Child sexual abuse leaves survivors emotionally and often, physically incapacitated for decades – instead of a positive childhood they deserve as the most vulnerable in our midst. That makes it even more important to make it our responsibility to ensure that our children are provided with a safe, healthy and happy childhood.

My petition to the prime minister makes three specific requests:

First, it asks for the government to conduct an exhaustive fact finding study to assess the full extent of the problem (both victims and predators) in our country. The oft quoted 2007 study of the Ministry of Women and Child Development was merely a sample study covering 13 states and only 12447 children, 2324 young adults and 2449 stakeholders. It is important that as a nation we understand the depth, scale and extent of this challenge and the predators. The child safety and protection discourse in India has a legacy of data inadequacy both about the victims and the criminals. This only tells us that despite children constituting more than 30% of the country's population, no attempt has been made by any government in the last 68 years, to analyze in details crimes against them including that of the issue of cases and criminals.

Second, it asks the PM to make protecting our children a national priority and draw out a set of time-bound actionable solutions, including new laws and training/responsibilities for the governments and various institutions like police and judiciary. This needs the involvement of all stakeholders including the police, judiciary, child rights activists, policymakers and others. This national plan for child safe India should be designed with the objective of ensuring that there are enough protective institutional mechanisms in place that ensure the safety of our children from sexual predators in all institutions, including schools and orphanages

Importantly, all this to be backed by a sense of urgency so that this can be done at the earliest – reversing decades of neglect on this very important issue.

Thirdly, I have requested the government to urgently establish a framework for the regulation of child care institutions such as schools, orphanages, tutorials and others, and involve all concerned stakeholders including child rights groups and citizens groups in its designing. This body must create and enforce statutory guidelines for the protection of our children.

While great awareness has been raised about sexual violence against women in India, much less is known about the problem of sexual abuse of children. The spate of incidents that have hounded our children over the last year, from across the nation should serve as a wake up call for government, citizens and the media. India's children deserve better, and it is up to us to ensure they get that.

http://blogs.timesofindia.indiatimes.com/inside-politics/why-we-all-need-to-come-together-to-end-child-sexual-abuse/

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PTSD: It's Not Just for Veterans

by Dani Bostick

When Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder is in the news, it is mostly because of the number of veterans suffering as a result of combat-related trauma. Victims of other kinds of trauma can also suffer from PTSD, though, and often do without realizing it. PTSD mirrors other mental illnesses such as depression and anxiety, and can also present as, "I feel fine," when really the "feeling fine" rooted in numbness and avoidance.

I have PTSD as a result of sexual abuse that was perpetrated on me throughout my childhood. Child sexual abuse and sexual assault are very common crimes, yet they are so stigmatized that they receive very little attention in the media from a mental health perspective. It is easier to report on a brave soldier coming home from war with flashbacks of violence than it is to admit that there are a lot of men and women out there suffering from similarly troubling symptoms that relate to their abuse or assault.

Has a traumatic event or episode happened to you, or did you witness one?
The threat of death, serious injury, violence, or sexual assault are all considered traumatic events. Not everyone experiences and perceives an event the same way, so there is no concrete list of events that can cause traumatic responses. It depends on the individual. Witnessing these events can be traumatic too, as can having a close friend or relative who has endured a traumatic event.

Sometimes, victims don't remember that they were exposed to a trauma. Traumatic memories are not processed and stored like regular memories. I didn't realize I had been a victim of sexual abuse as a child until I was an adult. In hindsight, I had a lot of PTSD symptoms even before I knew what had happened to me.

Are you re-experiencing the traumatic event?
The most common and well-known ways of re-experiencing a traumatic event is through flashbacks, intrusive memories and nightmares. There are, however, ways of re-experiencing a trauma that do not involve memories, dreams, or visions of the event.

Before I realized the extent of what had happened to me, I was re-experiencing my trauma -- I just didn't know that I was. Many of the ways I re-experienced the trauma then was through body memories. I would become overwhelmed by a particular emotion or feeling in my body.

Until recently, I was not aware that I was re-experiencing my trauma and I did not know that I was feeling distress or overreacting to a situation because it reminded me in some way of my trauma. While I have flashbacks and nightmares, the primary way I re-experience my trauma is by feeling emotions and physical reactions in my body that do not make sense when I consider what is actually going on around me.

Do you avoid things that remind you of the trauma?
Trauma is scary and disruptive. It is natural to want to avoid situations that might remind us of unpleasant or threatening events. People with PTSD want to avoid places, activities, objects that bring up unpleasant reminders or feelings about the trauma.

People with PTSD tend to avoid thoughts or feelings that related to the trauma. For example, I try to avoid feeling startled, because the adrenaline rush and sudden jolt reminds me of times I wasn't safe. So, while balloons popping have nothing to do with my abuse, the feeling the loud sound brings about does.

Is your memory out of whack? Is your mood off?
Feeling threatened and unsafe causes memories to be formed and stored differently than regular events. Sometimes victims dissociate, or "check out," while the event is going on. Inability to access memories of the event is a feature of PTSD.

Likewise, negative beliefs about the world can be indicative of PTSD. For example, it is easy for me to believe that the world is unsafe and people should not be trusted. While there are many cynical people out there, my belief system is rooted in childhood trauma.

Blame, negative emotions (shame, fear, anger, guilt), lack of interest in activities that were enjoyable pre-trauma, isolation, and the in ability to experience positive emotions are also symptoms of PTSD.

These cognitive and emotional symptoms are among the most confusing and are the reason PTSD is often misdiagnosed. Think about it: You feel sad, don't like to hang out with people, think the world is a bad place, and have few activities you actually like doing. Sounds like depression, right?

Do your reactions catch you off guard? Are you on high alert?
Engaging in destructive or self-injurious behavior are common in people with PTSD. Self-harm, for example, is a way many people cope with their past trauma. Other self-destructive behavior and addictions can be ways of dealing with the fallout as well.

Difficulty sleeping, feeling startled, always being on alert are also symptoms. When my PTSD was at its worst, I was very jumpy and uncomfortable around people. I was always on the lookout. I didn't know what I was looking out for, but I felt very shifty and compelled to notice everything in my environment. I also had so much trouble concentrating that I would get confused about the day of the week, or my route back home if I left the house.

Feeling startled and jumpy can also be symptoms of anxiety, so that is a common misdiagnosis of PTSD, particularly when the person suffering from PTSD is presenting as more agitated than sad and dejected.

Does any of this sound familiar?
When I figured out I had PTSD, I was surprised. I thought I was doing really well for years and years. In hindsight, I was just numb and had a constricted range of feelings, also related to the trauma. Later, my PTSD presented with some of the more dramatic characteristics like flashbacks, nightmares, and extreme emotional reactivity.

It's easy to explain away symptoms as more socially acceptable and common conditions. "Must be depression!" Or, "Oh, I guess I've always been hypersensitive." Those statements are easier to say than, "I think I have PTSD."

If you've been the victim of a traumatic event or episode and have assumed you are struggling with depression or anxiety, or, if you feel you are "over it," but don't feel much of anything when you really think about it, it might be worth familiarizing yourself with the symptoms of PTSD and get in touch with your doctor or a mental health professional who can help. The good news is, there are many effective treatments for PTSD that can improve the way you feel and function.

If you or someone you know has been affected by sexual violence, it's not your fault. You are not alone. Help is available 24/7 through the National Sexual Assault Hotline: 800-656-HOPE and online.rainn.org, y en español: rainn.org/es.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/dani-bostick/ptsd-its-not-just-for-veterans_b_8309184.html

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California

Contra Costa County Zero Tolerance Initiative awarded $1.6 million in federal grants

Contra Costa County's coordinated approach to addressing the devastating impacts of domestic violence, family violence, elder abuse, and human trafficking has been given a financial boost and vote of confidence with the announcement today of two significant federal grants.

United States Attorney General, Loretta Lynch announced $44 million in grant funding for programs across the country that combat human trafficking and support survivors.

Contra Costa County, considered to be among the leaders nationwide in its efforts to end domestic violence and human trafficking, was awarded a $727,364 three year grant so it can build upon its efforts of identifying victims and providing services for children and adults trapped in labor and sex trafficking. Zero Tolerance Chair, Devorah Levine says, “This grant is an endorsement of our accomplishments. It's our responsibility to understand how modern day slavery exists in our community and how to best help victims.”

Also announced today, another $26 million dollars for programs nationwide dealing with domestic violence, sexual assault and stalking. Contra Costa County received a $900,000, three year grant for its programs working with victims and perpetrators. Says Levine, “We are making progress, and an opportunity like this grant, helps catapult our efforts to reach more people.” The money will be used to advocate for victims, offer assistance with restraining orders and law enforcement training. Hiring a full time probation officer to monitor 35-40 high risk domestic violence probationers is among the strategies planned to deescalate violence.

For more information about Contra Costa County Zero Tolerance Initiative, contact Devorah Levine, Chair Domestic Violence and Human Trafficking Initiative dlevine@ehsd.cccounty.us 925-313-1524.

“Zero Tolerance for Domestic Violence”, an initiative of the Contra Costa County Board of Supervisors, is a public/private partnership designed to reduce domestic violence, family violence, elder abuse and human trafficking in Contra Costa County. Authorized by the California Legislature as the first Zero Tolerance for Domestic Violence County in the State, the initiative is aligning policies, practices and protocols, coordinating services, and creating a climate where violence and abuse are not tolerated.

Zero Tolerance functions on the principle that no one entity can do it alone; placing emphasis on public systems and private providers working, advocating and taking concerted action together.

http://antiochherald.com/2015/10/p18350/

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Georgia

Local communities learn to fight back against child sex traffickers

ATLANTA -- The statistics are truly frightening.

Hundreds of young girls are exploited for sex by thousands of men each month. And that's just here in Georgia.

But communities are learning how to fight back. Out of necessity. The business of prostitution is brutal. And it is booming. In fact, experts say sex trafficking is a $300 million industry in Georgia.

When DeKalb County police heard that two underage girls were being used as prostitutes in a local apartment complex, they brought in the swat team. They had to. Pimps don't give up easily. That's why it's so hard for their young victims to escape.

"These predators don't have a type," said Jeanita Demchak. "It's just a young lady or man that they feel that is easily persuaded."

Demchak should know. When she was a college student, she was like many of the young girls who take a chance to earn some money on the street. That was until a pimp kidnapped her to work as a sex slave in South America.

"I thought I was in control I thought I was doing what was easy," she said. "And when I got to that point where I was powerless, that's when the reality hit that I had made a lot of dumb decisions up to this point. And now, how can I make it out alive."

She was one of the lucky ones, because she got away. She told her story Sunday to the community at Ahavath Achim Synagugue in Buckhead.

The good news is that Georgia has become much more aggressive in fighting human trafficking, making many high profile arrests in recent weeks, thanks to tougher laws.

"We actually have other states in the nation that are now copying our safety net system. which is who takes care of the victims," said State Senator Renee Unterman. "(They're) also copying our laws. So, that's very indicative of how much the state of Georgia has invested in this issue."

Unterman says Georgia has gone from a D-rating to a B-plus in cracking down on sex predators. And part of the progress is due to simple meetings like this, where the GBI literally recruits neighbors to watch for signs of the underground sex trade.

Because it can happen anywhere.

"It's our experience that the more training that we do, the more public appearances that we make in this, then there are more leads generated that come to our attention," said Bureau Director Vernon Keenan.

Organizers said the two biggest counties for sex trafficking in the metro area are Fulton and DeKalb - accounting for about half. But the other half is spread throughout the rest of the state showing that no community is immune.

http://www.11alive.com/story/news/local/buckhead/2015/10/18/child-sex-traffickers-gbi-georgia/74200268/

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Colorado

For Colorado Sex Trafficking Victims, Rescue Is Just The Beginning

by Stephanie Wolf

Sex trafficking is modern-day slavery in the eyes of the Federal Bureau of Investigation. So every year, the bureau leads a nationwide crackdown to arrest traffickers and johns and to rescue victims, many of whom are children. Last week, the FBI announced that, in this year's sting, more underage victims were recovered from Colorado and Wyoming than anywhere else in the country.

Special agent in charge Thomas Ravenelle heads the FBI Denver Division. He spoke with Colorado Matters host Ryan Warner about what's next for these young victims and explained how the operation unfolded. Highlights from the conversation are below. Click the audio above to listen to the full interview.

Ravenelle on the conditions these victims often live in:

“They're usually with the trafficker, wherever the trafficker lives. They're made to work long hours, not always fed sufficient amounts of food. The only [money] they see out of the ordeal is what the trafficker provides them -- it might be to have their hair done, their nails done so they can look more presentable out on the streets. Some of them that we [find], they don't even have the basic hygiene products and needs taken care of for cleanliness.”

On how traffickers lure these victims in:

“There are several different angles they can lure them in. They can use the ‘boyfriend approach,' sometimes called the ‘Romeo pimp,' where they pretend that they're their boyfriend and like them. They use that sometimes with combined promises of them giving them a better life. […] They may use food, shelter, even drugs to entice them into this. And these are children that often times have run away from home.”

On what happens to the recovered teens when reuniting them with their families isn't an option:

“Some will go into foster homes. Some into group homes. Others enter residential treatment programs. And some of them will even go into out-of-state facilities… to get care, depending on the safety and security issues. […] There's a lot of counseling.

"Through these homes, there's a guardian assigned to them to watch out for their specific interests and what's best for them. It's a team approach to figure out what this child needs and to set up each child where they can feel like they actually have a future.”

On why the Denver Task Force recovered the most underage victims during the sting:

“We've done outreach and training over the last three years, and we've trained as many as 15,000 people from social service agencies, schools, churches, law enforcement. And these people are the ones that give us the tips, even hospitals.”

California

All-in-one center to help abuse victims opens in Van Nuys

by Sid Garcia

VAN NUYS, LOS ANGELES (KABC) -- A new program designed to help victims of sexual or domestic abuse is up and running in the San Fernando Valley.

A non-descript building in Van Nuys, which is the Family Justice Center, is a safe haven for victims of abuse. Instead of victims heading to different sites for medical, mental and legal help, they can receive it all at the center.

"Anything that happens to these victims, we are able to help them and move them forward and offer all of those services under one roof," said Brian Hammel with the Northridge Hospital Foundation.

In addition to the services, the new center allows police investigators to work on building a case against the person who assaulted an adult or child.

The victims are brought into a comfortable-looking room, which allows the victims to speak more freely about what he or she has gone through. In another room, officers are monitoring the interview.

"We have to hold perpetrators accountable, and the victims and the families need to know that's happening," Los Angeles City Attorney Mike Feuer said.

One survivor said the toughest thing for a victim to do is ask for help, but the hope is that this new facility will make that easier.

"You're not alone and whatever happened to you isn't your fault. People here want to help you. People want to protect you," Bobbie Matthews said. "We've got LAPD here everywhere. I've never felt safer than I do here. So you should come here. Ask for help, it's OK."

There is talk of opening a few more of the facilities in other parts of Los Angeles.

http://abc7.com/news/all-in-one-center-to-help-abuse-victims-opens-in-van-nuys/1039823/

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India

2-Year-Old And 5-Year-Old Gang Raped In Delhi, Rape Epidemic Continues, Global Problem Highlighted

by Denzel Hammett

The unthinkable has again happened in Delhi. The Times of India reports that there were two incidences of rape of minors in the Indian capital on Friday 16 October, 2015. Two men are alleged to have kidnapped and taken away on a a motorbike the 2-year-old and then left her in a nearby park. The infant was left there bleeding profusely and was taken to hospital immediately.

The 5-year-old girl was allegedly raped by three neighbors who have been identified as Prakash, Rewati, and Sitaram.

The Delhi police are under pressure to do more to prevent these atrocities against children, which are becoming commonplace in what has been deemed the “rape capital” of the world. The Time of India reported early on the incident.

“Police say one of the victim in the two separate attacks, a two-and-a-half year old girl, was abducted in west Delhi on Friday night by two men. She was sexually assaulted before being dumped in a park near her home.”

It is reported that both girls are recovering in hospital following the attacks. It was also reported that on 13 October that a 4-Year-Old was brutally raped and left in a communal toilet area. This makes three child rapes of infants in the last four days in Delhi.

Although Delhi is singled out in the media, all major cities across the world have high numbers of rapes. Particularly, the rape of children is a worldwide epidemic, as cities come to grips with the scale of child sexual abuse. According to Victims of Crime, as many as 1 in 5 girls and 1 in 20 boys is a victim of child sexual abuse.

•  Self-report studies show that 20 percent of adult females and 5-10 percent of adult males recall a childhood sexual assault or sexual abuse incident.

•  During a one-year period in the U.S., 16 percent of youth ages 14 to 17 had been sexually victimized.

•  Over the course of their lifetime, 28 percent of U.S. youth ages 14 to 17 had been sexually victimized.

•  Children are most vulnerable to CSA between the ages of 7 and 13. Delhi residents, however, are growing tired of the epidemic of rape against children in the city and have been actively protesting for more power to be transferred to police as well as greater punishment for the perpetrators.

http://www.inquisitr.com/2501706/2-year-old-and-5-year-old-gang-raped-in-delhi-rape-epidemic-continues/

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Pennsylvania

New law spurs sharp increase in child abuse investigations

by Tim Buckwalter

A new state law has led to a doubling of reports of suspected child abuse in Lancaster County this year.

Many of those reports have turned out to be unfounded, but the number of substantiated cases appears to be running about 20 percent ahead of last year.

Through Aug. 15, investigators substantiated 83 cases of abuse, up from 69 cases for the same period in 2014, according to the Lancaster County Children & Youth Agency.

Substantiated cases represent only a small fraction of the total reports received. And those reports have soared under a new law that carries criminal penalties for anyone who regularly works with children and fails to report a suspected case of abuse directly to police, a special state hotline or to child welfare authorities.

“If you suspect abuse you need to call, and that's what people are doing,” said Crystal Natan, Children & Youth's executive director. “They don't want to take a risk.”

More than expected

Natan said she was braced for a 25 to 30 percent increase in reports of suspected abuse after the new law took effect Jan. 1.

Instead, the number of reports quickly doubled, and the pace hasn't let up. Through September, the county received 1,733 reports of suspected abuse, up from 855 for the same period in 2014.

“This is really our new normal,” Natan said. “We're nine months into the year and our numbers really haven't gone down.”

Investigators are required to visit a child within 24 hours of receiving a report, and to complete an investigation in 60 days.

The growing volume of reports prompted an increase in local caseworkers this spring, Natan said, and a request for even more staff next year to ensure that all cases are investigated quickly and thoroughly.

Other help for families

Although the number of substantiated cases of abuse has risen much less than the number of reports, Natan said investigations sometimes lead to other improvements for a child, even when no abuse is found.

That's because investigators may discover issues such as substance abuse, mental illness or domestic violence in the child's household.

And that can lead to monitoring of a risky situation, or referrals for counseling or other services that might help stabilize a family and reduce the likelihood of abuse or neglect in the future.

“Just because something's unfounded doesn't mean that we don't react or respond or find services,” Natan said.

Background checks

The reporting requirement was part of a package of child-protection measures that lawmakers passed in the wake of the Jerry Sandusky child-abuse scandal at Penn State University.

The package also contained provisions requiring child abuse background checks for a much broader group of people who work or volunteer with children.

Those applications for clearances are coming in at more than twice the rate as last year. Through June 30, there were 682,500 requests for clearances statewide, or about 113,750 per month, according to the Department of Human Services. That compared with 587,545 — or 49,000 a month — for all of 2014.

Of those requesting clearances during the first half of the year, 964 turned out to have been named as perpetrators in child abuse reports. That compared with 1,118 such “hits” for all of 2014.

Kait Gillis, a spokeswoman for the Department of Human Services, said the number of reports of suspected child abuse totaled 21,988 statewide from Jan. 1 through June 30, or nearly 40 percent more than the same period last year.

About 11 percent of the reports were substantiated, indicating the total will be up significantly for the year.

For all of 2014, the state received 29,273 reports of suspected abuse, and 11 percent — or 3,340 — were substantiated, according to the DHS annual report.

Backlog cleared

Early in the year, the surge in clearance applications led to a backlog in processing requests for clearances. And that led, in some cases, to delays in when new employees or volunteers who work with children could begin their duties.

Cathy Utz, deputy secretary for the Department of Human Services' Office of Children Youth and Families, said that issue has been resolved through increased staffing and more applicants making use of the department's automated, online system.

Clearances are now routinely being processed by the 14-day deadline, she said.

Utz said the package of bills passed last year amounted to the biggest overhaul in the child welfare system in 20 years. So it's not entirely surprising that those who are mandated to report suspected child abuse are being particularly cautious in the first year “because they want to make sure they are doing the right thing.”

“It's really raised, I think, the level of conversations in the counties, at the state level, (and) in communities on, ‘Are our children being abused?'

Utz said she's confident that many people who work with children will get better at answering that question, and that will result in safer communities for children.

“I think that everyone will learn together what this looks like.”

School impacts

Michael Leichliter, superintendent at the Penn Manor School District, said he didn't have specific numbers but is sure his staff has filed more reports of suspected child abuse this year.

“Anecdotally, I'm reading more reports,” he said.

With the package of 20-plus bills approved by the Legislature, Pennsylvania went from “one of the most loose policies to one of the most stringent” in the nation for protecting children from potential abuse.

The down side, he said, is that adopting so many changes at once “ has made it very confusing and raised the anxiety level of teachers” who have to figure out gray areas without consulting school counselors or other experts.

“There is no further dialogue that's happening with officials who work with it everyday,” Leichliter said. “The report is being instantly filed.”

At Conestoga Valley, superintendent Gerald Huesken said the district hasn't seen an increase in reports of suspected child abuse. But he added that collecting and managing of clearances has put additional demands on CV's human resources staff.

Huesken said he was grateful for some revisions state officials made this year to make clearances more affordable and to delay the requirement until next year for some existing volunteers.

He said CV has not experienced a decline in school volunteers as a result of the new requirements.

http://lancasteronline.com/news/local/new-law-spurs-sharp-increase-in-child-abuse-investigations/article_4faceb76-743c-11e5-9fa4-7fa0214d544e.html

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Emotional abuse: How much do you really know?

by Maria Garrett

Emotional abuse (A.K.A verbal abuse or psychological abuse) can happen to anyone, no matter your age or gender. The definition of emotional abuse being: any act including confinement, isolation, verbal assault, humiliation, intimidation, infantilization, or any other treatment which may diminish the sense of identity, dignity, and self-worth. And while not a lot of people like to talk about such abuse, emotional abuse is actually a lot more common then you might think.

According to child abuse effects about 1,000 women 15 years of age and older, 36% had experienced emotional abuse while growing up; 43% had experienced some form of abuse as children or adolescents; while 39% reported experiencing emotional abuse in a relationship in the past five years. Some people might actually argue that emotional abuse isn't really abuse and that it's better than physical abuse.

While some feel that way, emotional abuse is just as bad as physical abuse. Just because you can't see the scars or the bruises, doesn't mean they aren't there. In fact, not all emotional abuse can come from loved ones or strangers. Sometimes it can very well come from ourselves. And when this happens, it can lead to depression and attempted suicide because the person experiencing this might feel so trapped and low, that taking their own life is the only way out.

But how does one know the signs of what emotional abuse is and what should you do if you know someone or suspect that someone might be in an abusive relationship or yourself? Well according to love is respect, the signs include but are not limited to; calling you names and putting you down, yelling and screaming at you and intentionally embarrassing you in public and preventing you from seeing or talking with friends and family or telling you what to do and wear.

While this is only half of what the signs are, they all still present themselves the same. And while you mostly hear about emotional abuse towards children, adults of all age and genders can also fall victim to this type of abuse.

People often live with emotional abuse for a very long time without getting help. This could be for many reasons. Often the abuse starts small and builds up in severity over time and so it takes a while before the victim truly sees the abuse. The victim might also stay in an emotionally abusive relationship due to marriage vows, kids, finances or weakened self-esteem. And once a person does decide it's time to leave, having more than just a "break up talk" plan is necessary and will involve outside help to protect against the threats and other things the abuser might do to the person leaving the relationship. Staying with an abuser, no matter how much you may love him/her/them, is never a healthy thing because love isn't supposed to hurt.

http://www.examiner.com/article/emotional-abuse-how-much-do-you-really-know

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Iowa

Children are silent victims of domestic abuse

by Mike Brownlee

Even if they're not physically abused, the children of domestic violence victims are affected.

At Catholic Charities Phoenix House, staff and volunteers work to help children and teens deal with the trauma.

“For children who stay with us at the shelter, we're able to provide them with a safe environment where they can be children,” said Katie Choquette, domestic abuse coordinator at Phoenix House, which offers a variety of services for victims of domestic violence and sexual abuse.

October is Domestic Violence Awareness Month.

Typically, victims of domestic violence do their best to care for and protect them children from experiencing violence, according to the Phoenix House. However, children are more aware of the violence than many parents realize and victimized parents have no way to control the actions of non-offending parents.

Being exposed to the characteristics and tactics of a battering parent has negative impacts on the child's physical and emotional well-being, Choquette said. The impact on children depends on many factors that include: the child's age, proximity of the abuse, the frequency and severity of the violence and the child's protective capacity.

“Often times being exposed to different tactics by the battering parent can have some long-term emotional and psychological affects,” Choquette said. “Mental health, substance abuse, thoughts of suicide, long-term trauma.”

Other affects include mixed emotions about parents, taking on adult responsibilities, poor nutrition, sleep disruption, depression/anxiety, self-blame, over/under performing, low self-esteem, withdrawal and isolation, regression (bed wetting or thumb sucking) or acting out.

Choquette talked about tactics the abusive parent sometimes uses against their spouse or significant other, in relation to the children.

“It's about power and control. Domestic violence, it's not just physical abuse. There are ways they can abuse – with threats, intimidation, isolation, using the children,” she said, noting the use of children includes “Undermining authority, passing messages along to the victimized parent and threatening to take kids away.”

Phoenix House works with victims of domestic violence and their children. Advocates work with parents to explain the adverse impact that violence has on children, to create plans to keep themselves and their children safe, as well as teaching victims about how to talk with their children about the violence they have witnessed. The impact of domestic violence is one of the topics for discussion during Journey Beyond Abuse, one of Phoenix House's psycho-educational support group offered on Thursday evenings.

“Know that you're not alone,” Choquette said. “There's help out there for them and their children. We can put them in touch with resources that'll help both mom and the kids.”