It’s worse than that. It’s a dark moment for everyone, though we are learning that this sort of shadow finds too many corners in locker rooms.

Once again, former junior coach James stood in front of a judge on Wednesday and was convicted of sex crimes. The court sat in Winnipeg. James blandly delivered his lines via video link from Montreal, where he is free on bail.He will remain free until his Feb. 22 sentencing.

James has already served 3½ years in prison for assaults on several of his other charges, including former NHLer Sheldon Kennedy.

James ran once before, but there’s nowhere for him to hide now. He has become the wearisome and malignant Canadian face of child abuse.

As part of a plea, James admitted guilt in the sexual abuse of two more of his young players, former Calgary Flames star Theoren Fleury and a second man whose name remains under a publication ban.

The ugly details were read out in an agreed statement of facts. How James began his abuse of Fleury by fondling him while he slept. How it escalated to forced oral sex. How, perhaps most damaging of all, he coerced Fleury’s silence by threatening to extinguish his NHL hopes if he told anyone.

The modus operandi was the same in both cases.

There is something twisted and mythic about Graham James. Like a storybook monster, he fed on the dreams of children. That was the word Fleury used to describe him — “monster.”

On TV, this would have been a moment of exhalation. The villain is bound by law and knows to a certainty that his punishment is coming. The victims get to move on, knowing that their persecutor will pay and, more importantly, that their stories have been vindicated.

Sadly, life isn’t like that. Everybody involved lost and will continue losing forever. Some crimes spiral out eternally. Vindication is a paltry thing measured against a lifetime of remembering.

Fleury didn’t sound relieved, or whatever word it is that we now reflexively attach to those who’ve suffered and survived.

“When he gets out of prison, he will do it again, and again, and again,” Fleury said from Calgary. “I believe what people show me. He showed me he was and is a rapist.”

Referring to James’ previous conviction and his infamous pardon, Fleury dismissed the entire notion of justice in this particular.

“What the legal system has shown me is that it’s flawed, very, very seriously, and that we have to change.”

Another of the children James preyed on, Greg Gilhooly, had even less to hang on to. The charges James faced in his case were stayed Wednesday.

Gilhooly has managed to find his footing in the world. He works as a corporate lawyer. He used that training to detach himself from the human element here — that human element being himself — and view things at a professional remove.

“The Crown gets a guilty plea,” Gilhooly said approvingly. “The Crown gets agreement to the statement of fact without opposition. And the Crown didn’t have to cut a deal on sentence.”

He appended that thought with a closing look inward: “Everybody gets what they want but me.”

There is no ending here, happy or otherwise.

As in the case of Penn State’s Jerry Sandusky — jailed on Wednesday — or Syracuse coach Bernie Fine — who skipped on several charges because of statute of limitations problems — there is only human wreckage.

All that’s left behind is a corrosive suspicion of the many good-hearted people who want to teach kids how to skate or tackle or dribble.

There is no lesson to be learned or guarantee of future vigilance.

All there is by way of apology for several lives destroyed is punishment. It’s a completely necessary and ultimately unsatisfying resolution.

Graham James took something wonderful — mentorship, sport, childish hopes — and twisted them into something horrible. No jail sentence can scrub off that taint.

Source: The Star

It doesn’t take much imagination to understand the horrors and damage caused by sex offenders. And it’s hard to talk about the facts of any criminal behavior since misinformation is common and ideas contrary to misinformation are quickly associated as soft on crime. The nuances of any criminal behavior are complicated.
A lot of sex offenses involve an over consumption of alcohol resulting in sexual assault and other inappropriate behaviors that have nothing to do with children. However, concerning children, we should not worry about sex offenders as a broad category; we need to worry specifically about pedophiles. Pedophiles are a certain type of sex offender.

Pedophilia is a specific mental disorder classified in the DSM, and to be clear, acting on impulses is also a crime. Pedophiles have a sexual interest in children; most, but not all, act on this interest but for those who do, it is serious crime. Not all sex offenders are pedophiles, however, by definition all pedophiles who act on their sexual interest in children are sex offenders and criminals.

Since experts estimate that only 1 in 20 cases of child sexual abuse is reported, the implication is that there are a sizable number of sex offenses and therefore sex offenders out there who are going unpunished. With this in mind it is very important: that a child knows 1) what constitutes inappropriate contact (something called “good touch, bad touch” training); 2) to say no when boundaries are crossed; 3) to report inappropriate contact to a parent and other trusted persons; and 4) that the child has done nothing wrong and should be praised for being brave enough to put aside the stigma wrongly associated with being a victim.

Also, sex offenders try to find children on the Internet; kids need to be made aware of risks and parents need to monitor activity.

Most internet sex offenders target teens, not children. With this in mind, the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children has several resources to reduce this risk, as does the Crimes Against Children Research Center. But most is not all, so we cannot stop there.

A total of 60 to 70 percent of sex offenses on children are done by acquaintances of the child. With this in mind, an effective strategy would begin by addressing this huge proportion of victims. It should also be made clear to the child that inappropriate contact can come from strangers or from someone known and trusted by the child. It is extremely important to let the child know that anything that happens to them is not their fault; that they have done nothing wrong; and they are not going to get in trouble for reporting any and all inappropriate contact.

Since 30 to 40 percent of victims are not an acquaintance of the offender, another extremely important thing that can be done is for parents to educate their children about the risks associated with strangers and how to be smart while alone. But more importantly, according to missingkids.com, or StopItNow.org, there are several things that parents can and should do to keep their children safe.

Kids don’t come with instruction manuals. Parents and caregivers need to be taught what symptoms to look for that indicate abuse.

It is important to know what works and what doesn’t in keeping children safe. For example, the program “Stranger Danger” has been found to be ineffective and, consequently, is a false sense of security. Since most sex offenses on children are done by people they know, “Child Safety Zones” and even sex offender community notification laws are also a false sense of security.

As awful as high profile examples sex abuse cases are, such as Jaycee Dugard or Elizabeth Smart, it is important to remember that high profile events are high profile precisely because they are unusual and unlikely. Making policy based on high profile events is a surefire way to overreact and make inefficient and, worse, ineffective policy.

A high profile event is good time find out where a shortcoming of a policy or a failure of a policy might reside, but a high profile event is not what policy should target. Doing so would result in the majority of cases being marginalized and a strategy designed around an unlikely event.

If prison is our way of dealing with sex offenders, or any criminal for that matter, it will have been too late; the crime and damage will already have been done.

Parents are their child’s best line of defense against sex offenders.

Source: The Milford Daily News

A total of 67 individuals living in transitional housing at Wacol will be fitted with the new devices.

The introduction of GPS trackers followed a community campaign in which more than 10,000 Queenslanders signed a Courier-Mail petition calling for the State Government to roll out the technology as soon as possible.Corrective Services Minister Neil Roberts announced the State Government would spend $13.7 million over four years to introduce the new GPS systems.

The Courier-Mail revealed in May there were 152 breaches of monitoring conditions by 53 pedophiles released from custody, including one who tried to abduct a boy from a skate park.

It also revealed electronic monitoring under-performed when it came to supervising sex offenders and their physical movements away from home or after hours.

Mr Roberts said the GPS technology would enhance existing radio-based monitoring systems but would not replace the vigilance of staff in the field.

Abakus Elmotech won the contract to supply the trackers earlier this month, following a successful trial of the devices by 30 staff from the Department of Corrective Services in August.

Tagged volunteers went to the beach, the gym, up mountain ranges and through tunnels as part of the week-long trial of the technology.

Under the scheme, a total of 67 “high-risk” offenders convicted under the Dangerous Prisoners (Sexual Offenders) Act will be fitted-out with GPS trackers.

One will be serial pedophile Raymond Yeo, 66, who was released in July, and has a criminal history dating back to when he was 13.

Douglas Brian Jackway, 32, who was jailed for raping a nine-year-old girl in 1995 and is due to be released from the Brisbane Correctional Centre at Wacol in February, is also expected to be fitted with a GPS tracker upon his release into transitional accommodation.

Mr Roberts said he expected all 67 serious sex offenders would be fitted with the GPS trackers by early 2012.

“All sex offenders fitted with GPS will be tracked on a 24/7 basis, with a specialist surveillance team working around the clock to monitor their movements,” he said.

Several high-profile Queenslanders, such as Olympian Susie O’Neill, hairdressing icon Stefan Ackerie, rugby league legend Darren Lockyer and child rape victim Sharon Tomlinson, added weight to The Courier-Mail campaign.

Source: Courier Mail

Richard Paul Baxter, 63, is the third person in three weeks to face court over the eight years of alleged abuse endured by the girl at a property in Brisbane’s southern suburbs, which police say ended only last month.

Mr Baxter was arrested on Monday and charged with 94 counts of indecent treatment of a child, four counts of obtaining prostitution and one count of making child exploitation material since 2004.His appearance follows the charging of a 60-year-old man and a 40-year-old woman earlier this month, also in connection with the ongoing police investigation, Operation Juliet Ostrich.

The pair, both from the southside suburb of Runcorn, were each charged with 15 offences including rape, sexual assault, indecent treatment of children, procuring prostitution and making child exploitation material.

Making Mr Baxter’s bail application yesterday, solicitor Adam Magill said his client had lived in Brisbane for 50 years and was not a flight risk.

The man would be contesting the charges against him, Mr Magill said.

Magistrate Judy Daly ordered Mr Baxter be bailed on strict conditions, including that he refrain from contacting the girl or going within 100m of her address.

He has also been ordered to surrender his passport and not approach a point of international departure.

Child protection detectives launched Operation Juliet Ostrich in September after they received serious allegations of sexual abuse towards the girl.

Mr Baxter will reappear for a court mention next month.

Source: The Australian

“This is ridiculous,” Caroline Mason, of Canyon Country, said Wednesday. “We are so done with not being informed about this guy living around our kids.”

In the spring of 2010, William Greggory Babb, 50, pleaded guilty in San Fernando Superior Court to one felony of contacting a minor with the intention of engaging in lewd or lascivious behavior.

On June 17, 2010, the 6-foot-1, 280-pound sex offender was put behind bars inside the California Institution for Men in Chino, at least 67 miles away from Canyon Country.

On Saturday, he was released from that prison. On Tuesday, he was spotted on Tumbleweed Way in Canyon Country, where one of his victims still resides.

“The state sent me a letter saying they would notify me in advance of his release so that we could prepare,” Mason said. “Then yesterday (Tuesday), I get frantic calls from neighbors that they spotted him on their street.

“My son is still a minor,” Mason said. “And (Babb) is not supposed to be near children.”

Luis Patino, spokesman for the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation, confirmed that the department is required to notify the families of victims about their rights, including notification of release.

“We do need to call them to let them know that someone is going to be released,” Patino said. Patino said he could not verify the details regarding notification of Babb’s release as of press time.

Babb was arrested Feb. 27, 2010, after preying on church-going boys. He was kept at the North County Correctional Facility in Castaic with bail set at $750,000.

“He used churches, several in Santa Clarita, to befriend children to develop a strange relationship between a 49-year-old man and 13-, 14-, 15-year-old boys,” Los Angeles County Sheriff​‘s Detective Rich Simmons of the Santa Clarita Valley Station’s Special Victims Bureau was quoted as saying at the time of the arrest.

Babb was charged with 10 felony counts.

Church officials and parishioners of the North Oaks Church of Christ in Canyon County, where Babb befriended Mason’s son four years ago, were also shocked to learn of his return to the street Wednesday without having received official notification.

“The state did not contact us,” said Ray Davis, the church’s preacher. “It would have been nice.”

Davis said he understands the church may not be included in the state’s list of those required to receive notification, but he cannot understand why the family of the victims were not notified.

“We’re just glad we know about it now,” Davis said. “I was under the impression we would get some kind of formal notification and, at very least, that the family would have been notified — and they were not notified.”

Babb is listed as a registered sex offender on the Megan’s Law website maintained by the state’s Department of Justice.

The Megan’s Law website, which alerts the public about sex offenders, describes Babb’s conviction and his appearance but lists no current address for him or a photograph of him.

Source: The Signal

Crown prosecutor Jenny Rees argued that the 48 images discovered on the card provided by Bradley Shawn Lemire on Aug. 28, 2009, half of them pornographic, led to more than 2,000 other images of child pornography being found on the accused’s computer after it was seized by police.

That collection included 228 images of the woman’s four-year-old daughter and another young girl from 10 separate occasions.

“There were two victims, both very young, who were sexually exploited by pictures being taken of them,” Rees, who argued for a total sentence of six to eight years, told provincial court Judge John Bascom on Friday.

“Young children are more vulnerable and are in need of protection by the courts. Courts have to send a message that abuse of the vulnerable will not be tolerated.”

Lemire, 48, who has been diagnosed as a pedophile, previously pleaded guilty to two counts of making child porn and one count each of sexually touching one of the girls and possessing child porn.

Defence lawyer Dean Zuk argued for four to five years for all of the charges, saying it was not a commercial endeavour in which the images were distributed to anyone else.

He also noted the touching was indirect and could warrant a concurrent sentence.

“Mr. Lemire says it was not right what he did. He says it was wrong,” said Zuk.

“He has admitted responsibility, he knows he is facing prison time and he wants treatment.”

Bascom said sex offender treatment is “absolutely necessary” for Lemire. But he added if the man doesn’t “buy into treatment” it won’t be successful. Court heard previously from the girl’s mother that there had been rumours among family and friends of Lemire’s questionable behaviour around children that caused some parents to not leave him alone with them.

The woman said in her victim impact statement that she never expected to find pornographic pictures of children when Lemire gave her the digital photo card from his camera.

She said she opened a file called “BAD” and discovered several photos of naked girls as young as four years old, and reported it to police.

Bascom adjourned sentencing, to consider both sides’ arguments, until Aug. 15.

dslade@calgaryherald.com

Source: The Calgary Herald

In an effort to stop repeat offenders, particularly those who target children, a pilot program will open June 23 in Allegheny County, according to the Pennsylvania Supreme Court. After a year, if deemed effective, it may be expanded statewide.

Judges hope that channeling sex abuse cases through a specialized court will speed up the process so that “victims and witnesses don’t have to wait before getting their day in court,” said Steve Schell, a spokesman for the Administrative Office of Pennsylvania Courts.

New York and Ohio have introduced similar courts in recent years.

In western Pennsylvania, the separate court will be composed of judges specializing in sex offender cases. It will focus on creating a uniform system, strengthening accountability and coordinating the management of adults who violate Megan’s Law, a mandated public registry for convicted sex offenders.

“This is a large-scale issue because it involves everything from rapes to minor sex offenses,” said Judge Jeffrey Manning, one of the judges working on the program.

“We’re going to try to make sure that those people who are convicted or plead guilty are immediately accountable.”

The separate court is designed to improve public safety by reducing repeat offenses by convicted sex criminals.

Pennsylvania Supreme Court Justice Debra Todd called the specialized court an “innovative approach for achieving consistency in sentencing and managing the difficult population of sex offenders, in our continuing effort to reduce recidivism.”

Programs like the sex offender court have arisen because “people are upset about this issue of sex offenders in their communities,” said Rebecca Thomforde Hauser, associate director of domestic violence and sex offense court programs at the nonprofit Center for Court Innovation in New York.

“It’s a newer kind of arena for the criminal justice system, but there’s a lot of national research and organizations that have been working around how communities can work in a more collaborative way to manage (sex offenders),” Hauser said.

Pennsylvania’s sex offender court will be funded with reallocated tax money, said Schell.

Source: REUTERS

Marlek E. Holmes, 37, who was released from prison in October, was arrested after two separate investigations into complaints against him, detectives Todd Crossett and Charles Dudek said.

Crossett said the first investigation began when a complaint was filed Feb. 19, alleging that Holmes sent indecent text messages to a minor. Earlier this week more information came in, claiming that Holmes was not living at the address he had filed as a registered sex offender.

Holmes was arrested at Royal Apartments in Le Roy.

He was charged with disseminating indecent material to a minor, failure to notify a change of address and endangering the welfare of a child.

Holmes on the sex offender registry lists 516 East Main St. in Batavia as his primary residence. He is a Level 3 offender, the most serious level, and is considered a “sexually violent offender.”

He was arraigned in City Court and committed to Genesee County Jail in lieu of $50,000 bail.

Le Roy Police Department assisted in the investigation.

Holmes was sentenced in 2000 to 10 to 11 years in prison. He served the complete term and was released Oct. 5.

Holmes was convicted of first-degree sexual abuse, attempted assault and criminal possession of stolen property after a Genesee County Court trial. He was convicted of sexually abusing a 22-year-old woman.

Source: thedailynewsonline

When many think of sex trafficking, they think of prostitutes in Southeast Asia, Nepal, Bangladesh or another faraway country – anywhere but here in the United States, and especially not of our own kids in our own communities.

But it is happening here.

About 100 from the community met for a discussion on the problem of sex trafficking of children in Snohomish County April 28 at Rosehill Community Center.

The League of Women Voters of Snohomish County sponsored the meeting, so that a panel of experts could discuss with the community the Everett-to-Tacoma prostitution circuit, law enforcement efforts and legal challenges, and what help these kids and teens need to recover as victims of sexual abuse.

“Sexual exploitation of children is a hideous problem – we all wish it didn’t happen but it does, and that’s a fact,” said the league’s Barbara Bush. “It’s happening internationally, it’s happening nationally, and it’s happening right here in Snohomish County.”

Child sex trafficking, aka domestic minor sex trafficking, is generally the sexual exploitation of 13- and 14-year-old girls – sometimes younger – who can’t legally consent to sex but are manipulated into having sex with adult men for another adult man’s profit.

Under federal law, the commercial sexual abuse of a minor is a Class B felony, punishable by a minimum of 27 months and up to 10 years in prison. The promoting of the commercial sexual abuse of a minor is a Class A felony, punishable by 7-10 years in prison.

That was not always the case, said Lisa Paul, deputy prosecuting attorney at the Dawson Place Child Advocacy Center.

In 2007, the law was changed from a Class C felony – the lowest of the felony offenses – and just 1-3 months in prison.

“Before the law changed, juvenile prostitution was considered less serious than theft of livestock,” she said. “So you could steal somebody’s cow, and it was considered more serious.”

Local law enforcement has seen prostitution in Snohomish County evolve in the last 5-7 years. Where there were once women in their 20s-40s “turning tricks” to support their drug addictions, there are now teenage girls working for their traffickers or “pimps.”

The scope of the problem is yet unknown. The pimps move their girls from Everett to Seattle to Tacoma, so there is a lot of overlapping of the sex-trafficking cases on record, said Dusty Olson, an advocate of Providence’s Intervention Center for Assault and Abuse.

She said the county had no way of tracking the movement of child victims until two years ago, and that it will be another year before it has any statistics.

“We’re talking about a lot of kids, but I can’t tell you what a lot is,” Olson said. “We don’t know yet.”

However, Olson said it is estimated that 300-500 kids a year are trafficked in Seattle. And with the overlap of victims, she said the numbers in Snohomish County couldn’t be too far off.

The FBI’s Pacific Northwest Innocence Lost Task Force and the Snohomish County Sexual Exploitation and Intervention Network are working to address the local sex-trafficking problem.

“First and foremost, our goal is to rescue them and get them in a safe house and get them out of that lifestyle and, secondly, go after that trafficker and seek a federal sentence,” said Everett Police Department Detective Tim Morgan, a member of the task force.

The challenge of solving child sex-trafficking cases in Snohomish County is that they are never reported. The pimp brainwashes the girls into thinking that law enforcement is the enemy.

If they do go to the police, it’s for domestic assault, and they won’t say the actual problem is prostitution.

Therefore, both the task force and the network are working to train themselves and the community to recognize the signs of children who are at-risk of becoming victims or already are victims of commercial sexual exploitation – and where to send them for help.

“I’ve seen victims with families of single moms, I’ve seen it with single dads, and I’ve seen it with middle class families that seem to have a normal life,” said Olson, co-founder of the network.

Risk factors include a history of sexual abuse, runaways, foster care, crime, poverty and a lack of education and job opportunities.

“People look at that and say, ‘That’s not our community’ or ‘That’s not my kid’ or ‘That’s not my neighborhood,’ but the other risk factors involved are pretty universal to kids,” Olson said.

Kids who go to school or other places by themselves, have access to a computer, want money and consumer goods, desire a romantic relationship, want more independence from their parents, test boundaries and take risks are also vulnerable to child sex trafficking.

The red flags include:

• A younger girl in a relationship with a much older boyfriend

• Money, cell phones, designer clothes, manicures, etc. without an explanation of how they were paid for.

• Change in appearance, including hair, clothing, nails – and sometimes even a changed name.

• Kids who are staying in hotels or traveling a lot without an explanation.

• Visible signs of abuse or specific tattoos.

“These are the things that need to be followed up on and need to be talked about,” Olson said. “Questions need to be asked.”

The task force and network are also working to adapt and coordinate the services available in the community to help the victims, who respond to sexual trauma similarly but not exactly like victims of sexual assault.

The children are difficult to work with because the trafficker has trained them to be difficult, to lie and to mistrust the police and service providers.

They go back and forth from feeling anxious and agitated to completely disconnected from the world.

There is also an incredibly strong psychological bond between the girl and the pimp that proves almost impossible to break.

“They have lost all sense of themselves, and so they completely identify with the pimp’s perspective and don’t know how to function without that individual,” Olson said.

“When we come and say we want you to make your own decisions and be empowered, they don’t know what to do with that. That is scary.”

Progress is slow for the task force and network, but it is still progress, Morgan said. He said they consider it a success if they are able to get a victim to stay in her designated safe house – away from the pimp – for more than a day.

“As far as longer successes, we haven’t gotten to that point,” he said. “We have to celebrate tiny successes or we won’t be doing this for very long.”

Source: mulkiteobeaconnews