Saudi Arabia’s Child-Rape Case: Female Activists Fight to Prevent Abuse, Child Abuse in America

Saudi Arabia’s Child-Rape Case: Female Activists Fight to Prevent Abuse

Feb 8, 2013 Christopher Dickey

A monstrous case of abuse in Saudi Arabia shakes the kingdom and strengthens the cause of Saudi women activists.

The torture and murder of 5-year-old Lama Al Ghamdi could hardly have been more horrific—and news of it, repeated in countless Twitter feeds, has enflamed opinion around the world. But the fact that this story of one little girl’s death and one father’s monstrosity went public is also a sign of just how hard women in Saudi Arabia are working to fight the cruel misogyny embedded in the kingdom’s version of Islamic law. And among those women is a daughter of the king….

Fayhan Al Ghamdi, a self-styled Islamic preacher who appears occasionally on local TV shows pontificating about morality, was arrested last year and charged with murder. He told authorities that he had suspected his 5-year old daughter was not a virgin. He had even taken her to a doctor to check. But apparently that had not satisfied him….

Saudi law claims to follow a clear path (sharia) laid out in the Quran, but in practice it’s based on a maze of sayings and traditions (hadith) with as many baffling contradictions as the codes used by lawyers anywhere. According to one reading, a father cannot be held fully accountable for the death of his children; their loss is a punishment for him. So the question arose in the proceedings whether Al Ghamdi could simply pay the mother “blood money” for the loss of her daughter and walk free….

The mother has said she will not accept payment. She has asked that the stepmother be investigated as well, and she has told her advocates that she wants to see her ex-husband executed, which in Saudi Arabia means beheading.

Before the middle of the last decade, domestic violence and child abuse in Saudi Arabia were treated mainly as family affairs. Nobody wanted to talk about them, and if police did bother to investigate suspected crimes, which was rare, they found proof very hard to come by.

But it’s important to remember Saudi Arabia is not the only country where domestic abuse is a hidden crime. Indeed, the United States has the worst record in the industrialized world. According to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, almost five children a day die from neglect or abuse, but according to the U.S. Government Accountability Office, those numbers almost certainly are understated….

http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2013/02/08/saudi-arabia-s-child-rape-case-female-activists-fight-to-prevent-abuse.html

Child Abuse in America
Children are suffering from a hidden epidemic of child abuse and neglect. Every year 3.3 million reports of child abuse are made in the United States involving nearly 6 million children (a report can include multiple children). The United States has the worst record in the industrialized nation – losing five children every day due to abuse-related deaths….Approximately 80% of children that die from abuse are under the age of 4.

http://www.childhelp.org/pages/statistics

Files Show Church Missteps, Evasions With Priests, Josh Powell’s in-laws want law to protect kids, Abuse victims ‘trafficked abroad’

Files Show Church Missteps, Evasions With Priests
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
February 2, 2013

LOS ANGELES (AP) — The Archdiocese of Los Angeles released 12,000 pages of personnel files on sexually abusive priests that Archbishop Jose Gomez described as “brutal and painful reading.” While many of the names of the abusers and accusations against them were known, the files reveal previously undisclosed details of how the church transferred priests out of state, sent them to therapists who wouldn’t report crimes and suppressed information from reaching the public. Lawyers for the archdiocese and priests who objected to the records being released did not return phone calls or an email seeking comment. Among the revelations in the trove of documents:

The church records show the archdiocese maneuvered behind the scenes to avoid a possible lawsuit against a priest over abuse allegations in Los Angeles. In 2007, five former altar boys from Tucson, Ariz., were awarded $1.5 million each as part of the archdiocese’s $660 million clergy-abuse settlement. The five said they were abused by the Rev. Kevin Barmasse, who was sent to Arizona during the 1980s after he’d been accused of child molestation in Los Angeles. The records show Monsignor Thomas Curry told Mahony in a Nov. 10, 1989, confidential memo that “the young boy involved is now about eighteen, so Kevin should certainly not return for another two years by which time the period for filing law suits will have passed.” Later that month, Mahony advised Barmasse to stay away from Los Angeles. “Your presence in this area … would greatly increase the possibility of a suit against you,” Mahony wrote. Barmasse was never criminally prosecuted.

http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/2013/02/02/us/ap-us-california-church-abuse-glance.html

Josh Powell’s in-laws want law to protect kids
February 2, 2013 OLYMPIA — The parents of a missing Utah mother pushed Friday for changes in Washington state laws on custody cases, saying proposed legislation might have prevented the killing of their two grandchildren.

Chuck and Judy Cox testified before a state Senate committee considering a bill that would restrict or block visitation rights for someone who is the subject of a murder investigation.

They told lawmakers the legislation could have changed the course of the case involving their missing daughter, Susan Powell, whose husband, Josh Powell, killed himself and their young kids during a parental visit last year….

http://www.yakimaherald.com/news/yhr/saturday/794502-8/josh-powells-in-laws-want-law-to-protect-kids

Abuse victims ‘trafficked abroad’
Seventies paedophile ring in Barnes extended to Amsterdam, say two men who claim they were abused in brothels
James Hanning , Paul Cahalan Sunday 03 February 2013

Two alleged victims of a sophisticated paedophile ring at the centre of a police investigation claim they were taken on trips to Amsterdam where they were sexually abused in brothels in the 1980s.

One male victim had been taken from the Grafton Close care home in Richmond, south-west London, it is claimed, and, as well as being trafficked in Amsterdam, was rented out to customers at the Elm Guest House, a bed and breakfast nearby. Another man has claimed he was taken to Amsterdam on a different trip.

Police are understood to be looking into the men’s claims as part of Operation Fernbridge, an investigation into historic child abuse set up in the wake of the Jimmy Savile scandal. Detectives are building a picture of the reach of the network – which allegedly used the property – and have seized a number of files from local authorities.

The Elm Guest House in Rocks Lane, Barnes, said to have been frequented in the Seventies and Eighties by prominent peoples including former Tory politicians, is at the centre of the investigation….

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/crime/abuse-victims-trafficked-abroad-8478607.html

Catholic cardinal stripped of duties as LA diocese child abuse files released, America Has an Incest Problem

Catholic cardinal stripped of duties as LA diocese child abuse files released

Retired Roger Mahony is said to have shielded priests accused of child abuse in Catholic archdiocese of Los Angeles
Reuters in Los Angeles     guardian.co.uk, Friday 1 February 2013

The Catholic archdiocese of Los Angeles has removed a top clergyman linked to efforts to conceal abuse as it released thousands on files of priests accused of molesting children.

Archbishop Jose Gomez said he had stripped his predecessor, the retired cardinal Roger Mahony, of all public and administrative duties. “I find these files to be brutal and painful reading. The behaviour described in these files is terribly sad and evil,” Gomez said in a statement released by the US’s largest Catholic archdiocese.

“There is no excuse, no explaining away what happened to these children. The priests involved had the duty to be their spiritual fathers and they failed,” he said.

Mahony’s former top aide, Thomas Curry, also stepped down as bishop of Santa Barbara.

The 12,000 pages of files were made public more than a week after church records relating to 14 priests were unsealed as part of a separate civil suit, showing that church officials plotted to conceal the abuse from law enforcement agencies as late as 1987.

The documents showed that Mahony, 76, and Curry, 70, both worked to send priests accused of abuse out of the state to shield them from scrutiny….

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/feb/01/cardinal-duties-child-abuse-files

America Has an Incest Problem
By Mia Fontaine Jan 24 2013

People are rightly horrified by abuse scandals at Penn State and in the Catholic church. But what about children who are molested by their own family members?

Last year offered plenty of moments to have a sustained national conversation about child sexual abuse: the Jerry Sandusky verdict, the BBC’s Jimmy Savile, Horace Mann’s faculty members, and a slew of slightly less publicized incidents. President Obama missed the opportunity to put this issue on his second-term agenda in his inaugural speech.

Child sexual abuse impacts more Americans annually than cancer, AIDS, gun violence, LGBT inequality, and the mortgage crisis combined—subjects that Obama did cover.

Had he mentioned this issue, he would have been the first president to acknowledge the abuse that occurs in the institution that predates all others: the family. Incest was the first form of institutional abuse, and it remains by far the most widespread.

Here are some statistics that should be familiar to us all, but aren’t, either because they’re too mind-boggling to be absorbed easily, or because they’re not publicized enough. One in three-to-four girls, and one in five-to-seven boys are sexually abused before they turn 18, an overwhelming incidence of which happens within the family. These statistics are well known among industry professionals, who are often quick to add, “and this is a notoriously underreported crime.”

Incest is a subject that makes people recoil. The word alone causes many to squirm, and it’s telling that of all of the individual and groups of perpetrators who’ve made national headlines to date, virtually none have been related to their victims. They’ve been trusted or fatherly figures (some in a more literal sense than others) from institutions close to home, but not actual fathers, step-fathers, uncles, grandfathers, brothers, or cousins (or mothers and female relatives, for that matter). While all abuse is traumatizing, people outside of a child’s home and family—the Sanduskys, the teachers and the priests—account for far fewer cases of child sexual abuse.

To answer the questions always following such scandals—why did the victims remain silent for so long, how and why were the offending adults protected, why weren’t the police involved, how could a whole community be in such denial?—one need only realize that these institutions are mirroring the long-established patterns and responses to sexual abuse within the family. Which are: Deal with it internally instead of seeking legal justice and protection; keep kids quiet while adults remain protected and free to abuse again….

http://www.theatlantic.com/national/archive/2013/01/america-has-an-incest-problem/272459/

Satanic ritual abuse in the UK and Scotland

Satanic ritual abuse in the UK and Scotland

Published on Jan 24, 2013
First of a series looking at expert Laurie Matthew and her work and research in the area of satanic ritual abuse.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hk9TjWIga6k

http::/ww.18u.org.uk
http://www.violenceispreventable.org.uk
http://www.rans.org.uk
http://www.izzyspromise.org.uk

I WAS RAPED AT 13 BY JIMMY SAVILE IN SATANIST RITUAL, Pervert MP Cyril Smith was pals with satanic child sex monster

I WAS RAPED AT 13 BY JIMMY SAVILE IN SATANIST RITUAL
Sunday January 20,2013 By James Fielding

A VICTIM of Jimmy Savile’s satanic abuse told yesterday of her sheer terror as she was tied to an altar and raped by the depraved star during a black mass.

The girl, who we will call Paula Bennett to protect her true identity, was just 13 at the time of the ­sickening attack in 1975.

Now aged 50, Paula still suffers horrific flashbacks and cannot sleep properly. She decided to come forward after we revealed last week how Savile raped two women ­during satanic ceremonies in the Seventies and Eighties.

Recalling her torment, Paula described how Savile was sitting on a throne wearing a mask and robes, clutching a trademark cigar….

Speaking at an address in North London, Paula said: “I was brought in to a dark cellar and made to stand in front of three men in a ­circle, with the man in the middle sitting on a throne-like chair in a bright gown with a cigar in his mouth. A man stood on either side in blue cloaks and masks….

Paula was too traumatised to tell the police. However, she spoke to the Sunday Express after we revealed how Savile raped a 12-year-old girl at a satanic ceremony at Stoke Mandeville Hospital, Buckinghamshire, in 1975 and a 21-year-old woman at a house in central London five years later.

She also took comfort from and praised the courage of the 450 ­victims who came forward as part of the Metropolitan Police’s Operation Yewtree to say they too were abused by Savile.

Paula said: “To speak of it after all those years feels like a great weight has been lifted off me at long last. There are many people all around the world who know exactly what men like Savile are capable of and the time has come to bring these atrocities of sheer evil and depravation to light.”

http://www.express.co.uk/posts/view/371936

Pervert MP Cyril Smith was pals with satanic child sex monster 19 Jan 2013

Victim Michael Roberts reveals his devil-worshipping stepdad Michael Horgan organised abuse

Paedophile MP Cyril Smith was in league with another appalling child sex abuser who set up satanic rituals and raped children as young as TWO, the Sunday People has discovered.

Victim Michael Roberts, 40, today bravely puts aside his right to ­anonymity to tell for the first time how he was only six when he was sexually abused by 29-stone politician Smith.

And shockingly he has revealed his devil-worshipping stepdad Michael Horgan organised the horrendous ordeal. Horgan made a deal with the man who went on to be knighted after years as a ­respected Member of Parliament.

Michael claims Smith, who was also a close pal of Jimmy Savile, told him he had been “a naughty boy” before forcing him to take part in a perverted spanking and groping ritual.

Horgan, who has also used the name Shaun O’Donnell, became known as the High Priest of Satan….

He was jailed for 10 years and placed on the sex offenders’ register after he was found guilty of six sex abuse ­charges in 1992. Smith died in 2010 aged 82.

The twisted pair are believed to have bonded initially over their mutual love for Elvis Presley before finding they also shared a sexual interest in children.

Abusing ­the young and vulnerable became an obsession.

Horgan organised a series of satanic-themed orgies for like-minded paedos….

Never married, Smith’s later years were dogged by rumours about his sexuality and allegations of child abuse.

According to police records, prosecutors were given evidence about him in 1970, 1998 and 1999 but charges were never brought.

He was finally exposed as a ­paedophile in November last year. The Crown Prosecution Service admitted he should have been charged….

http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/pervert-mp-cyril-smith-was-pals-1546290

Criminal investigation launched into paedophile ring involving UK politicians in the 1980s, India’s New Focus on Rape Shows Only the Surface of Women’s Perils

Criminal investigation launched into paedophile ring involving UK politicians in the 1980s
Police launch criminal investigation into MPs’ child sex ring
Martin Hickman Author Biography
Thursday 17 January 2013

Scotland Yard tonight launched a full investigation into allegations that Conservative politicians were members of a paedophile ring which abused children in care the 1980s.

Operation Fernbridge will centre on the alleged historic sexual abuse of children at Elm Guest House, in Rocks Lane, a suburban street in Barnes, south-west London.

Residents of a nearby care home run by Richmond Council claim they were sexually assaulted at the property by a network of prominent individuals, including Tory MPs, who used their connections to escape justice….

Saying that the file contained “clear intelligence of a widespread paedophile ring”, Mr Watson said at Prime Minister’s Questions: “One of its members boasts of a link to a senior aide of a former Prime Minister, who says he could smuggle indecent images of children from abroad….

In a short statement, Scotland Yard said: “The Metropolitan Police Service have today, Thursday 17 January, launched an investigation, Operation Fernbridge, into historic allegations of child abuse in the early 1980s at the Elm Guest House, Rocks Lane, Barnes, London.

“The investigation will be led by the Child Abuse Investigation Command.”

The statement went on: “The allegations under Operation Fernbridge were initially assessed under Operation Fairbank which was information passed to police by MP Tom Watson. Operation Fernbridge reached the threshold for a criminal investigation.
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/crime/police-launch-criminal-investigation-into-mps-child-sex-ring-8456434.html

India’s New Focus on Rape Shows Only the Surface of Women’s Perils
January 13, 2013
By GARDINER HARRIS / The New York Times

NEW DELHI — Harassed for years by her husband and his relatives, an Indian woman was finally kidnapped, raped, strangled and tossed into a ditch.

For more than a year, the woman’s father has tried without success to get the police to arrest those accused of killing her, including her husband, who were charged but remain at large. The father, Subedar Akhileshar Kumar Singh, an army officer, says he believes his daughter was killed because her in-laws were not satisfied with her dowry, according to an article on Thursday in The Indian Express.

Such crimes are routine in this country, where researchers estimate that anywhere from 25,000 to 100,000 women a year are killed over dowry disputes. Many are burned alive in a particularly grisly form of retribution.

While a horrific gang rape in New Delhi has transfixed India and drawn attention to a violent epidemic, rape is just one facet of a broad range of violence and discrimination that leads to the deaths of almost two million women a year, researchers say. Among the causes are not only sexual violence but also domestic violence, family disputes and female infanticide, as well as infant neglect and poor care of the elderly that affect girls and women far more than boys and men….
http://www.post-gazette.com/stories/news/world/indias-new-focus-on-rape-shows-only-the-surface-of-womens-perils-670266/

 

Jimmy Savile Satanic Sex Ring Claim: Star ‘Worshipped Devil’

Jimmy Savile Satanic Sex Ring Claim: Star ‘Worshipped Devil’
By Dominic Gover January 13, 2013

…Jimmy Savile sexually abused vulnerable girls during sinister black masses, it has been claimed.

The BBC star dressed in black robes during the rituals which allegedly took place in the basement of Stoke Mandeville hospital, in 1975.

Five years later, the Jim’ll Fix It star supposedly took part in more satanic abuse at a plush London residence. A 21-year-old was reportedly forced to take part in an orgy in a room decked out with satanic symbols.

Disgraced Savile hid his face with a mask during the abuse, but was identified by the 12-year-old victim in the Stoke Mandeville case. She spotted his distinctive white hair sprouting from beneath the garments and recognised his voice….
http://www.ibtimes.co.uk/articles/423569/20130113/jimmy-savile-satan-sex-abuse.htm

Jimmy Savile assaulted children as young as 10, report reveals, German Bishops Cancel Study Into Sexual Abuse by Priests, Rape Has a Purpose – Oppression

Jimmy Savile assaulted children as young as 10, report reveals
Police gather evidence of over 200 crimes in institutions visited by DJ, including children’s hospice
Sandra Laville and Josh Halliday  The Guardian, Thursday 10 January 2013

Jimmy Savile sexually assaulted children as young as 10 during nearly four decades of activity as a paedophile that took place in a string of institutions, including numerous hospitals, prisons and the BBC, the official inquiry by the Metropolitan police and the NSPCC will say on Friday.

The 30-page report, Giving Victims a Voice, will describe how the celebrity abused up to 500 children and young people, and may have raped more than 30.

Of the allegations made so far, police have gathered sufficient evidence to record 200 sexually related crimes by Savile across the country, committed using the power of his personality and fame to dupe a huge number of institutions – including, it is understood, at least one hospice – into giving him access to vulnerable people.

The number of institutions identified in the inquiry raises the spectre of a systemic failure that spread into every corner of British society.

Detectives and child protection experts working on the inquiry into Savile hope the report will mark a line in the sand – a cultural shift in attitudes between today and 30 years ago, when a blind eye was turned to such activity with children and young people and victims were not listened to.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2013/jan/10/jimmy-savile-abuse-inquiry-published

German Bishops Cancel Study Into Sexual Abuse by Priests
By REUTERS January 9, 2013
PARIS (Reuters) — Germany’s Roman Catholic bishops on Wednesday canceled a study into the sexual abuse of minors by priests, prompting the investigator to accuse them of trying to censor what was to be a major report on the scandals.
The independent study, examining church files that sometimes date to 1945, was meant to shed light on undiscovered cases after about 600 people filed claims against priests in 2010 following a wave of revelations of sexual abuse. The German scandals were part of a series of abuse scandals that also shook the Catholic Church in Ireland, Belgium, the Netherlands and the United States, forcing Pope Benedict XVI to issue a public apology.

Bishop Stephan Ackermann, a spokesman on abuse issues for the German Bishops’ Conference, said that the hierarchy had lost confidence in the researcher, Christian Pfeiffer, a criminologist, and that it would look for another specialist for the study.

“We will have to find a new partner,” Bishop Ackermann said in a statement that blamed Mr. Pfeiffer’s “communications behavior with church officials” for the breakdown.

Mr. Pfeiffer told German Radio that the bishops wanted to change previously agreed-upon guidelines for the project to include a final veto over publishing its results, which he could not accept.

Officials made “an attempt to turn the whole contract towards censorship and stronger control by the church,” said Mr. Pfeiffer, head of the Criminological Research Institute of Lower Saxony.
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/01/10/world/europe/german-bishops-cancel-study-into-sexual-abuse-by-priests.html

Rape Has a Purpose 1/05/2013 Soraya Chemaly

….No matter where you are in the world, the result of rape — “date rape,” “gang-rape,” “easy rape,” “emergency rape,” “war rape” — is the same: oppression. Women are not free to live without the constant threat of assault and violence or without being treated like objects and property.  When I last checked there were at least four “rape capitals” of the world. You know what that makes the rest of us? “Rape Suburbs.” Girls and women aren’t idiots. On the contrary, we understand perfectly: we’re supposed to “be careful.” Don’t do something we might “regret.”  “Stay home.” “So what if it happens, anyway?” We can’t feel any security that our bodily integrity will be respected. Or that our consent matters. We cannot enjoy the confident access and ownership of public space that men do. Our attempts to pursue equality and opportunity are inhibited, not only by actual rape, but by people’s malevolent tolerance for it. Rape is useful, even the rape of boys and men: it sustains a system that rewards physical dominance and sustains male hegemony.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/soraya-chemaly/syrian-rape-and-chemical-_b_2370638.html

Survivorship Ritual Abuse and Child Abuse 2013 Conference – Survivors Moving Forward

Survivorship Ritual Abuse and Child Abuse 2013 Conference – Survivors Moving Forward

Two days of survivor and professional workshops, a safe room, great price, good food, safe environment, a chance to mingle with others who share your experience, join together in this unique opportunity to bring the movement forward…

On May 4 – 5, 2013
Survivorship will hold a conference at
Executive Inn & Suite
1755 Embaracadero
Oakland, CA 94606 http://www.executiveinnoakland.com

Survivorship

Survivorship is one of the oldest and most respected organizations supporting survivors of extreme child abuse, including sadistic sexual abuse, ritualistic abuse, mind control, and torture.

Survivorship provides resources, healing, and Survivorship community for survivors; training and education for professionals who may serve survivors; and support for survivors’ partners and other allies. The organization functions as a lifeline for survivors who may be isolated emotionally or geographically. Through community outreach and training, Survivorship also raises awareness about these difficult issues.

The purpose of the conference will be to help survivors of ritual abuse and their allies. The conference will be for survivors, cosurvivors, helping professionals and others interested in this topic.

This year our keynote speaker is Steve Frankel.

Steve Frankel is a Board Certified Clinical and Forensic Psychologist and an Attorney at Law, who practices both professions in San Francisco’s East Bay.  A Clinical Prof. of Psychology at USC, he began recognizing childhood trauma in his adult patient case-load in 1980 and has specialized in working with that population ever since.  He joined the Int’l. Society for the Study of Trauma & Dissociation in the 1990s and was the consultant to the Trauma Program at Del Amo Hospital from 1993 until 2001.  He was President of the ISSTD in 2002 and has been active in developing and teaching courses in trauma treatment as well as publishing chapters in books and professional journals in the trauma field.

His presentation is:
“Validation: science is (finally!) catching up to what survivors and clinicians have known for years.”

Survivorship 2013 conference application for attendees:

To receive the application form please contact us either by e-mail: conference2013reg@survivorship.org
or postal mail:

Survivorship
Family Justice Center
470 27th Street
Oakland, CA 94612 USA

Please wait for acknowledgment from Survivorship before submitting your payment.
Survivorship reserves the right to limit attendance to protect the safety and security of the conference participants.

Cost of conference:

Low income: $100 for both days/$50 for one day
Regular participant: $175 for both days/$100 for one day
Professional participant: $225 for both days/$125 for one day.

Executive Inn & Suite
Hotel rates are $109-$129 a night. Here is how you get the Survivorship rates and rooms:
go to: www.executiveinnoakland.com
go to: book now
enter: arrival and departure date
enter: GR296ZA
click on: check availability
click on: continue
click on: book reservation.

To cosponsor this conference email: conference2013cosp@survivorship.org

To link directly to this page: http://survivorship.org/2013conference.html

In order to protect the health of conference attendees with environmental illness, please do not wear fragranced products (including “natural” fragrances) or clothes laundered in fragranced products to the Survivorship conference. Thank you.

India rape case, rape case loophole, pedophilia article reply, abuse convictions

- India victim’s male friend recounts Delhi rape attack
- Delhi women ‘carry knives’ on board buses
- US rape case loophole prompts uproar
- A response to Jon Henley’s article on paedophilia
- 123 child victims of Internet sex abuse identified — one just 19 days old, US officials say
- Proof that children can be brainwashed into believing sadistic abuse is ‘horseplay’
- Robert Sullivan “Worst case I’ve ever heard”: Judge blasts sadistic paedophile who used young girls as “playthings”
- Website to boost rape reporting in London

India victim’s male friend recounts Delhi rape attack 4 January 2013
The victim’s friend, who witnessed the attack, speaks to Zee News
The friend of a woman who died after being raped on a bus in Delhi has given his first interview since the incident.

The man, who has not been named, told Zee News how he and the victim had boarded the bus and paid a fare, before he was beaten unconscious by men on board, who then attacked her.

He also criticised police for their slow response to the attack.
The woman died of her injuries last weekend, and five men are due to stand trial for her murder and rape. The five could face the death penalty if they are convicted. A sixth suspect is expected to be tried in a juvenile court.

The friend said the bus had tinted windows, and that he believed the group of men had laid a trap for them. “We tried to resist them. Even my friend fought with them, she tried to save me,” he said. She tried to dial the police control room number 100, but the accused snatched her mobile away.”

He confirmed earlier reports that the assailants had thrown them off the bus and tried to run them over. And he also criticised the authorities, accusing them of being slow to arrive, then arguing over jurisdiction, and eventually taking them to the wrong hospital.

“My friend was bleeding profusely. But instead of taking us to a nearby hospital, they [police] took us to a hospital that was far away,” he said….
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-india-20916131

Delhi women ‘carry knives’ on board buses  3 January 2013
Indian authorities have charged five men with the kidnap, gang-rape and murder of a woman in Delhi last month.
The 23-year-old was travelling on a bus when the men beat her and her companion with iron bars, raped her for nearly an hour and then threw them out of the moving bus into the street, say police.
The attack has sparked mass protests in India and there have been calls to improve safety for women….
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-20903937

US rape case loophole prompts uproar  4 January 2013
California lawmakers have vowed to close a loophole that allowed a man’s rape conviction to be overturned because his victim was not married.

An arcane state law says a person who gets consent for sex by pretending to be someone else is guilty of rape only if posing as the victim’s spouse.

Julio Morales was initially convicted of rape after pretending to be the unmarried victim’s boyfriend. A similar loophole has already been closed in the state of Idaho.

In the California case from four years ago, Morales went into a room and had sex with an 18-year-old woman after her boyfriend, whom she had fallen asleep beside, had left….

In its ruling on Wednesday, the California appeal court reluctantly decided that Morales was not guilty of rape, because he was pretending to be the woman’s boyfriend and not her husband.  A law dating back to 1872 makes it a crime for a man to have sex with a woman while posing as her husband, but not as a boyfriend….
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-20918642

A response to Jon Henley’s article on paedophilia  Tom Watson MP January 4th, 2013
Jon Henley had a piece in yesterday’s Guardian, entitled “Paedophilia: bringing dark desires to light”. He’s received a furious response on social media and I can see why. Many involved child protection will find it hard to see it as anything other than the commentariat’s backlash, a contrarian response to a public outcry over recent revelations about child abuse by the rich and famous….

My main argument against this article is that this approach ignores the evidence of the experiences of abused children, the experiences of adult survivors of child abuse and the experiences of many professionals who work to protect children. It is a risky strategy at the current time because so many of those who promoted the rights of the ‘paedophile’ have in later years been convicted of sexual crimes against children. Equally, so many of those whom this lobby attacked have been vindicated in their efforts to protect and gain justice for children and survivors….

No wonder many more enlightened academics like Dr Liz Davies talk of the “child sex abuse lobby”. She argues some academic writings have to be located in the context of what is known about those who spread those viewpoints and their agendas. Their views were clearly expressed in a document dated 1975 where Paedophile Information Exchange submitted evidence to the Home Office.This proposed abolition of the age of consent and the removal of consensual sexual activity at all ages from the criminal law….

In order to sexually abuse a child a perpetrator will often groom the child and so it is not uncommon for a child to have some positive feelings towards the person harming them. The perpetrator may also be someone who is close to them and the child wants the abuse to stop but does not want to lose the relationship. This is no way suggests that the abuse is justifiable. In fact a state of confused emotions and responses adds to the severity of the trauma experienced by the child. That this is not obvious to Jon Henley is alarming to me.

Whether or not a child voluntarily entered into sexual relations with their abuser, and how positive or negative they felt about it at the time, is irrelevant when it comes to both the long-term effects of child sex abuse, and how seriously we should treat the abuse. Even if it is true that for some survivors of this type of consensual abuse there were no “undesirable outcomes” (though this is surely hard to quantify), this is certainly not true for all, or even many, if any, children who entered into abusive relationships voluntarily; and to draw a distinction between children who were violently abused and children who submitted willingly is irresponsible and damaging when children who submitted willingly are already more likely to feel shame, self-blame and not seek help due to their belief it was their own fault….

Survivors of child sex abuse commonly suffer from depression, anxiety disorders, panic attacks, phobias, flashbacks, disturbing thoughts, intrusive memories, self-harming, alcoholism, eating disorders, and feelings of shame, anger and worthlessness. This is the reality, but Jon Henley doesn’t voice it in his piece.
http://www.tom-watson.co.uk/2013/01/6445

123 child victims of Internet sex abuse identified — one just 19 days old, US officials say By Andrew Mach, NBC News
In just over a month, more than 120 sexually exploited children — one just 19 days old — were identified in an international operation that found them depicted in child pornography on the Internet, U.S. officials said Thursday.

In Operation Sunflower, led by agents from Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s Homeland Security Investigation unit from Nov. 1 to Dec. 7, 123 victims of child sexual exploitation were identified, ICE Director John Morton said at a press conference in Washington.

Of that group, 44 children had been living with their abusers, and 79 children were exploited by people outside of their home or were victimized as children and are now adults. Seventy female and 53 male victims rescued; 110 of the victims were identified in 19 U.S. states and the rest were identified in six foreign countries….

Of the victims identified during Operation Sunflower, five were under the age of 3, and one of those was just 19 days old. Thirty others were below the age of 10, officials said….
http://usnews.nbcnews.com/_news/2013/01/03/16327023-123-child-victims-of-internet-sex-abuse-identified-one-just-19-days-old-us-officials-say

Proof that children can be brainwashed into believing sadistic abuse is ‘horseplay’
Parents who ‘brainwashed’ their three children to hide years of horrific abuse face jail

The Chorley, Lancashire, couple, who cannot be named for legal reasons, subjected their children to years of abuse but convinced them that their sadistic punishments were ‘horseplay’
The parents were convicted of four counts of child cruelty having previously admitted five similar offences
By Nazia Parveen  6 December 2012

A care-home worker and her husband who subjected their children to years of horrific abuse were facing jail yesterday after being convicted of cruelty.

The couple hid their crimes for years by lying to social services and ‘brainwashing’ their daughter and two sons into believing their sadistic punishments were ‘horseplay’, a court heard….
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2244335/Parents-brainwashed-children-hide-years-horrific-abuse-face-jail.html

Robert Sullivan “Worst case I’ve ever heard”: Judge blasts sadistic paedophile who used young girls as “playthings” By Luke Traynor 4 Jan 2013  One of his two victims was four when he first assaulted her

….The court heard the defendant used the girls as “playthings” to fulfil his own sexual gratification in a “cycle of violent and sadistic behaviour.”
The abuse went on between 1977 and 1984.
Sullivan was arrested in 2009 but went on the run for 22 months before being caught last July. He admitted 25 sex charges, including nine rapes….
http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/robert-sullivan-sadistic-paedophile-jailed-1517508

Website to boost rape reporting in London 5 December 2012
A website aimed at boosting the number of reported rapes has been launched by the Metropolitan Police. Called My Decision, the site provides a step-by-step guide for anyone who has been raped or sexually assaulted.

It is designed to overcome barriers people may have to reporting such crimes – for example victims fearing they would not be believed. According to the Met only one in five rape victims go to the police and about 40% choose not to report it.

The Rape Crisis charity welcomed the fact the website will give information and answer victims’ questions, but said it lacks links to “crucial support services”….
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-london-20605215