Military Deployment Tied to Greater Odds of Child Abuse, Neglect, Drexel, Bryant U. rescind honorary degrees for Bill Cosby
November 13, 2015 Comments Off on Military Deployment Tied to Greater Odds of Child Abuse, Neglect, Drexel, Bryant U. rescind honorary degrees for Bill Cosby
Military Deployment Tied to Greater Odds of Child Abuse, Neglect
Periods during and just after deployment are highest risk, study finds
By Tara Haelle
HealthDay Reporter
THURSDAY, Nov. 12, 2015 (HealthDay News) — Young children of U.S. Army soldiers may have a higher risk of abuse or neglect during and just after a parent is deployed abroad, a new study finds.
“The findings are not that surprising because a family experiences enormous stress when a soldier goes off on a deployment,” said Dr. Bob Sege, a pediatrician specializing in child abuse and vice president of Health Resources in Action, in Boston.
“The men and women who go off to fight for us are doing very admirable work, and it’s not a surprise that it’s stressful for their families,” Sege said.
Other kinds of stress, such as extreme poverty, partner abuse and postpartum depression, are already known to increase the risk of child abuse, said Sege, who wasn’t involved in this research.
“This study confirms the family stress theory of what causes child maltreatment,” Sege said. “That’s important because I think many people feel that people who maltreat their children are morally deficient. But, those of us in the field know that often, they’re just really stressed out beyond their capacity to deal with their situation.”
It’s important to note that the study’s design only shows a link between deployment and child abuse, it cannot prove a cause-and-effect relationship.
Findings from the study were published online Nov. 12 in the American Journal of Public Health….
The study focused on children under age 2 because they are at the highest risk for abuse or neglect, the authors said.
The rates of maltreatment hovered around 0.5 percent among children of soldiers who had been deployed once or twice. However, the rates were higher during and just after deployment compared to the six months before deployment.
In families of soldiers deployed once, nearly four episodes of abuse or neglect occurred per 10,000 children per month during deployment. That compared to three episodes in the six months before deployment. And, in the six months after deployment, the rate was almost 4.5 episodes per 10,000 children, the study found.
In families of soldiers deployed twice, the highest rate of abuse and neglect occurred during the second deployment, at a rate of nearly five episodes per 10,000 children per month, the research revealed….
http://consumer.healthday.com/public-health-information-30/family-health-news-749/military-deployment-ups-odds-of-child-abuse-neglect-705209.html
Drexel, Bryant U. rescind honorary degrees for Bill Cosby
PHILADELPHIA — Drexel and Bryant universities have joined a number of schools in rescinding honorary degrees awarded to Bill Cosby, citing accusations of sexual assault.
Drexel President John Fry says the misconduct that came to light in a deposition Cosby gave “stands in clear opposition” to the Philadelphia school’s values.
He said in a letter Thursday to the Drexel community that universities are “critical arenas” in addressing sexual violence and Drexel takes that responsibility seriously.
Rhode Island-based Bryant said on its website Thursday that Cosby’s “egregious conduct” is “inconsistent with the character, values and behavior” it expects of the holder of an honorary degree.
It said that by revoking Cosby’s degree, it upholds the values, character and mission of the Smithfield school.
The comedian has never been charged with a crime and has denied allegations that he drugged and sexually assaulted women.
http://www.wral.com/drexel-university-rescinds-honorary-degree-for-bill-cosby/15104137/
Focus in alleged satanic rape case, Measuring child abuse’s legacy, Sexual abuse and neglect may be passed down
March 27, 2015 Comments Off on Focus in alleged satanic rape case, Measuring child abuse’s legacy, Sexual abuse and neglect may be passed down
“the first large, longitudinal study to track how victims of child abuse treat their own children has found little evidence of a cycle of violence, but suggests that sexual abuse and neglect may indeed be passed down the generations.”
Porn focus in alleged satanic rape case
March 26 2015 By Shain Germaner
Johannesburg – Police are scanning the electronic devices belonging to four people, including a church pastor, accused of raping a 9-year-old boy in an alleged satanic ritual.
This is to determine if they contain any illegal pornography.
This emerged in the Germiston Magistrate’s Court on Wednesday, when the 9-year-old’s grandparents, uncle and pastor appeared on charges of the alleged rape.
While a trial date was expected to be set, the court heard that the police needed time to download the data of all four accused’s cellphones and laptops to search for child porn and other evidence.
The group were arrested last month. Police suspect they brought the then 7-year-old to the Full Gospel Church of God in Witfield, Boksburg, in 2013.
At the venue, the four, clad in red robes and chanting, allegedly forced the boy to fondle their genitals before the uncle is said to have raped the boy….
http://www.iol.co.za/news/crime-courts/porn-focus-in-alleged-satanic-rape-case-1.1837340#.VRTHr5M0OMI
Measuring child abuse’s legacy
Emily Underwood
Science 27 March 2015:
Vol. 347 no. 6229 p. 1408
DOI: 10.1126/science.347.6229.1408
The notion that victims of physical abuse as kids are more likely to abuse their own children, often described as the “cycle of violence,” is widely held but sparsely documented. Now, the first large, longitudinal study to track how victims of child abuse treat their own children has found little evidence of a cycle of violence, but suggests that sexual abuse and neglect may indeed be passed down the generations. The study, published this week in Science, also makes a controversial claim: that heightened surveillance of families with a history of abuse may have biased some studies taken as evidence for the cycle of violence.
http://www.sciencemag.org/content/347/6229/1408.summary
Abused Kids Not Destined to Be Abusive Parents, Study Finds
By Amy Norton HealthDay Reporter
THURSDAY, March 26, 2015 (HealthDay News) — Conventional wisdom says that abused children often grow up to be abusive parents, but a 30-year study of American families suggests it’s more complicated than that.
In one striking finding, researchers uncovered little evidence that physical abuse is passed from one generation to the next.
“That was extremely surprising,” said lead researcher Cathy Spatz Widom, a professor of psychology at John Jay College of Criminal Justice, in New York City. “The theory has been that children of parents who were abused are at increased risk of physical abuse.”
That theory has been supported by past research. But, Widom explained, those studies have been hampered by limitations, such as working “backward” — starting with parents accused of abuse, and asking them if they’d been mistreated as kids.
“The problem there is, you miss the parents who were abused but did not go on to have these issues,” Widom explained.
Her study, published in the March 27 issue of Science, followed two generations of families, including over 1,100 parents and their kids. More than half of the parents had been abused or neglected as children, back in the 1960s and 1970s; the rest had no history of abuse, but were from similar backgrounds.
To see whether the children of abused parents were at risk, Widom’s team used three sources: Records from child protective services (CPS); interviews with parents; and interviews with their children once they were young adults.
Overall, the researchers found, children of abused parents were at no greater risk of physical abuse. And that was true whether the information came from parents’ or children’s reports, or CPS records.
Based on CPS reports, for example, almost 7 percent of kids born to abused parents suffered physical abuse, versus just over 5 percent of the comparison group — a difference that was not statistically significant.
In contrast, children of abused parents were at higher risk of sexual abuse or neglect, the finding showed.
http://health.usnews.com/health-news/articles/2015/03/26/abused-kids-not-destined-to-be-abusive-parents-study-finds
Vatican Arrests Former Archbishop On Child Abuse Charges, Don’t turn a blind eye to child abuse or neglect
September 25, 2014 Comments Off on Vatican Arrests Former Archbishop On Child Abuse Charges, Don’t turn a blind eye to child abuse or neglect
Vatican Arrests Former Archbishop On Child Abuse Charges
September 24, 2014
Jozef Wesolowski is the first high-ranking Vatican official to face criminal charges for sexually abusing children. Steve Inskeep talks to Joshua McElwee of the National Catholic Reporter.
….Vatican City, the home of the Catholic Church, is also a tiny, independent nation with its own laws. And today, one of its citizens is under house arrest. The Vatican took former Archbishop Jozef Wesolowski into custody. He had already been defrocked in June. All of this follows allegations that he sexually abused young boys while he was the Vatican’s ambassador to the Dominican Republic. He’s going to stand trial on a Vatican criminal court. Joshua McElwee, who is Vatican bureau chief for The National Catholic Reporter, is covering this story.
….Well, the Vatican had acted a couple months ago. What they’d done is they laicized Wesolowski, who was an archbishop, which basically made him a normal Catholic. He’s no longer a priest. He’s no longer an archbishop. And now they’re saying that they’re prosecuting him according to the laws of the Vatican City State for, apparently, accusations of abuse in the Dominican Republic.
http://www.npr.org/2014/09/24/351074916/vatican-arrests-former-archbishop-on-child-abuse-charges
Don’t turn a blind eye to child abuse or neglect
By Yvonne Abraham Globe Columnist September 21, 2014
How is it possible that Erika Murray’s oldest children went to school, had friends, and saw relatives, yet nobody raised the alarm about the horrors filling their Blackstone home?….
It all went to hell the summer before Spadaro turned 11, when she found her mother on the floor, in seizures. Doctors removed a brain tumor, leaving her mother with impaired judgment and impulse control, and dependent on sedatives.Her father, who had broken his hip and quit work years earlier, was also heavily medicated. Depressed, and with strained finances, her parents mixed alcohol with the drugs, descending into addiction.
“That combination of the unwashed people and the unwashed pets and the food that may be halfway round the bend,” recalled Spadaro, now 48. “You learn to function with the smell, but I don’t think you ever stop noticing it.”
She did what many kids do in these situations: She became the parent, at 11. She remembers trying to clear some of the mess away, hauling trash to the garage, and cleaning up after the beagle. For meals, she warmed frozen pizza in a toaster oven. She did laundry so that she and her sister — several years younger — would look presentable.
“I tried to keep things as best I could, but I could not be in charge of two parents, a younger sibling, and the pet,” she said.
For three years, none of the many adults in their lives came to their rescue….
Three years after the spiral began, her mother’s family took the girls in. Spadaro does not know why they decided to intervene then, and not sooner….
Several times, though, neighbors complained about pets being mistreated at the home. There was only one call about the children, found to be unsubstantiated. How those kids must have envied the dogs…..
http://www.bostonglobe.com/metro/2014/09/20/don-turn-blind-eye-child-abuse-neglect/d1OaB8XQbdqPXdaoERXf8J/story.html
1 in 8 Children Will Be Maltreated, Study Says, Priest Accused of Abuse in U.S. Rises Again in Paraguay
June 5, 2014 Comments Off on 1 in 8 Children Will Be Maltreated, Study Says, Priest Accused of Abuse in U.S. Rises Again in Paraguay
1 in 8 Children Will Be Maltreated, Study Says
The numbers are even higher for African-American and Native American children.
By Allie Bidwell June 2, 2014
The number of children who experience a confirmed case of maltreatment in their lifetime could be much higher than previous estimates, according to a new study released by Yale University on Monday.
Maltreatment – which can come in the form of neglect or physical, sexual or emotional abuse – is also known to have negative physical and mental health outcomes for children, including improper brain development, lower language development and impaired cognitive abilities.
More than 12 percent of American children will experience a confirmed case of maltreatment by the time they turn 18, the study found. Among African-American and Native American children, the numbers were even higher: 1 in 5 black children and 1 in 7 Native American children experienced maltreatment during that time, according to the study, published in the journal JAMA Pediatrics.
Still, the actual number of child maltreatment incidents is likely much higher, says Christopher Wildeman, an associate professor of sociology at Yale. The 12.5 percent estimate he and his colleagues determined is “the absolute floor,” he says, because confirming maltreatment cases is such a complicated process.
“The bar for getting to the point that you have a confirmed maltreatment case is very, very high,” Wildeman says. “The fact that 12.5 percent is actually a drastic underestimate is pretty concerning.”….
http://www.usnews.com/news/articles/2014/06/02/study-1-in-8-american-children-will-experience-maltreatment-by-age-18
The Prevalence of Confirmed Maltreatment Among US Children, 2004 to 2011 ONLINE FIRST
Christopher Wildeman, PhD1; Natalia Emanuel, BA2; John M. Leventhal, MD3; Emily Putnam-Hornstein, PhD, MSSW4,5; Jane Waldfogel, PhD, MED6; Hedwig Lee, PhD7
JAMA Pediatr. Published online June 02, 2014. doi:10.1001/jamapediatrics.2014.410
Importance Child maltreatment is a risk factor for poor health throughout the life course. Existing estimates of the proportion of the US population maltreated during childhood are based on retrospective self-reports. Records of officially confirmed maltreatment have been used to produce annual rather than cumulative counts of maltreated individuals….
Conclusions and Relevance Annual rates of confirmed child maltreatment dramatically understate the cumulative number of children confirmed to be maltreated during childhood. Our findings indicate that maltreatment will be confirmed for 1 in 8 US children by 18 years of age, far greater than the 1 in 100 children whose maltreatment is confirmed annually. For black children, the cumulative prevalence is 1 in 5; for Native American children, 1 in 7.
http://archpedi.jamanetwork.com/article.aspx?articleid=1876686
Priest Accused of Abuse in U.S. Rises Again in Paraguay
By Will Carless, GlobalPost
Father Carlos Urrutigoity glides into the sanctuary, his ivory and scarlet robes swishing between the pews. Revered by his flock in the unruly diocese of eastern Paraguay’s Ciudad del Este, the priest will deliver his sermon to hundreds of worshippers. They will later clamor outside the church to meet the man, to receive his benediction.
This is a man who’s been described by bishops from Switzerland to Pennsylvania as “dangerous,” “abnormal,” and “a serious threat to young people.”
He has spent two decades flitting from diocese to diocese, always one step ahead of church and legal authorities, before landing in this lawless, remote corner of South America. Here, in the pirate-laden jungle near the Iguacu falls, he has risen to a position of power.
Today, despite warnings from the bishop of Scranton, Pennsylvania, where in 2002 Urrutigoity was accused of molesting a teenage boy and sleeping with and touching other young men, this priest leads a starry-eyed cadre of young male seminarians. Despite once being accused of running what a fellow priest called a “homosexual cult” in the hills of Pennsylvania, Urrutigoity now graces the diocese website here, advertising seminars for budding young Catholics.
Urrutigoity’s voyage from his native Argentina to Pennsylvania and back to South America represents a new chapter in the shocking story of abuse in the Catholic Church.
It illustrates the church’s seeming inability to prevent a priest accused of illegal acts in the United States from fleeing to a remote developing country — even one on the doorstep of Pope Francis’ homeland — and remaking himself into a powerful religious leader.
Urrutigoity, who denies ever molesting anyone, says he’s been the victim of a smear campaign. But to those devoted to uncovering church misdeeds, the Argentine’s sustained protection by the Catholic establishment is emblematic of an ethos of cover-ups and gross negligence that continues to place young people at risk….
http://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/priest-accused-abuse-u-s-rises-again-paraguay-n121231
Over 100 ‘Human Trafficking’ Victims Rescued, National Statistics on Child Abuse
April 19, 2014 Comments Off on Over 100 ‘Human Trafficking’ Victims Rescued, National Statistics on Child Abuse
Over 100 ‘Human Trafficking’ Victims Rescued
Sky News – Thu, Mar 20, 2014
More than 100 people, suspected of being victims of a human trafficking gang, have been rescued from a house in Houston, Texas.
When officers opened the door to the property they found “a large, large group of people, some sitting on top of one another, in very confined spaces”.
A spokesman for the Houston Police Department said dozens of the victims were dressed only in underwear and were sitting in filthy conditions surrounded by bin bags full of old clothes.
They had been kept in a number of small rooms with access to just one toilet and no hot water.
Police made the discovery during a search for a 24-year-old woman and her two children who had been reported missing by relatives….
Five men have been arrested in connection with the discovery.
https://uk.news.yahoo.com/over-100-human-trafficking-victims-rescued-011448372.html
National Statistics on Child Abuse
In 2012, an estimated 1,640 children died from abuse and neglect in the United States.
In the same year, Children’s Advocacy Centers around the country served over 286,000 child victims of abuse, providing victim advocacy and support to these children and their families. In 2013, this number was over 294,000.
2012 NATIONAL ABUSE STATISTICS
An estimated 686,000 children were victims of abuse and neglect (unique instances).
51 states reported approximately 3.8 million children received preventative services from Child Protective Services agencies in the United States.
Children younger than one year had the highest rate of victimization of 21.9 per 1,000 children in the national population of the same age.
Of the children who experienced maltreatment or abuse, over 75% suffered neglect; more than 15% suffered physical abuse; and just under 10% suffered sexual abuse.
Approximately 80% of reported child fatalities as a result of abuse and neglect were caused by one or more of the child victim’s parents….
http://www.nationalchildrensalliance.org/NCANationalStatistics
ITCCS Finney released from jail, ex-Radio 1 DJ Dave Lee Travis charged, Trauma and child abuse effects
October 3, 2013 Comments Off on ITCCS Finney released from jail, ex-Radio 1 DJ Dave Lee Travis charged, Trauma and child abuse effects
– He’s Out! International intervention frees Canadian Prisoner of Conscience Steve Finney
– Political Persecution of Canadian activist Steve Finney in Ontario court to be investigated by International Human Rights Observers
– Dave Lee Travis Charged With Two More Offences
– Traumatic events do not occur at random
– Effects of child abuse can last a lifetime
He’s Out! International intervention frees Canadian Prisoner of Conscience Steve Finney
“Early morning call” to Ontario’s Attorney General spurred ITCCS leader’s release Posted on October 02, 2013 by itccs
Kitchener, Ontario: The courage and resolve of Steve Finney himself, and phone calls from the ITCCS and a United Nations non-governmental body to the Ontario government, stopped cold an attempt by local judges and police to silence Finney and his campaign to confront child trafficking in Kitchener, Ontario.
Finney was released this afternoon in a sudden about-face by local authorities less than two hours after Ontario Attorney General John Gerretsen spoke with two human rights officials who have monitored Finney’s unlawful arrest and imprisonment.
According to one of these officials, who is a legal advisor to the ITCCS in Brussels,
“We can’t disclose the conversation we had with the Attorney General, out of mutual agreement with Mr. Gerretsen. But I can tell you that we informed him that we were preparing a motion at the United Nations to censure his government for its treatment of Mr. Finney. We were also going to name Finney as a prisoner of conscience if he wasn’t released, since he was clearly incarcerated because of his political beliefs.”
Kitchener Judge Michael Cuthbertson had just yesterday told Steve Finney that he would not be released on bail unless he formally renounced his involvement with the ITCCS, and denied anyone connected to ITCCS the right to offer sureties for Finney. The Crown Counsel had also attacked ITCCS in the bail hearing and suggested that Finney’s wife Amy Smart could be arrested for posting ITCCS videos on youtube. “I feel fantastic” said Steve Finney in a brief telephone interview soon after his release.
http://itccs.org/2013/10/02/hes-out-international-intervention-frees-canadian-prisoner-of-conscience-steve-finney-early-morning-call-to-ontarios-attorney-general-spurred-itccs-leaders-release/
itccs.org
Political Persecution of Canadian activist Steve Finney in Ontario court to be investigated by International Human Rights Observers
Finney may be named as a Prisoner of Conscience and Political Prisoner Posted on October 02, 2013 by itccs
Brussels: Steve Finney, the unlawfully jailed Canadian leader of the International Tribunal into Crimes of Church and State (ITCCS), was told yesterday by a Kitchener, Ontario court judge that he won’t be released on bail unless he disassociates himself from the Tribunal.
Ontario Court of Justice magistrate Michael Cuthbertson informed Finney through Duty Counsel Dave Woodbeck that no-one associated with the ITCCS would be allowed to post bail for him, and neither should Finney himself remain active with the ITCCS if he wished to “avoid another thirty days in jail”.
Steve Finney still faces no charges after his sudden arrest Sunday morning, the day after he spoke on international radio about his work to expose child trafficking in Kitchener involving government and police officials. Finney has been severely beaten by Kitchener police, assaulted and denied any contact or communication with anyone while in prison.
In response to such flagrant political persecution, the ITCCS and its United Nations affiliates have dispatched two accredited human rights observers to Kitchener to attend the Wednesday, October 2 bail hearing of Steve Finney.
http://itccs.org/2013/10/02/political-persecution-of-canadian-activist-steve-finney-in-ontario-court-to-be-investigated-by-international-human-rights-observers-finney-may-be-named-as-a-prisoner-of-conscience-and-political-pris/
Dave Lee Travis Charged With Two More Offences The Huffington Post UK 01/10/2013
DJ Dave Lee Travis has been further charged with two offences of indecent assault on a woman aged over 16 between January 1 1992 and December 31 1993.
The 68-year-old, whose real name is David Patrick Griffin, has been accused of assaulting a woman aged over 16 between January 1 1992 and December 31 1993, Scotland Yard said.
Travis, of Mentmore, in Leighton Buzzard, Bedfordshire, has already appeared in court to face 12 counts, including indecent assault and sexual assault.
The ex-Radio 1 DJ was first charged on August 15 as part of Operation Yewtree, the police investigation prompted by the Jimmy Savile abuse scandal, but the accusations against Travis have no connection to the disgraced television presenter.
http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/2013/10/01/dave-lee-travis-charged-indecent-assault_n_4022792.html
Traumatic events do not occur at random
30 September 2013
Dr. Katie McLaughlin is a clinical psychologist and Assistant Professor in the Department of Psychology at the University of Washington. She received her doctorate in Clinical Psychology and in Epidemiology and Public Health from Yale University in 2008. Her research seeks to identify psychological and neurobiological mechanisms linking child trauma exposure to the onset of psychopathology in children and adolescents. Today, Katie writes about what population-based data can tell us about trauma in U.S. children and adolescents….
We sought to understand how common traumatic experiences are in the lives of U.S. youths by conducting a study examining trauma exposure and PTSD in the National Comorbidity Survey Replication Adolescent Supplement (NCS-A), a nationally-representative sample of 6,483 adolescents aged 13-17. This study is the largest population-based study examining trauma exposure and PTSD in U.S. youths, and the findings reveal trauma and PTSD are significant public health problems in this population….
Trauma Exposure is Pervasive among U.S. Youths
A majority of U.S. youths have experienced a traumatic event by the time they reach adolescence. Sixty-two percent of teenagers have experienced at least one traumatic event in their lifetime, including interpersonal violence, serious injuries, natural disasters and death of a loved one, and 19 percent have experienced three or more such events. The prevalence of trauma exposure among children and adolescents is nearly as high as the prevalence in adults based on similar population-based studies.
Traumatic Events do not Occur at Random
Some types of trauma occur more frequently to younger children, including physical abuse by a caregiver, witnessing domestic violence, and kidnapping. Approximately half of all children who will experience these types of trauma in their lifetime have been exposed before the age of 8.
http://trauma-recovery.net/2013/09/30/traumatic-events-do-not-occur-at-random
Journal of the American Academy of Child & Adolescent Psychiatry Volume 52, Issue 8 , Pages 815-830.e14, August 2013 Trauma Exposure and Posttraumatic Stress Disorder in a National Sample of Adolescents Katie A. McLaughlin, Ph.D., Karestan C. Koenen, Ph.D. ,Eric D. Hill, M.S.P.H., Maria Petukhova, Ph.D., Nancy A. Sampson, B.A., Alan M. Zaslavsky, Ph.D., Ronald C. Kessler, Ph.D.
Objective
Although exposure to potentially traumatic experiences (PTEs) is common among youths in the United States, information on posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) risk associated with PTEs is limited. We estimate lifetime prevalence of exposure to PTEs and PTSD, PTE-specific risk of PTSD, and associations of sociodemographics and temporally prior DSM-IV disorders with PTE exposure, PTSD given exposure, and PTSD recovery among U.S. adolescents.
Method
Data were drawn from 6,483 adolescent–parent pairs in the National Comorbidity Survey Replication Adolescent Supplement (NCS-A), a national survey of adolescents aged 13 through 17 years. Lifetime exposure to interpersonal violence, accidents/injuries, network/witnessing, and other PTEs was assessed along with DSM-IV PTSD and other distress, fear, behavior, and substance disorders.
Results
A majority (61.8%) of adolescents experienced a lifetime PTE. Lifetime prevalence of DSM-IV PTSD was 4.7% and was significantly higher among females (7.3%) than among males (2.2%). Exposure to PTEs, particularly interpersonal violence, was highest among adolescents not living with both biological parents and with pre-existing behavior disorders. Conditional probability of PTSD was highest for PTEs involving interpersonal violence. Predictors of PTSD among PTE-exposed adolescents included female gender, prior PTE exposure, and pre-existing fear and distress disorders. One-third (33.0%) of adolescents with lifetime PTSD continued to meet criteria within 30 days of interview. Poverty, U.S. nativity, bipolar disorder, and PTE exposure occurring after the focal trauma predicted nonrecovery….
http://www.jaacap.com/article/S0890-8567%2813%2900338-9/abstract
Effects of child abuse can last a lifetime: Watch the ‘still face’ experiment to see why
By Brigid Schulte, Published: September 16, 2013
In one of the most sobering findings, the report highlighted that advances in brain research now show that child abuse and neglect damages not only in the way a developing child’s brain functions, but changes the actual structure of the brain itself, in such a way that makes clear thinking, controlling emotions and impulses and forming healthy social relationships more difficult…..
Some infants, however, become so distressed that that they’re unable to console themselves. Tronick and other researchers have found that neglect leads to increases in the heart rate, a flush of the stress hormone cortisol and to cell death in key regions of the brain.
In recent studies, Tronick and colleagues in Milan, have found that four-month-old infants exposed to the still face will remember it two weeks later, rapidly showing physiological changes to negative responses that infants exposed to it for the first time do not….
In studies of infants at orphanages who are fed and clothed, but not held, talked to or played with have found that some neglected children, literally, fail to grow. “Some of them actually died,” he said….
The report found that one of the biggest risk factors for child abuse and neglect is if the parent him or herself was abused or neglected. So Tronick and others are working to train professionals and educate and treat parents in an effort to break the cycle. And, one hopes, put an end to the wrenching effects of The Still Face.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/she-the-people/wp/2013/09/16/affects-of-child-abuse-can-last-a-lifetime-watch-the-still-face-experiment-to-see-why/
Huronia institution cemetery a painful reminder of neglect and abuse
September 19, 2013 Comments Off on Huronia institution cemetery a painful reminder of neglect and abuse
Huronia institution cemetery a painful reminder of neglect and abuse
As part of the $35 million settlement with former residents of Huronia Regional Centre, Ontario will offer a formal apology and a promise to maintain the cemetery and create a registry of all those buried there.
By: Rachel Mendleson News reporter, Published on Tue Sep 17 2013
Most of the 2,000 children and adults buried in the unkempt field across from Huronia Regional Centre were laid to rest in unmarked graves.
Others are identified by numbers scrawled on small slabs of concrete hidden amid overgrown grass.
For former residents of the government-run institution for the developmentally delayed in Orillia, the cemetery has served as a painful reminder of the neglect and abuse they have long insisted occurred there.
But that may soon change. On Tuesday, the Ontario government settled a historic class-action lawsuit with former residents of Huronia. The terms include $35 million, a formal apology — and a promise to maintain the cemetery and create a registry of all those buried there….
Under the terms of the settlement, 65,000 documents — including internal government documents, police reports, eyewitness accounts and letters from concerned parents — will also be made public.
http://www.thestar.com/news/gta/2013/09/17/former_residents_settle_huronia_lawsuit_for_35m.html
Miami Cold Case Murder Solved With Recovered Memories
June 24, 2013 Comments Off on Miami Cold Case Murder Solved With Recovered Memories
Miami Cold Case Murder Solved With Recovered Memories
By Michael E. Miller Thursday, May 9 2013
….Instead, it would be more than a quarter-century before police caught a break. “Back then we were finding so many dope murders,” says retired Miami-Dade homicide detective John Parmenter. “We all thought [the bodies] had something to do with drugs.” He pauses and adds quietly, “How wrong we were.”….
So when Gloria Hampton walked into McCully’s office in the summer of 2010 with a story stranger than fiction, the sergeant was suspicious.
“I just need somebody to listen to me,” Gloria pleaded. The short 29-year-old with wide hips, tan skin, and curly hair had been through years of psychiatric therapy, she said. From the haze of her hurtful childhood, however, she had pulled one particular memory and polished it until clear.
“I saw my father kill my mother when I was 4 years old,” she said. “He put her body into an army-green bag.”
McCully was still skeptical. Cops don’t put much faith in recovered memories, and these were 25 years old. But after Gloria left, he cracked open musty boxes of cold-case files. He flipped through yellowing photographs and police reports for hours before pulling out a thin binder that hadn’t been touched in years. It was the unsolved murder from April 4, 1985. And inside was a photo of a woman’s body in an army-green bag.
DNA analysis quickly confirmed that Gloria’s mother, Nilsa Padilla, was the murder victim known for decades as “Theresa Torso.” Gloria’s father, Jorge Walter Nuñez, instantly became the only suspect. For Miami-Dade police, it was a breakthrough in one of the department’s oldest and most vexing cases. For Gloria, it was salvation.
“They thought I was crazy,” she says of the cops, foster parents, and caseworkers who ridiculed her claims for years. “Now they know I’m not.”….
I didn’t like him at all,” Soto says of Nuñez. “He was always drunk.” He also brought out the worst in Padilla. She drank heavily, slipping into dark moods. One day, Padilla drunkenly hit 4-year-old Bernisa on the head with a brush, causing a gash. Soto told her: “If you ever do that again, I’m calling the cops on you.”
Nuñez and Padilla left town shortly afterward in an old U-Haul truck he’d turned into a makeshift camper by cutting a window in the rear. They drove down the coast to Florida.
When Soto next saw her cousin, it was three years later, in 1984. Padilla was in worse shape than ever. She now had three kids: Bernisa, Gloria, and a baby named Alicia. But the family was on the run from the Florida Department of Health and Rehabilitative Services.
When Soto asked why, Padilla pointed to Gloria’s shoddily bandaged left hand. Nuñez had dropped a heavy piece of metal on the 3-year-old — by accident, he said — mangling her thumb. The two drunks had never taken the toddler to the hospital….
Nuñez, meanwhile, made no effort to hide his hatred. “I’m fed up with her,” he told Soto in Spanish. “One of these days, I’m going to kill her.”….
Instead of comforting her, Padilla drunkenly smacked her daughter. “She hit me so hard my face was bleeding,” Bernisa says. “Maybe she finally realized that she was with the wrong man.”
If so, it was too late. When Nuñez returned around 2 a.m., Padilla was waiting for him. From their bunk bed near the ceiling, the three children saw their father strike her with the butt of a beer bottle. He hit her again and again in the head, the glass breaking within its brown paper bag. She tried to climb out the back door. For a moment, moonlight flooded into the tiny camper.
“Then he shoved her back in with his foot,” Bernisa remembers. “He closed the door, and then he finished her off.”….
“I saw my mom beaten to death,” Bernisa says. “My only protector in the world, and she couldn’t protect herself.” Neither sister remembers Nuñez cutting up the corpse, but Gloria distinctly recalls seeing her father stuff her mother’s body into an army-green bag. “I remember helping him dispose of her,” she says….
The two sisters had already seen their father kill their mother and sister. But those sickening moments were nothing compared to the rape, violence, and neglect that would follow. Without Padilla around, Nuñez would become a monster. And Bernisa and Gloria would be forced to live like animals alongside him to survive….
Nuñez never worked, likely living on Padilla’s welfare checks. Whatever money he did have, he spent on Budweiser or marijuana. The campground was only a few hundred yards from Lower Matecumbe Key’s strip malls, but Bernisa and Gloria lived like wolves. Their hair — Bernisa’s dark, Gloria’s blond — grew long and matted, and they survived on crabs or shrimp they found in shallow pools. “If we didn’t catch anything, we didn’t eat,” Bernisa says.
The sexual abuse that had begun as a secret now spread into a sick obsession. Nuñez would emerge from the U-Haul, growl “Vámanos chicas,” and then molest them. He raped one or both of them nearly every day for years. Sometimes Nuñez would let other men take the girls into the dirty U-Haul at the edge of the world.
“Some of it is blacked out, thank God,” Bernisa says of the abuse. “If we remembered the whole thing, we probably would have gone crazy.”….
The girls’ nightmare lasted four years. Even when the police took Nuñez away, the two girls did not say what he had done to them. It would take another child to scream out….
At the police station, officers tried to get Bernisa to talk. But the 11-year-old said Nuñez never abused them. Then the cops tried Gloria. At first she also denied it all. But then the talkative 8-year-old began to tell the horrible truth. “She would have to keep the bedroom door locked at night to keep Daddy from coming in and touching them,” reads a Monroe County Sheriff’s report from March 1989. They’d kept quiet out of terror, police realized. “If I tell you, will you let my daddy go?” Gloria fearfully asked an officer.
Police didn’t let Nuñez go, at least not for four years. He was convicted of two counts of lewd and lascivious acts on children. By the time he was released in 1993, his daughters had changed their names and disappeared. But they could not change the past. And as they became teenagers, Gloria and Bernisa would relive the horrors of their childhood in their own ways….
http://www.miaminewtimes.com/2013-05-09/news/miami-cold-case-murder-nilsa-padilla/
Saudi Arabia’s Child-Rape Case: Female Activists Fight to Prevent Abuse, Child Abuse in America
February 9, 2013 Comments Off on 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….
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.
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