JANET STREET PORTER: Your tragic Savile letters show this isn’t just hysteria

JANET STREET PORTER: Your tragic Savile letters show this isn’t just hysteria

By Janet Street Porter

5 November 2012

The BBC has decided not to broadcast repeats of Top Of The Pops hosted by Jimmy Savile, as if belatedly culling the evil court jester from our screens constitutes an act of cultural cleansing.

Since I discussed the scandal on Question Time on October 4, the day after ITV broadcast their shocking documentary, I have received a huge number of emails and letters.

Every day brings more revelations — involving hospitals, prisons and places where vulnerable people thought they were safe….

Stories of abuse going back half a century are being told for the very first time, and there are calls for previous investigations into abuse at children’s homes in Wales and in Jersey to be re-opened.

The initial exposure of Savile has uncovered abuse that seems to have permeated every aspect of society, unacceptable behaviour that those in authority accepted for decades. Only last week, Rick Parfitt of Status Quo blithely told a female journalist ‘everybody was at it’ at Top Of The Pops ‘…there was a lot of groping’.

Yesterday, a newspaper asserted that the unit investigating sexual misconduct at the Corporation has received complaints involving 29 BBC staff and presenters.

Let’s be clear, the media are not pursuing a witch hunt against the BBC (as Jonathan Dimbleby asserts), but responding to the righteous indignation of the mistreated, ordinary men and women who were never believed up to now.

When I said on television that my hairdresser touched me inappropriately when I was about ten or 12, and my mother just slapped me and called me a liar, loads of you recounted similar stories.

They describe being abused as teenagers, never able to tell their stories, or if they did, they were routinely disbelieved. One man kept quiet about being abused by a group of older boys at school until he was in his 60s, and then had a breakdown.

Men and women have written to me who worked in television make-up and costume departments when they were young, who endured routine molesting from big stars with fragile egos as part of the job. This isn’t mass hysteria — we are at the start of a healing process, and the tragedy is that many of the perpetrators are dead.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-2227852/Your-tragic-Jimmy-Savile-letters-isnt-just-hysteria.html

Luis Walker, Air Force Staff Sgt., Faces Sentencing For Rape, Assault, Chile investigating 61 schools for child sex abuse

Luis Walker, Air Force Staff Sgt., Faces Sentencing For Rape, Assault
By WILL WEISSERT 07/21/12

SAN ANTONIO — An Air Force instructor convicted of raping a female recruit and sexually assaulting several others cried Saturday as he asked a military jury not to sentence him to life in prison.

Staff Sgt. Luis Walker is among 12 Lackland Air Force Base instructors investigated for sexual misconduct toward at least 31 female trainees, and he faced the most serious counts among the six instructors charged in a sex scandal that rocked one of the nation’s busiest training bases.

A military jury convicted Walker on Friday on all 28 counts including rape, aggravated sexual contact and multiple counts of aggravated sexual assault. Trial judge Col. Wesley Moore consolidated those charges into 20 on Saturday morning, saying some counts duplicated others, but the change did not affect Walker’s maximum sentence….

Five of the women testified Saturday at Walker’s sentencing, saying they couldn’t sleep or maintain relationships with men after the assaults. They said Walker’s actions eroded their trust in authority and affected their performance at work.

“It’s gotten to where I had anger issues even at work,” said one, who had left the military. “If anyone makes even the slightest sexual reference, I go off. I have zero self-control.”….

The women told jurors during the trial that Walker gained their trust to get them alone in his office or an empty dormitory, where he then forced them into kissing, touching or intercourse. The alleged sexual misconduct among instructors at the base apparently began in 2009, but the first woman didn’t come forward until last year. The women who testified against Walker said they didn’t tell anybody at first because they feared being booted from the Air Force…..

According to prosecutors, Walker had sexual intercourse with four of the 10 female recruits. He was also accused of making flirtatious or sexually suggestive comments, sending inappropriate text messages and sometimes groping his recruits.

Prosecutors also accused Walker of forcing five recruits to engage in sexual acts with him by threatening their military careers, and they said he intimidated two of the women into lying about his alleged misconduct. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/07/21/luis-walker-air-force-sta_n_1691690.html

Chile investigating 61 schools for child sex abuse  July 20, 2012

SANTIAGO, Chile — Chile’s attorney general is investigating 61 schools in the country’s capital for possible child sex abuse….

Attorney general Sabas Chahuan said Friday that his office will look at 49 schools in eastern Santiago and 12 on the capital’s west side. Several teachers have recently been accused of sexually molesting children at day care centers and schools in affluent neighborhoods on the city’s eastern side.

According to official estimates, reports of sexual abuse of children under age 14 jumped 22 percent in the first half of the year, compared to the same period in 2011. http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-501715_162-57477114/chile-investigating-61-schools-for-child-sex-abuse/

Jerry Sandusky trial: Former coach allegedly wrote intimate letters to victims, Child sex-abuse cases under-reported, often ignored

Jerry Sandusky trial: Former coach allegedly wrote intimate letters to victims
Tuesday, Jun 5, 2012 Associated Press and Sporting News staff

Former Penn State coach Jerry Sandusky allegedly sent love letters and gifts to his victims, ABC News reported on the first day of jury selection in Sandusky’s child molestation case.

Known only as Victim 4, one of Sandusky’s eight accusers said he received intimate letters from the former coach. The letters will be read into testimony during the trial, which begins on Monday. Victim 4, who is expected to be the first person to testify, will also show gifts Sandusky gave him during the course of their relationship.

The letters, said to be in Sandusky’s handwriting, are expected to corroborate the accusations of Victim 4, who met Sandusky through the former coach’s Second Mile charity. Victim 4, now 28 years old, is one of seven alleged victims who will testify against Sandusky in the three-week trial.

Ben Andreozzi, Victim 4′s attorney, says the letters will play a key part in the case against Sandusky. “They have evidence to support his allegations, and there’s other evidence that has not been released to the public yet that I think will really resonate with the jury,” Andreozzi told ABC News….

Sandusky, 68, faces 52 criminal counts and potential penalties that could result in an effective life prison sentence for alleged abuse involving 10 boys. He has denied the allegations.
http://aol.sportingnews.com/ncaa-football/story/2012-06-05/jerry-sandusky-trial-jury-selection-sexual-abuse-penn-state

Child sex-abuse cases under-reported, often ignored Saturday, June 2, 2012 Sat Jun 2, 2012   By Bill Heltzel and Halle Stockton

….David Scott Zimmerman’s case is a cautionary tale about what happens when certain patterns of behavior are not recognized and reported. Another boy described abusive sexual conduct by Zimmerman to school officials — three years after the 1995 incident involving the first boy. Vincentian officials immediately suspended Zimmerman, notified police and the county prosecutor, and started their own investigation. Ultimately, 13 boys told police of sexual behavior by Zimmerman. This time, a public scandal engulfed the Catholic high school. Court proceedings show that the school made a deal with Zimmerman to keep quiet about his dismissal if he absolved the school of liability. He also kept his teaching license.

A proposed Pennsylvania law would make confidential deals like the one between Zimmerman and Vincentian impossible. Other states have already acted. Oregon recently passed a law that could make it easier to recognize sexual misconduct. The law, cited as a model, could stop abuse in its early stages. Recent changes in Oregon law were made because of the Sandusky case, officials said. As policymakers consider a response, teachers, parents and students can be alert to recognize classic “grooming” patterns that are precursors to the sexual abuse of children. Another effective step, experts say, is to ban the practice of “passing the trash,” a phrase that describes when a suspected school employee is allowed to resign quietly and without consequences.

“You can stop a lot of this behavior,” said Charol Shakeshaft, an education professor at Virginia Commonwealth University who studies sexual abuse. One of every 10 students becomes a target of sexual misconduct that includes such behavior as unwanted sexual comments, inappropriate touching, and even rape, Shakeshaft said. Yet only about 6 percent of child sexual-abuse cases are reported to authorities, and teachers….

Coaches or teachers suspected of abuse tend to single out students for special treatment, lavishing them with attention and rewards. They become unusually close to children, finding ways to spend time with them privately in school and on trips outside of school.

Recognizing these techniques and reporting them are the keys to stopping predators from abusing children, experts say.
http://www.timesonline.com/news/local_news/child-sex-abuse-cases-under-reported-often-ignored/article_8cf83740-ac23-11e1-842e-001a4bcf6878.html

Jaycee Dugard sues US over failure to monitor abductor

Jaycee Dugard sues US over failure to monitor abductor

Electronic monitoring of Garrido was considered ‘too much of a hassle,’ complaint says
9/22/2011 SAN FRANCISCO

Jaycee Dugard sued the federal government Thursday for failing to monitor the convicted sex offender who kidnapped her and held her captive for 18 years.

The complaint filed in U.S. District Court in San Francisco said the mistakes by federal parole officers in the handling of Phillip Garrido’s case are as “outrageous and inexcusable as they are numerous.”

Had federal parole officers done their jobs, Dugard’s lawyers allege, Dugard and her daughters would not have had to endure their years of captivity in a ramshackle compound tucked inside Garrido’s Antioch backyard.

Garrido, who was convicted in 1977 of raping and kidnapping a 25-year-old woman, was on parole and under federal supervision when he kidnapped Dugard in 1991. He fathered Dugard’s two children while he and his wife, Nancy, held her captive. The pair was been sentenced to prison after pleading guilty to kidnapping and rape charges in the case.

The complaint alleges that the federal government’s negligence allowed Garrido to be free to kidnap Dugard. The complaint said federal authorities were aware he was still dangerous yet failed to revoke his parole and send him back to prison….

It says Garrido tested positive for drugs and alcohol while on parole, a violation for a sex offender, but was never punished. It also says authorities ignored reports of sexual misconduct, including a complaint that Garrido showed up at his former victim’s work and made an “alarming” comment to her.

“Inexplicably, the federal parole authorities responsible for Garrido’s direct supervision disregarded the victim’s concerns as mere hysteria,” the documents say.

After the incident, Garrido’s counselor recommended electronic monitoring, but his parole officer disregarded it as “too much of a hassle,” according to the complaint.

The documents also allege federal parole officers did not follow up on a sexual harassment complaint by one of Garrido’s co-workers….

She and her daughters already have received a $20 million settlement from the state of California for the failings of its law enforcement. The state took over Garrido’s parole supervision in 1999.

Dugard, who was kidnapped when she was 11 years old, was reunited with her family in August 2009.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/44629763/ns/us_news-crime_and_courts/t/jaycee-dugard-sues-us-over-failure-monitor-abductor/

measures to protect students from predators sometimes fail, pattern of abuse

Despite states’ efforts, measures to protect students from predators sometimes fail
By Michael Alison Chandler
Washington Post Staff Writer
Sunday, July 25, 2010  For nearly three decades, Kevin Ricks exploited gaps in a system that is supposed to keep sexual predators out of the classroom. He landed teaching jobs at one school after another — public and private, urban and rural, domestic and foreign — despite mounting evidence of his troubling personal relationships with male students. The emerging portrait of Ricks as a serial sexual abuser raises questions about why schools continued to hire him and what could have been done to stop him….

Maryland, Virginia and other states have long sought to bolster safeguards for students. They have required criminal background checks for prospective school employees, created tougher penalties for sex crimes committed by educators or others in positions of authority, and given employers liability protections to encourage them to speak candidly during reference checks. Many states also have required school systems to file reports when teachers are convicted of sexual crimes or resign amid allegations of abuse, so that their licenses can be reviewed or revoked.

None of these measures stopped Ricks. He held at least 12 teaching positions from 1982 until his arrest in February at Osbourn High School in Manassas….In 2004, a congressionally mandated study estimated that one in 10 students from kindergarten through 12th grade were victims of some form of sexual misconduct by a school employee — from being told a dirty joke or shown pornography to being inappropriately touched or raped. In 2007, an Associated Press investigation found more than 2,500 teachers nationwide had licenses revoked, suspended or denied from 2001 through 2005 because of sexual misconduct. http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/07/24/AR2010072402589.html

Kevin Ricks’ career as teacher, tutor shows pattern of abuse that goes back decades By Josh White, Blaine Harden and Jennifer Buske
Sunday, July 25, 2010  What teachers, parents, students and even his wife didn’t know was that his journals contained decades of dark secrets, a running handwritten commentary of Ricks’s world of obsession, infatuation, pursuit, sexual abuse and international child exploitation. They didn’t know about his library of homemade pornographic videos and explicit photographs capturing his tequila-soaked sex acts with teenage boys he had handpicked. They didn’t know about the makeshift shrine boxes containing mementos of the episodes, including sex toys, soiled tissues and hair trimmings.

Even some of the victims didn’t know they were victims.
A four-month Washington Post investigation of Ricks’s career as a teacher, tutor, foreign exchange host and camp counselor has revealed a pattern of abuse that dates to at least 1978 and has left a trail of victims spanning the globe. But despite the abuse, Ricks moved from one teaching job to the next over nearly 30 years, navigating the nation’s public and private school systems undetected, evading traps designed to catch him.  In some cases, school officials and foreign exchange companies knew of or suspected Ricks’s inappropriate behavior and simply let him go, leaving the next employer with no idea what was coming.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/07/24/AR2010072402605.html

Study: Clergy sexual abuse an ongoing problem

More than 3 percent of adult women who attend religious services at least once a month have been victims of clergy sexual abuse, according to researchers at Baylor University, Waco, Texas. Four percent of respondents said they knew of a close friend or family member who experienced a sexual advance by a clergy member in their congregation, the study said.
Baylor researchers said their report is the largest scientific study into this issue in the U.S. “Because many people are familiar with some of the high-profile cases of sexual misconduct, most people assume that it is just a matter of a few charismatic leaders preying on vulnerable followers,” said Diana Garland, dean of Baylor’s School of Social Work and lead researcher in the study. “What this research tells us, however, is that clergy sexual misconduct with adults is a widespread problem in congregations of all sizes and occurs across denominations.” http://www.thelutheran.org/article/article.cfm?article_id=8572