Breaking the silence!

The Brooklyn DA arrested an astounding 89 Orthodox men on charges of child sex abuse — forcing open a community that sometimes covers up such crimes.

By MICHAEL LESHER

Last Updated: November 27, 2011

The numbers are startling — in the past two years, Brooklyn District Attorney Charles Hynes’ office says it has arrested and charged 89 Orthodox Jewish men with child sex abuse.

It’s horrific and shocking, though in terms of effective law enforcement and honest dealings with the public, finally a good thing.

Some background: The Brooklyn DA has been accused for years by child advocates of handling the insular, image-conscious Orthodox Jewish community with kid gloves over sex-abuse scandals. Those familiar with abuse survivors from within that community — myself included — have complained that Hynes is too fearful of retaliation from a politically powerful religious bloc to hold its sex abuse perpetrators to the same standard applied elsewhere in Brooklyn.

Hynes, who denies this, claimed in 2009 to have arrested 26 Orthodox Jewish men for sex abuse over a two-year period — a claim that drew some praise at the time, but also some skepticism for being just too good to be true. But now the DA is double-daring (or triple-daring) his doubters, claiming that since October 2009, the rate of sex-abuse arrests within that community has more than tripled, all the way up to 89.

Still, from the quiet way Hynes broke the news, one senses some reticence behind the bravado. There was no fanfare, no typical press release; Hynes’ spokesperson Jerry Schmetterer offered the numbers in an unheralded exchange with the Jewish newspaper Forward over two weeks ago, and left it at that.

But the unprecedented claim can’t possibly remain a whisper. With the child-abuse cover-up at Penn State on everyone’s lips, any report of such a whopping crackdown in a community notorious for resisting public reports of the crime is bound to have significant results.

True, the lack of detail about the arrests — the Brooklyn DA has declined to give names, charging information or current case status for any of the suspects, or even how far back these cases date — is cause for legitimate concern. I’m not surprised that child advocates within Orthodox Brooklyn have publicly cast doubt on the DA’s numbers. No one knows better than I how hard it can be to pry the facts about such cases out of Hynes’ office. To name just one instance: my four-year effort to obtain records of the abortive attempt to extradite Avrohom Mondrowitz, indicted on 13 child sex-abuse counts in 1985 and still at large in Israel, has led all the way to New York’s highest court, where I will be arguing the Freedom of Information Law case against the DA’s Office this winter.

Read more: http://www.nypost.com/p/news/opinion/opedcolumnists/breaking_the_si_ence_fowlLEBaFdRumDAfT2gc0J?mid=53

On the Eve of the Annual Agudath Israel Convention

"Please believe me when I say that this is not a story about Penn State or some other corrupt organization. Characterizing what happened in State College, particularly the failures of so many adults to report the abuse, as the product of some morally bankrupt institution is a way of convincing ourselves that we are outsiders to these sinister forces. It is no different from calling Sandusky a “monster.” That is soothing, I realize. But it also lets us off the hook too easily, allowing us to avoid asking hard questions about what happens, or can happen, in our own backyards. The Penn State cover-up could have, and undoubtedly has, happened at many other institutions, including those you most care about. Don’t content yourself with demanding something of Penn State, or big-time college sports. While that might make you feel better, it won’t prevent the next tragedy."

The Cruel Lesson of Penn State

How what happened in State College forced me to confront my own abuse.
By Professor Mark P. McKenna
November 18, 2011

A student raised his hand in my torts class last week and asked whether Joe Paterno might be exposed to liability for failing to tell the police about Jerry Sandusky’s alleged sexual assault of a young boy in the Penn State locker room. It was a perfectly legitimate question—we had been studying tort law’s general reluctance to impose liability for omitting to act. And it didn’t come as a surprise—I have always encouraged students to bring current events to class, and the Penn State situation was nearly impossible to avoid last week. Still, I had prayed no one would ask about it because I was not sure I could make it through any sort of answer. As I’d feared, the question stopped me cold.

I have spent the better part of my life working to cover wounds from my own childhood abuse, about which I have never spoken publicly. In fact, I’ve hardly talked about it at all; I can count on two hands the number of people who know anything about it. Some of my siblings will learn of it from this article.

The cascade of emotions that washed over me as I stood before my torts class and tried to muster a coherent response would be impossible to describe here. After many years of hard work, and with a lot of help, I no longer think every single day about that terrible winter night. There are still plenty of reminders, to be sure, and there are some things that will never be normal for me. But most days, the wound is insulated by lots of scar tissue. Not this week, though. The story hit me at a bad time, during a year that was already very difficult. And the similarities were too hard to ignore.

The perpetrator at Penn State was a coach, as was mine. The abuse happened on the periphery of a major college football program, and I was a walk-on college football player when the weight of my childhood abuse became too much for me and I finally sought help. Most significantly, I have a son who is about as old as the boys Sandusky allegedly assaulted, and nearly the same age I was when I was victimized. He is so young.

I cried uncontrollably at least three separate times last week. This is part of what makes abuse so wretched—it strips you of control, not only of your body in those moments of abuse, but of your mind long after. Sometimes emotions just sneak up on you. And even when you know difficult conversations are going to arise and you try to steel yourself, sometimes there’s nothing you can do. The emotions come, and you can’t make them go away. Then you hate yourself for feeling so weak and exposed. You are sure everyone is looking at you, and you know that no one would look at you the same way if they knew your story. They’d see you as damaged goods. Or they’d pity you. It’s hard to know which is worse.

All this rushed through me when the student asked his question. I can never recall my classroom having been so quiet. Mercifully, no one followed up on my answer; perhaps they could sense my discomfort. So I moved on, knowing I had probably shortchanged the class with my half-answer.

But as the story has remained in the headlines and the uncomfortable conversations have continued, I haven’t been able to shake an overwhelming feeling that I failed Sandusky’s victims and, by extension, far too many other boys. Abuse thrives on silence. In some cases, as the Penn State situation makes clear, the silence of third parties gives perpetrators license. But victims’ silence also plays a huge role. This is true in the immediate aftermath of the abuse, where victims’ inability to speak out puts them (and others) at further risk. It’s also true much more generally. Several of my friends, for example, were shocked when Rick Reilly reported that, according to a 1998 study on child sexual abuse by Boston University Medical School, one in six boys in America will be abused by age 16. For girls, it's one in four by the age of 14. They were shocked, no doubt, because concrete examples of abuse are not as available to them as the statistics suggest. Most people don’t think they know any abuse victims.

But they do know victims. They just don’t realize it, because so many of us have been unable to reveal ourselves. This breeds a false sense of security, with too many adults believing abuse is someone else’s problem.

This reality that the silence of victims creates opportunities for evil is a particularly cruel one, especially when you know it to be true and still haven’t been able to reveal your own abuse. It is another reason abuse is so insidious. Perpetrators procure their victims’ silence by causing such deep shame that private torment seems tolerable by comparison. But it is precisely this silence that helps create the conditions for abuse. This is what has been on continuous replay in my head in the days since my torts class. I can’t shake the feeling that I failed those boys. I failed them by hiding. You cannot imagine how devastating that feeling has been.

When I told this to my friend, the psychologist to whom I disclosed my abuse in college and whose counsel I have relied on for the last 16 years, he told me all the reasons I couldn’t have expected more of myself. Intellectually, I know he is right. But this isn’t primarily about what I didn’t do long ago—it’s about what I wasn’t doing last week. So here it is: I am a victim of sexual abuse.

I say this now, at age 36, in the hopes it can make a small difference to those currently suffering in silence. You know them, I promise. They are your neighbors, your friends, your co-workers, and, painfully, your children. Be a safe place for these people. If you are one of them, I am sorry. Know you are not alone. You did nothing wrong, and you are lovable. It can get better.

I am also moved to say this publicly to counter two aspects of the public reaction to the Penn State situation, both of which reflect our collective attempt to distance ourselves from the reality of abuse. First, it is a mistake to characterize Jerry Sandusky as some kind of subhuman monster. The inclination to do so is entirely understandable, for his behavior was unequivocally monstrous. But to describe him as a monster shields us from the reality that human beings have the capacity for tremendous evil. This recognition is critically important. Predators do not look like monsters; they look like your neighborhood basketball coach or the guy running a children’s charity. They look like people you know, because they are. This is so important for parents to realize: If you allow yourself to think of these predators as “monsters,” you will convince yourself that they are rare, and you will not be as vigilant as you need to be. This recognition is also important for your kids, because if you teach them that they should be on the lookout for monsters, they will be confused by the inappropriate behavior of adults who don’t fit that profile.

This is particularly true with respect to adults who have parents’ implicit trust: friends, family members, and coaches. Sadly, the statistics tell us that most perpetrators are in this group. Focus on behavior—teach your kids that adults are never entitled to touch their bodies, and that no one is entitled to touch their bodies without their permission.

Second, many have painted this story as one fundamentally about Penn State or college athletics. At the Sports Law Blog, for example, Alan Milstein asked whether, were the perpetrator an assistant professor of biology and the witness a graduate student, there was “any doubt the perpetrator, if aware he had been seen, would immediately stop, the witness would intervene, the cops would be called, the professor would be put away, and the university and its president would not be implicated in the least?” In Milstein’s mind, there was no doubt: The big money in college football is the reason Jerry Sandusky’s abuse was not reported.

This is wrong. There is absolutely a doubt about what a graduate student would do in these circumstances. Graduate students are as highly dependent on faculty advisers for their futures as graduate assistant coaches (like Mike McQueary) are on their superiors. For the same reason, I have significant doubts about what an associate at a law firm (or a junior person at Goldman Sachs, or an intern in Congress) would do if he witnessed a sexual assault. Because this is not about a problem at some other institution; it’s a reflection of a universal human tendency to look out for oneself, and to preserve hierarchical institutions about which one cares and upon which one is dependent. It’s also a reflection of the nearly boundless capacity to ignore inconvenient facts and to make excuses for those within our own circle. Think about the Catholic Church. Predators flourished in parishes for years, not simply (and probably not even primarily) because higher-ups worried about financial exposure. They flourished because many otherwise good people could not bring themselves to believe or to act upon information that their priest was a rapist.

Please believe me when I say that this is not a story about Penn State or some other corrupt organization. Characterizing what happened in State College, particularly the failures of so many adults to report the abuse, as the product of some morally bankrupt institution is a way of convincing ourselves that we are outsiders to these sinister forces. It is no different from calling Sandusky a “monster.” That is soothing, I realize. But it also lets us off the hook too easily, allowing us to avoid asking hard questions about what happens, or can happen, in our own backyards. The Penn State cover-up could have, and undoubtedly has, happened at many other institutions, including those you most care about. Don’t content yourself with demanding something of Penn State, or big-time college sports. While that might make you feel better, it won’t prevent the next tragedy.

http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/jurisprudence/2011/11/penn_state_scandal_how_what_happened_in_state_college_forced_me_to_confront_my_own_abuse_.single.html

The Vatican said "The ad was damaging to not only to dignity of the pope and the Catholic Church but also to the feelings of believers.”

What about the lives and dignity of the untold thousands of kids you destroyed?



By Joe Palazzolo

The Vatican is promising legal action to stop the distribution of a photo of Pope Benedict kissing an imam on the mouth. The photo is fake, by the way, and is part of a shock-factor advertising campaign by Italian fashion company Benetton that features world leaders getting fresh.

Benedict’s inamorata in the photo is Ahmed Tayeb, leader of Al Azhar in Cairo, Sunni Islam’s most influential institution. Another ad shows President Obama kissing Chinese President Hu Jintao.

The new campaign, as well as the UNHATE Foundation, a new Benetton think tank aimed at, um, communicating love, are part of the company’s social responsibility strategy. Click here for the foundation website and here for slideshow of the ads. WSJ’s Heard on the Runway has more here, and the Journal has a story on the ad campaign here.

The Vatican, however, isn’t feeling the unhate. It said in a statement Thursday its lawyers in Italy and around the world had been instructed to “take the proper legal measures” to stop the use of the photo, even in the media, Reuters reported. And Here‘s a link to the statement in Italian, for what it’s worth. (Prego.)

The statement said the ad was “damaging to not only to dignity of the pope and the Catholic Church but also to the feelings of believers.” It wasn’t clear whether the Vatican intended to sue Benetton directly.

Benetton had said on Wednesday night it was withdrawing the advertisement. But apparently not quickly enough.

Photo: Tiziana Fabi/AFP

http://blogs.wsj.com/law/2011/11/17/vatican-calls-in-the-lawyers-to-snuff-out-kiss-campaign/?mod=djemlawblog_t

Dovid Cohen, Israel Belsky, David Mandel RESIGN!

Penn State, Second Mile Not the First to be Embroiled in a Sex Abuse Scandal
By Perry Chiaramonte
Published November 15, 2011






Allegations that former Penn State defensive football coach Jerry Sandusky sexually molested young boys and that university administrators did not adequately report the accusations against him have tarnished the once-shiny image of both Sandusky’s Second Mile charity and the university’s stellar Nittany Lions athletics program.

But it’s hardly the first time a charity group or sports organization has dealt with charges of sexual molestation.

“As much as the Penn State situation has shocked the nation, the more shocking fact is that the veil of secrecy is more commonplace than we probably realize,” said Justin Leto, a Miami-based civil trial attorney who has handled numerous sex abuse cases.

This month, Lon Harvey Kennard Sr., co-founder of the Utah-based nonprofit group Village of Hope, was sentenced to 15 years to life in prison after he pleaded guilty to 43 counts of sex abuse and exploitation.

Kennard, who started Village of Hope to help women and children in Third World villages, had been charged with molesting six Ethiopian children he had adopted. He was arrested last year after one of the children told police that she and one of her sisters had been abused between 1995 and 2002.

Another sexual predator is Douglas Perlitz, a Colorado man who founded a school for homeless children in Haiti. He was sent to prison last year when he was found guilty of abusing eight students.

Perlitz admitted to investigators that he committed illicit sexual conduct with students who attended his Project Pierre Toussaint School for Homeless Children in Cap-Haitien.

During Perlitz's trial, prosecutors said, he gave the children money, food, clothing and electronics equipment in an attempt to buy their silence, and that he threatened to take it all away and have them expelled if they told anyone what happened. Six of his victims were flown to Connecticut to testify at his trial in federal court.

The scandal led to the collapse of the school, forcing many of the students back into homelessness and despair on the streets of Haiti. Perlitz is serving a 20-year sentence.

Like the charities, Penn State’s football team is not the first sports program to be accused of covering up allegations of sexual abuse.

The Boston Red Sox faced a similar scandal in the early '70s and successfully kept the allegations from going public until 1991.

The team had a clubhouse manager, Donald Fitzpatrick, who during his 30 years with the team solicited sex from young boys he would hire to work during spring training.

Fitzpatrick’s accusers said it was common knowledge among the Red Sox that it was dangerous to have children around him, and one of his victims said players Jim Rice and Sammy Stewart warned the kids to steer clear of him.

In 1971, one of Fitzpatrick’s victims went to Red Sox management and blew the whistle on him, accusing him of being sexually inappropriate with many of the children in the clubhouse and at a hotel where the team stayed during spring training in Florida.

The Sox did not report the claims to authorities, and they fired the victims who came forward. Fitzpatrick suffered no penalties and was allowed to keep his job.

The claims did not resurface until 1991, when one of his accusers – sitting in the crowd at a nationally televised game between the Red Sox and Angels -- held up a sign that said, “Don Fitzgerald sexually abused me.” The Sox eventually paid the man a $100,000 settlement. In 2002, Fitzpatrick pleaded guilty to four counts of sexual battery on a child. In 2003, the team settled a $3.15 million lawsuit with seven victims in Florida.

“The thing these organizations all neglect to recognize is that eventually the truth will come out,” Leto said. “And when it does, the years they have spent protecting the predators and themselves will end in far greater consequences than if they would have done what is right from the start.

“The interest of the employer should never supersede the moral, ethical and legal obligation to ensure that no child is subject to this type of unthinkable abuse.”

Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/us/2011/11/15/penn-state-second-mile-not-first-to-be-embroiled-in-sex-abuse-scandal/?cmpid=NL_FNTopHeadlines_20111115#ixzz1dobWoXqb

Moetzes Agudath Israel RESIGN! - Part Three

"All of which gives rise to these questions: Those men and women who remained silent in the face of this evil -- are they truly good? Or are they cowards who were simply not willing to take a modest personal risk for the preservation of the one thing they supposedly valued most?"

Penn State's Cowardly Lions
By Michael Goodwin
Published November 14, 2011

It is a cliché to say that football is like life. At Penn State, it is also insufficient. For under Joe Paterno, football was life.

And now a glorious era is finished, demolished beyond redemption. The scandalous end of Paterno’s career has wiped out the university’s sterling reputation and shattered the trust of an entire sport. Riots by crackpot students and death threats punctuate the madness.

To Pennsylvanians and millions of football fans everywhere, the fall of the House of Paterno is like the collapse of an empire. It crashed without warning or mercy.

In truth, the core values rotted away over the years, the work done secretly in the dark, like that of termites and cancer. The end only seemed sudden.

It could be a long time before we know the full extent of the pedophilia horror allegedly perpetrated by a former coach and the outrageous silence of many, perhaps dozens, of people. But already the most important lesson is clear.

Civilizations, from single universities to national cultures, must be defended with relentless vigilance and courage, or they will not survive. Only the details of their demise will differ.

A sage, perhaps Edmund Burke, once said, “All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing.”

That describes the fate of Penn State. The brilliant days of sunshine, victory and integrity in Happy Valley were not a mirage. They were real for generations of players, parents, students, alums and fans who, over the 46-year tenure of Paterno, believed in the “grand experiment” -- of winning the right way, with honor.

But evil triumphed because of a fundamental failure by Paterno and others to uphold the principles the experiment represented. And so the whole enterprise lies in shambles, everyone associated with it tarnished and generations of adherents suffering an angry loss of faith.

I share that loss because I grew up in the shadow of Penn State, just 30 miles from the shining oasis he created. In my youth, Paterno and Penn State football were synonymous with the working-class values of the hardscrabble mountains of central Pennsylvania.

He was the pope of a secular religion that forged friendships and family bonds. Under his benevolent dictatorship, “old school” became a term of rectitude and integrity.

Uniforms were simple, the players were legitimate students and the code of sportsmanship meant something.

Paterno and his wife contributed $4 million to the university, some of it to enhance the teaching of classics.

The righteousness of the path was confirmed by the fact that Paterno won more games than any major-college coach in history.

Yet the rot was quietly hollowing out the foundation. The first report that respected coach Jerry Sandusky was a pedophile was quietly investigated, and dropped without explanation in 1998.

Other reports followed, with the most important one coming in 2002, when a young assistant said he spotted Sandusky, then retired, raping a child in a locker-room shower. The assistant told Paterno, who told his supervisors -- but nobody told the police.

So Sandusky, according to the shocking indictment against him, was allowed to continue his predations for nine more years.

The price for that shameful silence must be measured in tens of millions of dollars, reputations lost and lives ruined.

All of which gives rise to these questions: Those men and women who remained silent in the face of this evil -- are they truly good? Or are they cowards who were simply not willing to take a modest personal risk for the preservation of the one thing they supposedly valued most?

I believe they are cowards. Their goodness was found wanting when it was needed most, and so was shallow if it existed at all. They are sunshine patriots who could not be counted on when the stakes were highest.

In life, even more than in football, courage is required.

Michael Goodwin is a Fox News contributor and a New York Post columnist.

Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/opinion/2011/11/14/lesson-penn-state-life-requires-courage/?cmpid=NL_BestofOpinion_20111114#ixzz1dj5l08EH

TORAH TRUE JUDAISM FROM BILL O'REILLY:

Moetzes Agudath Israel RESIGN! - Part Two - KOLKO IS YOUR LEGACY!

Don't Be an Enabler -- When a Child Is Abused, Here's What to Do
By Michael Reagan

Allegations of child sexual abuse by a former assistant football coach at Penn State University have dominated the news this week. On Wednesday legendary football coach Joe Paterno released a statement in which he said, "With the benefit of hindsight, I wish I had done more." How lame is that, coach?

Would you have accepted that excuse from one of your players? "With the benefit of hindsight, coach, I wish I had run the route we rehearsed a thousand times in practice." See how stupid that sounds? It doesn't take "hindsight" to know that when some monster is raping children in your locker room, you call the police.

Coach, you knew back in 2002 that Jerry Sandusky had anally raped a ten-year-old boy in the Lasch Football Building. You handled the matter quietly with your athletic director, Tim Curley. You took away the rapist's keys and barred him from the facility—but you didn't call the police. You didn't lift a finger to help the victim. No hindsight needed, coach. You screwed up.

Yes, we all know about your 61-year career at Penn State. But when you allow children to be victimized right under your nose, you wipe out 61 years of achievement. The Jerry Sandusky scandal is your legacy now.

This scandal has also indelibly stained the reputation of The Second Mile, the charity Jerry Sandusky founded in 1977 as a foster-care program for at-risk kids. Turns out the kids were most at-risk from Sandusky himself.

The Second Mile was one of George Bush Sr.'s Thousand Points of Light and probably did some good work. But the grand jury says Sandusky met his victims through The Second Mile. So even if the program survives this scandal, it will always be remembered as Jerry Sandusky's private sandbox for recruiting rape victims.

As for the alleged child-rapist himself, you have to stand amazed at his gall. He actually had the brass to title his autobiography "Touched: The Jerry Sandusky Story." What is that, the punch line of a sick joke?

I don't want to hear any more "benefit of hindsight" excuses. So let's be clear about what you should do if you learn that a child is being sexually abused. Print this out, post it on your bulletin board, and make sure everyone in your family, company, or organization knows how to respond to child sexual abuse.

1. If you see an act of child abuse in progress, step in and STOP IT. I have to wonder why the grad assistant who witnessed the rape felt he only had to report it to someone. Why didn't he jump in, knock Sandusky on his butt, and protect the child? If you see a child being raped by an adult, please have the guts and good sense to intervene.

2. If a child tells you he or she is being abused, don't panic, don't act shocked. Make sure the child feels supported and protected. Say, "You did the right thing in telling me."

3. Believe the child. Even if the offender is "good old Uncle Charlie," tell the child, "I believe you." It takes a courage for kids to speak up because they fear they won't be believed. Kids need to know you're on their side, and they almost never imagine sex acts unless they've experienced them.

4. Tell the child that he or she is not bad. Say, "He knew better; you didn't know. We'll make sure he can't touch you again."

5. Focus on the child's needs. Don't think about the reputation of any individual or organization. The moment you shift your focus off of what's best for the child, you're on the wrong side of the issue.

6. Don't confront the offender in front of the child. Keep adult discussions away from the child. Kids need to feel protected. They don't need to be upset, disturbed, and frightened.

7. Report the crime to the police. Law enforcement agencies in your area have trained investigators who will talk with you and the child, and who know exactly how best to handle the situation.

And don't you dare tell me that you don't have the heart to have "good old Uncle Charlie" arrested. If Uncle Charlie is molesting a child, protect that child!

I've heard too many horror stories of people who protected "good old Uncle Charlie" or "good old Coach Sandusky" instead of protecting children. You must have absolute moral clarity: Child molesters belong in jail where they can't hurt children. If you don't call the police, then you are an accomplice and no better than a molester yourself.

8. If the molester is a member of the clergy, DO NOT report the abuse to church officials. If the molester is a coach or teacher, DO NOT report the abuse to the school authorities. Some churches and organizations worry more about lawsuits and bad publicity than about kids. Just call the police.

9. Don't call Child Protective Services—investigating crimes is not the function of CPS. If the police determine that CPS should be involved, they will make that decision. Don't let the predator talk you out calling the police. Most predators are amazingly persuasive—that's how they entice their victims, and that's how they get people to cover for them instead of reporting them. Don't be taken in by a charming predator.

10. After you call the police, call the ChildHelp National Child Abuse Hotline at 1-800-4ACHILD (1-800-422-4453). The ChildHelp counselor will listen to your concerns, answer your questions, and direct you to local support services for the child.

Finally, don't you ever use the "benefit of hindsight" excuse! I've armed you with the foresight to do the right thing to protect a child—and that child is counting on you.

The reason I tell you all this? Because, I was once that boy.

Michael Reagan is the son of President Ronald Reagan. He is a political consultant, the founder and chairman of The Reagan Group, and president of The Reagan Legacy Foundation. Visit his website at www.reagan.com, and visit the Michael Reagan Center at Arrow Child & Family ministries. Portions of this column are adapted from his book "Twice Adopted."

Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/opinion/2011/11/10/dont-be-enabler-when-child-is-abused-heres-what-to-do/#ixzz1dYnGPRXU

Moetzes Agudath Israel RESIGN!

NEW YORK TIMES EDITORIAL - NOVEMBER 10, 2011

The Pennsylvania State University Board of Trustees made the only rational choice on Wednesday when it dismissed the football coach Joe Paterno for failing to pursue a horrific allegation of sexual assault of a child that was brought to his attention by a subordinate in 2002. Mr. Paterno, who failed to call the police, now concedes that he did not do enough to curb what prosecutors describe as a 15-year cycle of child rape and sexual assaults, perpetrated partly on university property, by Jerry Sandusky, Mr. Paterno’s former assistant coach.

Mr. Paterno seems to understand that his failure to act had tragic consequences for the child victims. He was not fired because he participated in or condoned the sickening acts described in a 23-page grand jury report. He was fired because he did not take steps that probably would have ended them. The university must now explain this truth to angry, misinformed students who rioted in the streets when they learned of Mr. Paterno’s dismissal.

The obvious place for the students to begin is with the grand jury report, a harrowing document that depicts Mr. Sandusky as luring young children with gifts and outings before going on to rape and assault. The Penn State student newspaper, The Daily Collegian, has put the report on its Web site for anyone who wants to read the testimony.

The person identified in the report as Victim 1 told the grand jury that he was 11 or 12 years old when he met Mr. Sandusky in 2005 or 2006 through a charity for underprivileged children. The child was taken on trips and given a computer, clothing and cash. He says he eventually began sleeping over at the Sandusky home, where the former coach would creep into his bed at night and perform oral sex on him.

After many sexual encounters, the victim says he managed to terminate contact with Mr. Sandusky in the spring of 2008. According to the report, Mr. Sandusky was barred from assisting as a coach in the child’s school district after his mother called the school to report the child’s allegation of sexual assault. That was in 2009, seven years after Mr. Paterno’s graduate assistant coach, Mike McQueary, claims he first witnessed Mr. Sandusky raping a young child in the Penn State football building.

No one connected to the university should feel anything but shame that the institutional leaders did so little to protect the children involved. The trustees seemed to acknowledge that on Wednesday. The sooner misinformed students understand the basic facts, the better.

CLICK ON LINK FOR GRAND JURY INDICTMENT:
http://www.freep.com/assets/freep/pdf/C4181508116.PDF

Parents Must Always Call The Police And Speak Out!

http://www.thepostgame.com/features/201111/mothers-alleged-sandusky-victims-speak-out

On Tuesday morning, the tide of momentum against the Penn State football program and head coach Joe Paterno became even more overwhelming. A ninth alleged sexual assault victim of former coach Jerry Sandusky has reportedly come forward. A press conference scheduled for 12:20 ET was canceled as a report surfaced in the New York Times about plans for Paterno's exit. And most importantly, an exclusive story in the Patriot-News gave voice to two mothers of alleged victims.

Their stories are specific, extensive, and chilling. And both mothers accuse Penn State officials of doing too little to prevent tragedy.

"I'm so upset," the mother of a 24-year-old, who authorities are calling Victim Six, told The Patriot-News exclusively. "My son is extremely distraught, and now to see how we were betrayed, words cannot tell you. To see that Graham Spanier is putting his unconditional support behind [former Penn State athletic director Tim] Curley and [resigned Vice President of Business and Finance Gary] Shultz when he should be putting his support behind the victims, it just makes them victims all over again."

***

For the mother of another former child, who is now being called Victim One, trouble started when Sandusky, a volunteer coach at the boy's Pennsylvania high school, wanted to help discipline him for bad behavior. The two had met through Sandusky's charity for needy children, Second Mile.

"I said, 'No way, he's my kid,'" the mother told the Patriot-News.

Soon after, her son, then 15, started asking about a database for "sex weirdos."

She called the high school principal and was told to come in "right away."

The principal was in tears. The boy, upon telling his mom what happened, also broke down.

Central Mountain High School officials contacted the authorities immediately.

The boy was "very afraid" of Sandusky, according to the mother. When told to say no to the coach, he told his mother he couldn't.

When asked why not, he said, "You just don't do that.

***

The story told by the mother of "Victim Six" is every bit as haunting, if not more so. After Sandusky gave her son a tour of the Penn State football locker room in 1998, the boy came home and told her, "If you're wondering why my hair is wet, we took a shower together."

He then ran to his room.

The boy later told his mom there was another child in the shower with him and the coach. That boy was 11.

The mother called police. An investigation started. The mother confronted Sandusky in his home, with the police listening in another room.

According to grand jury evidence, Sandusky told the mother of Victim One: "I understand. I was wrong. I wish I could get forgiveness. I know I won’t get it from you. I wish I were dead."

But Sandusky was cleared.

"And you're going to tell me that Spanier and Paterno weren't informed of something that was that huge that [the district attorney] was in on it but Spanier was kept in the dark?" the mother told the Patriot-News. "I’m just not that stupid. I’m so upset I just can’t believe it."

Sandusky's attorney, contacted by the Patriot-News, denies all charges. Scott Paterno, Joe's son, said Penn State lawyers assured him his father was never told about the 1998 report.

According to the grand jury presentment, Sandusky had eight alleged victims. Six shared showers in Lasch Building at Penn State, which houses the football program.

Both mothers suffered for several years, only to learn over the weekend that Penn State officials did not report the incidents to police.

"I'm infuriated that people would not report something like that," the mother of Victim One told the Patriot-News. "I still can’t believe it. I'm appalled. I'm shocked. I'm stunned. There's so many words. I'm very mad. They could have prevented this from happening."

“We felt we need to restore trust in the university” - So Simple - Shame on the Jews World Over!

The Wall Street Journal

In its fifth day, the metastasizing scandal at Pennsylvania State University ended the career of Joe Paterno—the longest-tenured coach in major-college football—and resulted in the ouster of the university’s president.

After an emergency meeting Wednesday evening, the school’s Board of Trustees announced at a news conference at 10 p.m. that they had dismissed Mr. Paterno and Graham Spanier, the school’s president for the past 16 years.

“We felt we need to restore trust in the university,” said John Surma, the board’s vice president.

An Old Gentile Knows When His Time Is Up!

The Washington Star, David Israel says, is “an insular world that protects its own, and operates outside of societal norms as long as victories and cash continue to flow bountifully.” Penn State rakes in $70 million a year from its football program. This is what Israel calls “the delusion that the ability to win football games indicates anything at all about your character or intelligence other than that you can win football games.”

...I’ve got to wonder how the 84-year-old coach feels when he thinks about all the children who look up to him; innocent, football-crazy boys like the one he was told about in March 2002, a child then Anthony’s age who was sexually assaulted in a shower in the football building by Jerry Sandusky, Paterno’s former defensive guru, according to charges leveled by the Pennsylvania attorney general.

Paterno was told about it the day after it happened by Mike McQueary, a graduate assistant coach who testified that he went into the locker room one Friday night and heard rhythmic slapping noises. He looked into the showers and saw a naked boy about 10 years old “with his hands up against the wall, being subjected to anal intercourse by a naked Sandusky,” according to the grand jury report.

It would appear to be the rare case of a pedophile caught in the act, and you’d think a graduate student would know enough to stop the rape and call the police. But McQueary, who was 28 years old at the time, was a serf in the powerfully paternal Paternoland. According to the report, he called his dad, went home and then the next day went to the coach’s house to tell him.

“I don’t even have words to talk about the betrayal that I feel,” the mother of one of Sandusky’s alleged victims told The Harrisburg Patriot-News, adding about McQueary: “He ran and called his daddy?”

Paterno, who has cast himself for 46 years as a moral compass teaching his “kids” values, testified that he did not call the police at the time either.

The family man who had faced difficult moments at Brown University as a poor Italian with a Brooklyn accent must have decided that his reputation was more important than justice.

The iconic coach waited another day, according to the report, and summoned Tim Curley, the Penn State athletic director who had been a quarterback for Paterno in the ’70s.

Curley did not call the university police, who had investigated an episode in 1998 in which Sandusky admitted he was wrong to shower with an 11-year-old boy and promised not to do it again. (Two years later, according to the grand jury report, a janitor saw Sandusky performing oral sex on a boy in the showers and told his supervisor, who did not report it.)

Curley waited another week and a half to see McQueary, who told the grand jury that he repeated his sodomy story for Curley and Gary Schultz, a university vice president who oversaw campus police.

Two more weeks passed before Curley contacted McQueary to let him know that Sandusky’s keys to the locker room had been taken away and the incident had been reported to The Second Mile, the charity Sandusky started in 1977.

Prosecutors suggest that the former coach, whose memoir is ironically titled “Touched,” founded the charity as a way to ensnare boys. They have charged Sandusky, now 67, with sexually assaulting eight boys he met there.

Despite knowing of the two similar rapes, The Second Mile did not do anything to keep Sandusky away from vulnerable children until 2008.

Curley said he told Sandusky he could no longer bring children onto the Penn State campus. In other words, Jer, if you want to violate kids who live in cow town where everything revolves around the idolatry of Penn State and Paterno, kindly take them off campus. The predator was still welcome on his own, though; he was spotted at the football team’s weight room working out last week.

Curley told the university president, Graham Spanier, about the matter, and it got buried. Paterno, Curley and Schultz disingenuously claim they were left with the impression that the contact might have been mere “horsing around,” as Curley put it. That’s grotesque.

Like the Roman Catholic Church, Penn State is an arrogant institution hiding behind its mystique. And sports, as my former fellow sports columnist at The Washington Star, David Israel says, is “an insular world that protects its own, and operates outside of societal norms as long as victories and cash continue to flow bountifully.” Penn State rakes in $70 million a year from its football program.

Paterno was still practicing for the game against Nebraska on Saturday, and supportive students were rallying at his house. This is what Israel calls “the delusion that the ability to win football games indicates anything at all about your character or intelligence other than that you can win football games.”

I can only hope that by the time Anthony’s parents work up their nerve to have what they call “the conversation” with him about his fallen idol, St. Joe and the other Penn scoundrels will have been ignominiously cast out of what turns out to be a not-so-Happy Valley.

CLICK ON LINK BELOW FOR ENTIRE ARTICLE:
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/11/09/opinion/dowd-personal-foul-at-penn.html?emc=tnt&tntemail1=y

The Molester Next Door!

By FRANK BRUNI
Published: November 7, 2011

The longest, most exhaustively researched article I ever wrote for a newspaper or magazine was about a child molester who had sexually abused a little boy living down the street. The abuse went on for more than two years, beginning when the boy was 10.

This molester had a job. A house. A wife. Two kids of his own. And he gained access to his victim not through brute force but through patience, play and gifts: help with his homework, computer games, a new bike. To neighborhood observers, including the victim’s parents, the molester’s attentiveness passed for kindness, at least for a while. A molester’s behavior very often does.

The arrest on Saturday of a former Penn State University assistant football coach — who is accused of sexually abusing eight pre-adolescent, adolescent and teenage boys — brought this all back to me. I wonder if people who know the coach and saw him working with kids will comment on how genuinely nurturing he seemed and how this surely prevented or discouraged suspicions about him.

This is something that has come up repeatedly over decades — I wrote that article back in 1991, for The Detroit Free Press — but that remains tough to accept: the predator to watch out for is less likely to don a trench coat and lurk behind a bush than to wear a clerical collar and stand near the altar or to hold a stopwatch and walk the sidelines. And he (or, for that matter, she) works with children as a function of being drawn to them for reasons beyond their welfare.

The former Penn State assistant coach, Jerry Sandusky, 67, founded and ran a charity program for disadvantaged boys. That’s one of the ways he got to know and interact so extensively with kids, some of whom received special favors related to his college-football connections. His alleged abuse of them is said to have occurred over a 15-year period ending in 2009.

He maintains his innocence of the charges against him. That’s important to note, because sexual abuse of children is a crime so rightly enraging that the specter of it has prompted unfair rushes to judgment in the past.

But true or not, the accusations against Sandusky, spelled out in great detail in a 23-page grand jury report, bring to mind many proven cases in which a molester occupied a position of trust, identified and gravitated to children who were especially vulnerable, made them feel special and was by all outward appearances their champion, which many molesters indeed believe themselves to be.

In their own minds these molesters aren’t predators. They’re people whose affinity for children just happens to have a sexual element, the satisfaction of which they’ve convinced themselves isn’t such a big, harmful deal.

Parents face a tricky challenge. They need to be watchful but not paranoid, because most clergy members, scout leaders, camp counselors and coaches aren’t abusers in waiting and are improving children’s lives. They deserve the opportunity to.

But parents should also remain conscious of an additional lesson suggested by the Penn State story. Institutions do an awful job of policing themselves.

That has been true of the Boy Scouts, which has paid out tens of million of dollars in response to lawsuits by former scouts molested by adults who continued to work in the organization despite complaints or questions about their behavior.

That has been true of the Roman Catholic Church, whose diocesan heads and bishops repeatedly transferred abusive priests from one parish to another rather than report them to law enforcement authorities. This cover-up spanned decades and went all the way up the hierarchy of the church.

Many factors explain it, including a fear of scandal and desire to protect the church’s image. The Boy Scouts, too, didn’t want messiness exposed.

Was that a dynamic at Penn State as well? Two university officials have been indicted for not contacting the police after being alerted many years ago to the possibility that Sandusky was abusing boys from his charity on university premises.

And there are lingering questions about whether the university’s renowned head football coach, Joe Paterno, was irresponsible.

According to an account in the indictment that he hasn’t disputed, a graduate assistant in 2002 told him of inappropriate activity in a university shower between a boy and Sandusky, who had already retired from his longtime job as the coordinator of the football team’s defense. Coach Paterno relayed that to a university official, then apparently moved on. And Sandusky continued to interact with troubled boys.

Paterno absolutely should have followed up. Maybe he just couldn’t envision someone like Sandusky — a distinguished professional, a seeming do-gooder — as a molester. But it’s important that we all do.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/11/08/opinion/the-molester-next-door.html

Sandusky, 67, was arrested Saturday and charged with 40 counts of sexually abusing children over 15 years...

Two top university officials — Gary Schultz, the senior vice president for finance and business, and Tim Curley, the athletic director — were charged with perjury and failure to report to authorities what they knew of the allegations, as required by state law. The Penn State board of trustees held an emergency meeting Sunday night, after which the university president, Graham B. Spanier, announced that Curley had asked to be placed on administrative leave while he fought the charges and that Schultz had resigned.

By MARK VIERA
Published: November 6, 2011

STATE COLLEGE, Pa. — On Saturday, March 2, 2002, according to Pennsylvania prosecutors, a Penn State University graduate student went to visit Joe Paterno, the university’s football coach. He had a horrific story to tell: the night before, the graduate student had witnessed one of Paterno’s former coaches sexually assaulting a 10-year-old boy in the football facility’s showers.

Paterno, according to the prosecutors, did not call the police. Instead, the next day, he had the university’s athletic director visit him at his home, a modest ranch house just off campus in State College. According to prosecutors, Paterno told the athletic director of the report regarding the former coach, Jerry Sandusky.

The authorities then say nothing about what, if anything, Paterno did in the subsequent days or weeks. They do not say whether he followed up on the allegation or whether he ever confronted Sandusky, a man who had worked for him for 32 years and who, even after retiring, had wide access to the university’s athletic facilities and students.

What prosecutors do contend in detail is that Sandusky went on to abuse at least one and perhaps any number of other young boys after Paterno and other senior officials at Penn State were told of an assault in 2002.

Sandusky, 67, was arrested Saturday and charged with 40 counts of sexually abusing children over 15 years, including his time as an assistant at Penn State. He was specifically accused of having assaulted the young boy in 2002. All the accusers were boys Sandusky had come to know through a charity he founded, the Second Mile, for disadvantaged children from troubled families.

On Sunday, Paterno issued a statement insisting that the graduate assistant had not told him of the extent of the sexual assault that he said he witnessed, only that he had seen something inappropriate involving Sandusky and the child.

“As Coach Sandusky was retired from our coaching staff at the time, I referred the matter to university administrators,” Paterno said in the statement.

“I understand that people are upset and angry, but let’s be fair and let the legal process unfold,” Paterno said.

Paterno’s son Scott said in an interview Sunday that Paterno never spoke to Sandusky about the allegation, and that he never seriously pursued the question of whether any action had been taken by the university or any other authorities against Sandusky.

“From my imperfect recollection, once he referred it off, I do not believe he had a second conversation about it,” Scott Paterno said of his father and how he handled any follow-up on the allegation. He added: “The appropriate people were contacted by Joe. That was the chain of command. It was a retired employee and it falls under the university’s auspices, not the football auspices.”

The university’s athletic director, Tim Curley, and another senior administration official have been charged with lying to a grand jury about what they had been told about Sandusky’s conduct, and they are expected to surrender to the authorities Monday morning. Their lawyers have maintained they will be exonerated. Sandusky, through his lawyer, has maintained his innocence.

It appears prosecutors believe that Paterno, whatever his personal sense of obligation to inquire or act further, met his legal requirement in reporting the graduate student’s allegation to his direct superior, Curley.

Under state law, if a staff member at a school makes a report of possible sexual abuse of a child, it is the responsibility of “the person in charge of the school or institution” to make a report to the state’s Department of Public Welfare. According to prosecutors, neither Curley nor the president of Penn State, Graham B. Spanier, who had been told by Curley of the complaint against Sandusky, made such a report to child welfare authorities.

Of course, there was nothing preventing Paterno from doing more, and some sexual abuse experts and those who have represented young sex victims over the years have begun questioning why he did not take more immediate, aggressive action....

CLICK ON LINK BELOW FOR THE REST OF THE ARTICLE:
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/11/07/sports/ncaafootball/in-penn-states-sex-abuse-case-a-focus-on-how-paterno-reacted.html?_r=1&nl=todaysheadlines&emc=globaleua28

The Greek Gedolim - Leading From Behind!

THE DENIALS THAT TRAPPED GREECE

THE warning was clear: Greece was spiraling out of control.

But the alarm, sounded in mid-2009, in a draft report from the International Monetary Fund, never reached the outside world.

Greek officials saw the draft and complained to the I.M.F. So the final report, while critical, played down the risks that Athens might one day default, with disastrous consequences for all of Europe.

What is so remarkable about this episode is that it wasn’t so remarkable at all. The reversal at the I.M.F. was just one small piece of a broad pattern of denial that helped push Greece to the brink and now threatens to pull apart the euro. Politicians, policy makers, bankers — all underestimated dangers that seem clear enough in hindsight. Time and again over the last two years, many of those in charge offered solutions that, rather than fix the problems in Greece, simply let them fester.

Indeed, five months after the I.M.F. made that initial prognosis, Prime Minister George Papandreou of Greece disclosed that, under the previous government, his nation had essentially lied about the size of its deficit. The gap, it turned out, amounted to an unsustainable 12 percent of the country’s annual economic output, not 6 percent, as the government had maintained.

Almost all of the endeavors to defuse this crisis have denied the overarching conclusion of that I.M.F. draft: that Greece could no longer pay its bills and needed to drastically cut its debt.

Until October, when European leaders conceded that point, the champion of the resistance was Jean-Claude Trichet, who stepped down this month as president of the European Central Bank. It was he who insisted that no European country could ever be allowed to go bankrupt.

“There is simply no excuse for Trichet and Europe getting this so wrong,” said Willem Buiter, chief economist at Citigroup. “It is fine to make default a moral issue, but you also have to accept that outside of Western Europe, defaults have been a dime a dozen, even in the past few decades.”

If leaders had agreed earlier to ease Greece’s debt burden and moved faster to protect the likes of Italy and Spain — as United States officials had been urging since early 2010 — the worst might be behind Europe today, experts say.

The turning point came at a late-night meeting last month when Angela Merkel, the German chancellor, pushed private creditors to accept a 50 percent loss on their Greek bonds. Mr. Trichet had long opposed such a move, fearing that it could undermine European banks. Instead, at his urging, European leaders initially promoted painful austerity for Greece, prompting a public backlash that pushed Mr. Papendreou’s government to the brink of collapse and could force Athens to abandon the euro.

Many view the latest rescue plan as too little, too late.

“Because of all this denial and delay, Greece will need to write down as much as 85 percent of its debt — 50 percent is not enough,” Mr. Buiter said.

It was never going to be easy to turn things around in Greece, particularly given European politics. In countries like Germany and the Netherlands, many people oppose bailing out their southern neighbors. Policy makers and, indeed, many financiers believed that they could buy enough time for Greece to solve its problems on its own.

“It was quite obvious, by the spring of 2010, that Greek debt could not be paid off,” said Richard Portes, a European economics expert at the London Business School. “But in good faith, policy makers felt that Greece could grow out of its debt problem. They were wrong.”

BOB M. TRAA is no one’s idea of a radical. A Dutchman, he labors at the I.M.F., among the arcana of global debt statistics. He wrote the 2009 report.

Immediately after that bulletin, he produced another, more damning analysis, which concluded that if Greece were a company, it would be bankrupt. The country’s net worth, he concluded, was a negative 51 billion euros ($71 billion).

But because Greece had a high-enough credit rating at that time, it could keep borrowing money and skate by. Once again, the Greek government objected to the I.M.F. analysis, although this time, the report was not amended.

Attention has only recently been drawn to these early I.M.F. studies. The Brussels research group Bruegel, which conducted an analysis at the I.M.F.’s behest, concluded the fund should have done more to draw attention to Greece’s troubles.

By early 2010, banks and bond investors were growing reluctant to lend Greece money. The country’s finance minister, George Papaconstantinou, delivered a blistering message to his European partners....

CLICK ON LINK BELOW TO READ THE ENTIRE ARTICLE:
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/11/06/business/global/europes-two-years-of-denials-trapped-greece.html?nl=todaysheadlines&emc=globaleua24

Camp Agudah Failed To Report Abuser - Yudi Kolko was 18 when he learned that Camping offered a unique opportunity to meet boys.

DIFFERENT TITLE - SAME STORY!



Boy Scouts failed to report abuser

By Jason Felch and Kim Christensen, Los Angeles Times
Sat Oct 29 2011

Rick Turley was 18 when he learned that Scouting offered a unique opportunity to meet boys.

He would show up in a uniform with a sash full of merit badges, charm parents with claims of being a "top" leader and offer to take their preteen boys out for a swim or drive. Then, often after plying them with alcohol, he would fondle or rape them — once going so far as to kidnap a boy in a stolen plane.

Over nearly two decades, Turley molested at least 15 children in Southern California and British Columbia, most of whom he met through American and Canadian Scouting, a Los Angeles Times and Canadian Broadcasting Corp. investigation has found.

Scouting officials on both sides of the border not only failed to stop him, but sometimes helped cover his tracks, according to confidential Scouting records, court files and interviews with victims, families and Scout leaders.

At one point in 1979, Boy Scouts of America officials decided not to call police after Turley admitted molesting three Orange County boys, the organization's records show.

"We were following exactly the national recommendations of the Boy Scouts of America and its board who set up the rules," said A. Buford Hill Jr., a former Orange County Scouting executive, in a recent interview. "You do not want to broadcast to the entire population that these things happen. You take care of it quietly and make sure it never happens again."

But it did.

Turley returned to British Columbia, signed on with Scouts Canada, which is separate from its U.S. counterpart, and continued his abuses for at least a decade.

Turley, now 58, is still surprised at how often he got away with it.

"It was easy," he said in an interview this month at the Alberta truck-stop motel where he now works.

Turley is one of more than 5,000 suspected child molesters named in confidential files kept by the Boy Scouts of America. The documents — called the "perversion files" by the organization — include unsubstantiated tips as well as admissions of guilt.

Those records have surfaced in recent years in lawsuits by former Scouts, accusing the group of failing to exclude known pedophiles, detect abuses or turn in offenders to the police.

The Oregon Supreme Court is now weighing a request by newspapers, a wire service and broadcasters to open about 1,200 more files in the wake of a nearly $20-million judgment in a Portland sex abuse case last year.

The Scouts' handling of sex-abuse allegations echoes that of the Catholic Church in the face of accusations against its priests, some attorneys say.

"It's the same institutional reaction: scandal prevention," said Seattle attorney Timothy Kosnoff, who has filed seven suits in the last year by former Scouts but was not involved in the Oregon case.

Current Boy Scouts of America officials declined to be interviewed and would not say how many files exist or what is in them. Their lawyers have said the records are confidential, in part to protect victims and because some of the files are based on unproven allegations.

"The BSA has continued to enhance its youth protection efforts as society has increased its understanding of the dangers children face," the Scouts said in a statement.

In the 1980s, the Boy Scouts began requiring that at least two adults be present for troop activities. The following decade, it mandated criminal background checks for staffers, a requirement that was expanded to the organization's nearly 1 million volunteers in 2008. Last year, it required child abuse prevention training as well. All suspicions of sexual misconduct must now be reported to police.

Those measures would likely have stopped Turley had they been in place decades ago. Instead, the Scouts' national policy had long recommended keeping abuse and other misconduct a secret.

Turley said one call to police by Scouting officials in 1979 "probably would have put a stop to me years and years and years ago." Instead, he "went back to the Scouts again and again as a leader and offended against the boys," said Turley, who said he has learned to control his impulses.

CHILD-ABUSE IN ULTRA-ORTHODOX YESHIVAS COMES IN ALL FORMS!

THESE WERE ALL WRITTEN BY FORMER STUDENTS OF R. MOSHE LAZER BLUM & R. SHIMON GOLDBRENER OF MONSEY --- NONE OF THE WRITERS ARE FRUM TODAY!

One day the boys were assigned chavruses (studying partners). R. Goldbrener and R. Blum paired me up with this kid, I didn't want to study with, so I told them that I would like to learn with someone else. The response was NO you have to learn with him. I argued back, of course, and R. Goldbrener took me into a nearby room and slapped me once, then he asked me "are you gonna partner up with that kid, yes or no?" so my answer was "no", so he slapped me again, this went on for a while (maybe 15-20 minutes) as he kept on asking "yes or no?" and my answer constant "no". (Wasn't he giving me a choice by asking me yes or no? I answered his question!) The beating got harder and more violent, (the entire time I was thinking, if only R. Blum would find out what R. Goldbrener is doing to me, he would get in trouble from R. Blum) so after about 15-20 minutes R. Blum came into the room and asked R. Goldbrener if I already answered and he responded that "no he didn't" so then came the worst; two adults started beating on me. After another ten minutes of two adults beating on me, I of course answered yes and they stopped. Later on, R. Goldbrener told me that I was a stubborn child & he would knock it out of me, but little did he know that he ruined me for life and I'm now more stubborn than ever.

Shortly after I turned thirteen, my parents sent me to a "sleep-away" yeshiva located in Monsey, where we lived. By the afternoon of the first day, I was calling home in tears, begging my mother to come get me. In trying to describe the physical and emotional abuse that went on there, I'm doing the place a disservice. Beatings were so normal a sight, they were ignored by other students. Rebbeim bragged about how much they intimidated us, and kids walked around with bruises, welts and all sorts of marks.

Besides the physical abuse, there was the mental pressure put on us, every second of every day was controlled, starting with waking up at the crack of dawn, to the fifteen minutes we had to run to the mikvah, haul ourselves back and be seated at our spot, (Heaven help you if you were seconds late) to laying down on the left side and waking up on the right. Not tolerated were: laughing, talking about anything aside from what we were studying, contact with the outside world, no food or snacks outside of the three meals served to us (fifteen minutes per meal, no talking), no personal books, tape players, etc.

When I say beating, I'm not referring to a little slap or even a backhand to the head. I'm talking about all out, go for broke: fists, elbow, sticks, anything handy were all fair game. I've seen coffee jars used as weapons, heads slammed through drywall, chairs and trash cans thrown - all in one session!

I could fill a book with all the stories that happened to me and other bochurim. It got to the point where we were immune to the beatings and we bragged about how badly we got hit that day. I even remember thinking to myself one day that today was the first time an entire day had gone by without begin hit once. That day was one and a half years into my time there.

My parents, being naive, as so many parents are, believed that anyone with the title Rebbe, Rosh Yeshiva or Menahel could do no wrong. No matter what I said to them, the answer was the same, "He's a Rosh Yeshiva, he must know what he's doing".

I eventually gave up trying to convince my parents to remove me. After I left the yeshiva, I made a conscious effort to forget and get over my experiences there and to a large extent, I was successful. I moved on, for the most part blocking the whole thing out of my head, but certain things wouldn't go away. to this day, I never sit with my back to the room. I get jumpy and easily startled and I flinch when people "high five or back slap" me. I avoid talking about the whole experience because when I do, I get physically ill (as I am typing this, my heart is pounding and my hands are shaking).

I don't know how many of you know the difference between a 6 slice yarmulke (kippa) and a 4 slice, but that R. Blum sure does know the difference. One fine afternoon it all seemed to be going well, I went into town and bought a new yarmulke. I went from a 6 slice to a 4 slice (one difference is that the 6 slice was soft & the 4 was more stiff) I threw out the 6 slice and I rolled into yeshiva with my new 4 slice yarmulke. I didn't pay much attention to my new yarmulke, just that it was more comfortable on my head. All of a sudden R. Blum comes up to me and tells me to get rid of the 4 slice yarmulke and wear the 6 slice. I explained to him that I like this one and that I threw away the other, then R. Blum took my yarmulke off my head and left me with nothing on my head, so I was like if the so called rabbi can remove my kippa and if I'm doing a sin, it's on his responsibility. Then the he started pounding my head with his fingers and he kept on saying "put on a yarmulke put on a yarmulke" and I was like, "so give me back mine", but he refused. Then while his hand is knocking on my head, I put my head down on the table (like taking a nap) and the pounding got stronger and harder. Then he asked one of the boys for a blade, and he cut my yarmulke in to 4 pieces and there was my yarmulke all cut up and I'm not wearing any, that made him even more angry because I kept on asking and I was upset that my yarmulke was cut, so the pounding continued until it got real ugly.

He threw me on the floor and started kicking my head (it looked like he was playing soccer with my head as the ball). I can tell you one thing, I was beaten..... I don't even remember the end of the story. I just know that I'm still alive to tell the story and nowadays I proudly wear only 4 slice yarmulkes. It did leave a trauma because I wouldn't change that style for anything. It goes so far that my daughter once came home and said that her friends were making fun of her that her dad is wearing a 4 slice yarmulke. My wife gave me that look like she would appreciate if I would change it, & I explained to her that I suffered so much for that yarmulke, even nearly lost my life over it, and I hope she understands, she did understand. And that's where this story ends. May they never have a peaceful day.

This weekend I saw an invitation for a Tea Party for a yeshiva in Monsey. After reading it thru, I noticed something that all of a sudden started heating my blood and I felt my pressure rising. The trigger was a name on there: "Shimon Goldbrener". After reading that, I started having flashbacks from back in the day when I went to the yeshiva of Moshe Lazer Blum & Shimon Goldbrener. At the same time, the left side of my neck was killing me and that got my blood pumping even more. I started remembering what had happened in that school, I don't think about it every day and can even go by years that I don't think of it, but at that moment it hit. The story with the hurting shoulder/neck/back was as follows: (when I do think about that man, I will never forget the details on the story and nor will the kids that watched it either) On May of 1994 there was a ceremony in Brooklyn and I wanted to attend, so being that the yeshiva was in Rockland County, I asked the administration (Rabbis Blum and Goldbrener) if I could go tomorrow to Brooklyn and they said yes. Next morning came and I woke up a bit late, I rushed to mikvah and then rushed into shul. They were already in middle of davening (basically, I was late) so after davening, one of those two came up to me and said to me that I cannot go to Brooklyn because I arrived late to prayers. I tried arguing that we didn't make any kind of deal like that and that he can't stop me from going but it still didn't help and he said no you can't go. Later after breakfast and just about walking into class, R. Goldbrener told me that he would allow me to go but on one condition; he will give me 50 punches on my shoulder and back and after that I can go (mind you this guy was about 250 lb and I was a little 13 year old, maybe 125 lbs tops). And me wanting to be a hero said no problem it's a deal.

Having all students sitting around one big table (a few tables put together, about 15-20 kids) he started punching one after another. I was sitting next to him on his right side & my left shoulder was his punching bag, as he kept going one after the other, and the students counted with him, 21, 22, 23 and so on. When it came to 33, the students counted that # twice. I was like "that's not fair" but my screams were disregarded. When it came to 49 the guy stopped and said that I cannot go because he didn't give me FIFTY punches. We argued and argued, he even at one point threatened me that if I don't stop arguing he would beat me up. At the end, the students stuck up for me and they said that when counting they counted one of the #s twice so that means that really it was 50 not 49, so I was granted permission to go. In Brooklyn, at the ceremony there were so many people and there was lots of pushing going on, and when people were pushing on me it hurt so bad that while the trip almost wasn't worth it, it was still worth it since I had gotten through that. This is only one of the many, many stories I myself had there, G-d is my witness that I'm not making this up.

One day during a Shiur, MLB. ‘hinted’ to us that the building we were in wasn't suited for such a Chushiveh Mukom Torah like ours, and if only we could make this one burn down, we could collect on the insurance policy…

We immediately started making plans to burn the building down. It started out as an open secret, that only our class knew about, but eventually everybody was in on it. MLB helped with planning the job, and made sure we didn't make it look like an arson. The plan was to disconnect the oven from the gas line, and leave the pipe open over the Channukah vacation, meanwhile we lit a yartzeit candle in a far corner of the room… The Sifrei Torah ‘should be’ secure because they were in a safe at the opposite end of the building, but the rest of the seforim would have to be collateral damage if we wanted to get away with it.

Before I go on, I have to point out that the building we inhabited had been a shul for many years, and MLB had only bought it a few years before. Part of the deal was that the congregation - which mostly used it on Shabbos and Yom Tov - let us use their siddurim, seforim, and sifrei torah, all week, but it still belonged to them…
L’Kavod Channukah we got released on thursday afternoon - instead of the usual friday afternoon, and we sprang into action. We filled several trash bags with “the important stuff” we didn't want to lose, and hid it behind the Viznitz girls school (why specifically there - I’ll never know). We set up our sophisticated Jewish lightening rig, and ran home.

Sunday morning came, and the building was still there! Our master plan hadn't worked. The candle had gone out, and all we were left with was a building that smelled so bad, we had to stay out of the top floor for days.

We had to rethink our methods,so we decided to go with the old faithful boiler. A little while later, the Yeshivah put on a Melaveh Malkah as a fund raiser in Yeshiva Spring Valley which is just a few hundred yards down the street from our building.
This time we came prepared, we had two-way radios, spotters, and scouts. We laid out a haphazard-looking row of towels from the boiler to a wooden table, and then dropped some paper towels into the pilot. We waited till we saw flames, and then left the building.

We went across the street to the Bais Dovid parking lot, and watched. This time it worked. It didn't take long for flames to start shooting out of the windows. Eventually the sirens started, and the fire department showed up. The fire wasn't that big, and it didn't take them too long to put it out, but we weren't satisfied. We waited for hours till everyone was gone, and snuck back into the building, and lit it on fire again! We again waited till we saw substantial flames, and then went home. Early the next morning I ran as fast as I could to the Yeshiva building, and sure enough, it was destroyed. Part of the roof had caved in, and the inside was completely burnt out.

Long story short, MLB and company got away with it. We went on Galus for a while, roaming from shul to shul, but when the money finally came in he bought a house, and (illegally) converted it into a Yeshiva building. We had all the amenities, indoor mikvah, beis hamedrash, dorm rooms, big kitchen, and dining room. Once in a while we had to hide the fact that we had converted a residence to a school, if the ‘suits’ showed up we’d rearrange rooms, and hide half the kids. But we obviously did a good job, because he was never caught.

R. Shimon Goldbrener is currently a Maagid Shiur in a Yeshivah, and R. Moshe Lazer Blum is currently opening a new Yeshivah. Would you send your kids to study under them? If you care for your children, pass this along.

"For Months a 14 Year Old Boy Was Repeatedly Raped and Sodomized..."

http://abclocal.go.com/wabc/story?section=news/local/northern_suburbs&id=8403362
CLICK ON ABOVE LINK TO WATCH THE EYEWITNESS VIDEO:

Eyewitness News

SPRING VALLEY (WABC) -- A self-proclaimed rabbi in Spring Valley was arrested last week on charges of molesting a teenage boy from Monsey.

Police say they received a report that a 14-year-old boy had been sexually abused.

Moishe Turner, 58, was taken into custody and charged with seven counts of felony second-degree criminal sex act and one count of endangering the welfare of a child.

People at the synagogue in Monsey say Turner used to attend services there but was asked to leave because of similar allegations some years ago, allegations that did not result in criminal charges.

In the case that resulted in charges, the parents of the victim went to the police. There are conflicting reports about whether Turner is a rabbi. He apparently refers to himself that way professionally, but the community is divided on the issue.

This investigation is ongoing and more charges are expected. Police believe that more victims are out there. Anyone who may have any information is asked to contact the Ramapo Police Investigations Division.

Turner was remanded to the Rockland County Jail in lieu of $75,000.

The name of the victim is being withheld to protect his identity.

Monsey, Spring Valley Rabbi Accused of Sodomizing Boys!

Rabbi Shmuel Kamenetsky, hear my words: Many (victims of abuse) have chosen baptism and conversion. Others have committed suicide..

From: Benjamin Aryeh Uchytil
1100 Howe Ave Apt 551
Sacramento, CA 95825

To: Rabbi Shmuel Kamenetsky
Talmudical Yeshiva of Philadelphia
6063 Drexel Rd.
Philadelphia, PA 19131-1296

August 2, 2011

Dear Rabbi Kamenetsky,

As an adult survivor of severe and unrelenting childhood sexual abuse, I have followed your halachic decisions and media pronouncements regarding this issue with great concern.

I am a Litvak, yeshiva-trained, from Monsey, New York. For many years I taught at Monsey yeshivos, mostly at the mesivta level. Rabbi, from my long-term perspective within the yeshiva velt I confirm:

1. Orthodox Jewish pedophilia is alive and ‘well’ in our communities,

2. The rabbonim actively protect our perpetrators from prosecution, ensuring that even more children will be sexually abused,

3. The rabbonim censure and threaten victims and their families in order to force them to keep quiet about what has occurred,

4. Orthodox Jews are often provoked to violence against victims who report to the police due to the Torah proscription against ‘mesirah’.

Due to your misguided attempts to ‘save the nedon’, to prevent the prosecution of our perpetrators, these recalcitrant individuals are doomed to a high rate of recidivism: they offend repeatedly over the course of their lives. Indeed, a pedophile molests, on average, approximately 140 different children prior to his first arrest.

Rabbi, can you not see what is occurring under your very nose? Orthodox pedophiles are not only defiling but destroying our ‘pirkei kehuna’, our precious children. I cannot believe you consider your current course of action wise and profitable for our community. Saving perpetrators from prosecution: Is it good for the Jews? Most definitely not!

Rabbi Shmuel Kamenetsky, hear my words: Your halachic interpretations, intended to moderate and mediate between Orthodox pedophiles and their victims, are failing as I write this very letter. While you are busily engaged protecting our perpetrators, Orthodox Jewish victims are fleeing Torah, fleeing Yiddishkeit. We are fleeing left and right. Many, such as myself, have gone frei. Many have chosen baptism and conversion. Others have committed suicide.

You are losing us. Thousands have left the fold. Truly: you seem to care so much about our perpetrators, do you not care for victims? It would seem not. Given this, we are on the move. We are writing, writing to the goyishe papers, the Yiddishe papers, and on the Internet - to whomever will hear us. Every time I meet a Jew - Orthodox or frei - I tell him or her the truth about Orthodox pedophilia and about your frightful course regarding this issue. I tell Jews, Catholics, Protestants, Evangelicals, Muslims....

Rabbi, here is the truth: Although many survivors write you politely, groveling at your feet in the hope that you will change tack, you need to know that we despise you. You have hurt Orthodox survivors so badly, many to most of us will never forgive you for your destructive stance. Personally, I sincerely pray every day that HaShem will convict your heart and serve you a resounding kick in the tukkis.

Very truly,

Benjamin Aryeh Uchytil

“This is about protecting children”

MEDIA ADVISORY:

Pennsylvania is seeking to join California and Delaware as states that have created a window year or two for survivors of sexual abuse to come forward and sue their abusers. In the two states that have done so over 350 child predators have been identified through the outcome of the window. Similar legislation is being attempted in New York State but is being fought by the Catholic Church, the Satmar Chasidim and the Agudath Israel of America. They are natural allies in attempting to thwart the exposure of child molesters both because they do not want their schools and institutions to have to pay money even if they have knowingly covered up and protected abusers. They also continue to want to sweep the problem under the carpet, preferring to protect pedophiles rather than children.

Fortunately, while there are many, many Jewish children in Pennsylvania who are at risk for being abused, Agudah and Satmar are not very powerful there, so the molesters are not as powerful either. But, of course, as the Pope is being investigated by the Hague on charges of crimes against humanity for protecting molesters, the Catholic Church continues to brazenly fight the survivors every step of the way.

The benefit to the Jewish community if this will be passed is great. For example, serious allegations have emerged that Rabbi Shmuel Kaminetsky, the Rosh Yeshiva of the Philadelphia Yeshivah covered up that Moshe Eiseman molested boys in his yeshiva years ago. He instead of publicizing the danger, helped Eiseman to get a job at Ner Yisroel in Baltimore where he went on to abuse many boys over many years. Rabbi Kaminetsky also covered up for a child molester named Rabbis Zusha or Stanley Levitt who is only now being prosecuted in Massachusetts for molesting children in Boston.

While prosecutors are beginning to find ways to criminalize the cover up of child molestation, see the NY TIMES below -- about a Bishop in Kansas City being indicted for what appears to be less of an irresponsible action than Reb Shmuel's, it is already an actionable tort for survivors to sue both their molesters and those who have enabled and protected them putting children in harm's way. I believe that the only way for the rabbis and powerful people in our community to stop protecting molesters and start protecting children is to give the survivors the most options to hold the enablers accountable.

While Agudah has claimed that by allowing such a law and holding the yeshivas accountable for past negligence and tragic damages it will destroy the "financial integrity of the yeshivas", virtually all of the survivors of rabbinic/clergy and school-based abuse I know who want to sue their yeshivas, including those who are suing Torah Temima, are not out for money. Rather they have tried every other way to appeal to Rosh Yeshivas and have been stonewalled and dismissed without any changes in the way our community does business. There is still no acknowledgment of the cover ups, there has been no apology to the victims, no attempt to help them financially to get therapy or other treatments, and perhaps most importantly to the survivors the rabbis have still not begun to report molesters to the authorities, are fighting making rabbis mandated reporters, and do not teach the children in school about appropriate safety protocols.

While financial remuneration for damages suffered can be helpful, what most survivors find most healing in my experience is the validation that the community lead by its rabbis and gedolim understand the damage that was done, take responsibility for it, and take steps to prevent it from happening again. Unfortunately, until enough yeshivas are sued, it seems that it is unlikely for real change to occur.

In fact, it took the possibility of such legislative statute of limitations reform passing in New York to get the Gedolim to even admit that Jewish children were being molested despite the fact that they had been discussing the problem for years (according to an article in the Yated Ne'man and many other sources).

The two goals of helping survivors heal and protecting future vulnerable children go hand in hand. Let's help support this law and any others that create a safer community in which adults take responsibility for children's safety.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/15/us/kansas-city-bishop-indicted-in-reporting-of-abuse-by-priest.html?_r=1&nl=afternoonupdate&emc=aua2

Bishop Indicted; Charge Is Failing to Report Abuse
By A. G. SULZBERGER and LAURIE GOODSTEIN
Published: October 14, 2011

KANSAS CITY, Mo. — A bishop in the Roman Catholic Church has been indicted for failure to report suspected child abuse, the first time in the 25-year history of the church’s sex abuse scandals that the leader of an American diocese has been held criminally liable for the behavior of a priest he supervised.

The indictment of the bishop, Robert W. Finn, and the Diocese of Kansas City-St. Joseph by a county grand jury was announced on Friday. Each was charged with one misdemeanor count involving a priest accused of taking pornographic photographs of girls as recently as this year. They pleaded not guilty.

The case caused an uproar among Catholics in Kansas City this year when Bishop Finn acknowledged that he knew of the photographs last December but did not turn them over to the police until May. During that time, the priest, the Rev. Shawn Ratigan, is said to have continued to attend church events with children, and took lewd photographs of another young girl.

A decade ago the American bishops pledged to report suspected abusers to law enforcement authorities — a policy also recommended last year by the Vatican. Bishop Finn himself had made such a promise three years ago as part of a $10 million legal settlement with abuse victims in Kansas City.

Though the charge is only a misdemeanor, victims’ advocates immediately hailed the indictment as a breakthrough, saying that until now American bishops have avoided prosecution despite documents showing that in some cases they were aware of abuse.

“This is huge for us,” said Michael Hunter, director of the Kansas City chapter of the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, and a victim of sexual abuse by a priest. “It’s something that I personally have been waiting for years to see, some real accountability. We’re very pleased with the prosecuting attorney here to have the guts to do it.” The bishop signaled he would fight the charges with all his strength. He said in a statement: “We will meet these announcements with a steady resolve and a vigorous defense.”

The indictment announced on Friday by the Jackson County prosecutor, Jean Peters Baker, had been under seal since Oct. 6 because the bishop was out of the country. He returned on Thursday night.

In a news conference, Ms. Baker said the case was not religiously motivated, but was about the obligation under state law to report child abuse.

“This is about protecting children,” she said.

If convicted Bishop Finn would face a possible fine of up to $1,000 and a jail sentence of up to a year. The diocese faces a possible fine of up to $5,000.

Ms. Baker said that secrecy rules for grand jury proceedings prohibited her from discussing whether other charges were considered, such as child endangerment, a felony. But she said the fact that the bishop faces a single misdemeanor count should not diminish the seriousness.

“To my knowledge a charge like this has not been leveled before,” she said.

It also may not mark the end of the legal troubles facing the diocese in the case, which includes civil and criminal cases in federal court. Last month Bishop Finn and Msgr. Robert Murphy testified before another grand jury in neighboring Clay County. A spokesman for the prosecutor’s office there declined to comment.

The priest accused of taking the lewd photos, Father Ratigan, was a frequent presence in a Catholic elementary school next to his parish. The principal there sent a letter to the diocese in May 2010 complaining about Father Ratigan’s behavior with children. Then, last December, a computer technician discovered the photos on the priest’s laptop and turned the computer in to the diocese. A day later Father Ratigan tried to kill himself. The diocese said that Monsignor Murphy described — but did not share — a single photo of a young girl, nude from the waist down, to a police officer who served on an independent sexual abuse review board for the diocese. The officer said that based on the description it might meet the definition of child pornography, but he did not think it would, the diocese said.

Bishop Finn sent Father Ratigan to live in a convent and told him to avoid contact with minors. But until May the priest attended children’s parties, spent weekends in the homes of parish families, hosted an Easter egg hunt and presided, with the bishop’s permission, at a girl’s First Communion, according to interviews with parishioners and a civil lawsuit filed by a victim’s family.

Parents in the school and parishioners — told only that Father Ratigan had fallen sick from carbon monoxide poisoning — were stunned when he was arrested in May after the diocese called the police. He was indicted by a federal grand jury on charges of taking indecent photographs of young girls.

The new indictment released on Friday said that Bishop Finn and the diocese had reason to suspect that Father Ratigan might subject a child to abuse.

It cited “previous knowledge of concerns regarding Father Ratigan and children; the discovery of hundreds of photographs of children on Father Ratigan’s laptop, including a child’s naked vagina, upskirt images and images focused on the crotch; and violations of restrictions placed on Father Ratigan.”

Bishop Finn said in his statement on Friday that he and the diocese had given “complete cooperation” to law enforcement. He also pointed to steps he had taken since the scandal first became public, including commissioning a report to look into the case, and reinforcing procedures for handling allegations of abuse.

That report found that the diocese did not follow its own procedures. It also found that Bishop Finn was “too willing to trust” Father Ratigan.

The case has generated fury at the bishop, a staunch theological conservative who was already a polarizing figure in his diocese. Since the Ratigan case came to light, there have been widespread calls for him to resign.

Contributing to the sense of betrayal is the fact that only three years ago, Bishop Finn settled lawsuits with 47 plaintiffs in sexual abuse cases for $10 million and agreed to a list of 19 preventive measures, among them to immediately report anyone suspected of being a pedophile to the law enforcement authorities.

France may be the only country where a bishop has been convicted for his failure to supervise a priest accused of abuse, said Terrence McKiernan, president of BishopAccountability.org, a victims’ advocacy group that tracks abuse cases.

A grand jury in Philadelphia indicted a top official in the archdiocese there, Msgr. William Lynn, for mishandling cases of abuse. The former archbishop, Cardinal Anthony Bevilacqua, was not indicted, but he has been called to testify.