Counter Pedophilia Investigate Unit

A Deltona man who routinely invited teenage girls into his house for marijuana and alcohol was behind bars on child molestation charges Wednesday after sheriff’s investigators said one girl collapsed drunk on a sidewalk near his home and another described enduring sexual abuse in his bedroom.

Deputies charged 45-year-old Mauro Angel Hanco — who they said eyed teenage girls as they walked past his home on Trade Street, near two Deltona schools — with lewd and lascivious battery and contributing to the delinquency of a minor, according to the Volusia County Sheriff’s Office.

And investigators urged other victims in the neighborhood, if any, to come forward.

The investigation into Hanco began last week after a 15-year-old girl stumbled out of his home, drunk on vodka, and passed out on a sidewalk on Howland Boulevard, sheriff’s spokesman Gary Davidson said. Deputies said they found the girl so incoherent she could only give them her name.

She was taken by ambulance to Florida Hospital Fish Memorial to have her stomach pumped. (more…)

WASHINGTON — U.S. dioceses and religious orders received 505 new credible allegations of child sex abuse by clergy in 2010, a slight decrease from the previous year and a significant drop from the 1,092 new allegations reported in 2004, when the numbers began being tallied, according to a report released April 11 by the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops.

The report was prepared for the USCCB Secretariat of Child and Youth Protection by the Center for Applied Research in the Apostolate at Georgetown University from survey responses submitted by all but one of the 195 U.S. dioceses and eparchies (Eastern Catholic dioceses) and 156 of the 218 religious orders that belong to the Conference of Major Superiors of Men.

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NAMPA — From kindergarten to high school, bullying is something that affects kids all across the country.

The American Academy of Pediatrics recently designated bullying as a “National Health Crisis,” affecting three million kids a year.  One Nampa teen knows all too well the devastating effects a school bully can have.

Sixteen-year-old Nicole Clark considers herself a typical teenager.

“I had my friends, I enjoyed going to school, I was a good student — straight A’s,” said Nicole Clark.

She was a sprinter on her school’s track team and even participated in the Miss Teen Idaho pageant. But things at school quickly changed for Nicole. (more…)

Parents who want to prevent their children from accessing pornographic material online normally only worry about traditional PCs, but what’s the use of installing filtering software now that kids can get porn on their phones? Internet-enabled smartphones can access any pornographic website, but mobile filtering software is limited or non-existent. And with the rise of sexting, children can even share their own indecent images.

A recent patent application by electronics giant Samsung could have the answer. The patent describes a system for parents to monitor their offspring’s mobile activity through their own handset. It scans incoming images – either from the web, or the phone’s internal camera – for pornographic content by searching for large regions of exposed skin. If the image looks suspect, the child is locked out from accessing it and a copy is sent to their parent’s phone, who can choose to allow access in the case of a false alarm, such as a cosmetics advert. (more…)

By STABROEK STAFF
Dear Editor,

2011 has started very badly for women and children in Guyana. Two women have already been murdered by their male partners; another woman lies in hospital seriously injured from multiple stab wounds inflicted by her partner; an 11-year-old girl was allegedly raped by a police officer at the BV police station; a 9-year-old boy committed suicide; a male and female student from one of the most prestigious schools in Guyana were filmed having oral and penetrative sex; a teacher has been charged for sexually assaulting female secondary school students. And these are only the cases that have been reported in the media. We are less than two months into a new year and it already seems as though domestic violence, gender-based violence and child abuse are set to continue unabated.

It is alarming to read in SN of February 17 that according to Vanessa Francis, repeated reports of domestic violence, including serious threats from her former reputed husband to the Cove & John police station, never resulted in arrests or charges being laid. The Commander, officer in charge of Cove & John and the Commissioner of Police must explain what investigation was done and why this attempted murderer was not charged and placed before the court. (more…)

The Film and Publication board is calling on schools to teach cyber safety to school children, as part of its Back to School campaign against child pornography.

“The Internet and social media networks play a key role in the way young people communicate,” said FPB CEO Yoliswa Makhasi. “And, due to their immediacy and anonymity, they offer fantastic opportunities for self-expression, which can also be perilous.”

“That’s why, more than ever before, we need to encourage parents and other care-givers to play an active role in children’s digital lives. We believe that by including cyber safety in the curriculum, our children will be given the skills they need to avoid the perils of the Internet.”

The campaign aims to teach parents, teachers and students about the dangers of social networks and the legal consequences for those who create, send, receive or store child porn.

The event was launched at the Jules High School in Gauteng, the site of a notorious sex scandal last year involving three children, who distributed videos of their sex acts via cell phones and the internet.

By Times LIVE

By Connie Agius

Children who have been bullied tend to carry their battle scars throughout adulthood and become bullies themselves.

That is what a Wesley Mission report, Give Kids A Chance: No-one Deserves To Be Left Out, has found.

The organisation is calling on the Australian community and governments to put a stop to bullying.

The research found seven out of 10 adults have been affected by school bullying.

Wesley Mission CEO Keith Garner says the impacts of bullying flow into daily life.

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