The Child Protection eNewsletter

Caged kids trial opens in Ohio… 
A couple on trial for putting some of their 11 adopted, special-needs children in cages  vol3_iss54,  vol3_iss53,  vol3_iss52  are guilty only of loving them, a defense attorney said Tuesday in his opening statement.  newsnet5.coml  “Eleven is a strain, a huge strain, but they did it for the right reason,” said Ken Myers, attorney for Sharen Gravelle who, along with her husband, Michael Gravelle, is charged with 16 counts of felony child endangering and eight misdemeanor child endangering charges.

The children ranged in age from 1 to 14 when authorities removed them in September 2005 from the Gravelles' home in rural Wakeman about 60 miles west of Cleveland.  The youngsters were placed in foster care last fall.  The couple, who lost custody in March, has repeatedly said the enclosures, equipped with alarms, were necessary to keep the children from harming themselves or one another.  The children have problems such as fetal alcohol syndrome and a disorder that involves eating nonfood items.

Huron County Prosecutor Russell Leffler told jurors not to get hung up on semantics.  “It's about chicken wire and wooden boards, being literally cooped up, hotter than blazes in summer, an amazingly shrill alarm and little fingers trying to tear wire,” Leffler said.

Fort Worth diocese withheld evidence of priest molestations until civil liability deadline passed… 
Leaders in the Fort Worth Roman Catholic Diocese withheld information about the extent of sexual abuse allegations against half a dozen priests and helped them stay in the ministry, according to secret files released by a judge Tuesday.  ap.org

The 700 pages show how the late Bishop Joseph P. Delaney and his top assistants dealt with accusers and the priests.  Documents show that diocese leaders and other church officials counted the days until the risk of civil liability had passed in dealing with one accuser; allowed one priest who admitted abusing a child to keep working until his death; and withheld details about accusations to minimize public fallout.  State District Judge Len Wade released parts of the files after diocese attorneys tried to keep them closed for about a year, the Fort Worth Star-Telegram and The Dallas Morning News reported in their online editions Tuesday.

Meanwhile, the Pennsylvania legislature has approved legislation to make broad changes to Pennsylvania's child sex-abuse laws, including some that were recommended by a Philadelphia grand jury that investigated abuse by Roman Catholic priests.  philly.com  If Governor Rendell signs the bill, victims of child-sex crimes will have until their 50th birthday - 20 years longer than current law allows - to file criminal complaints.  Employers and supervisors could be held criminally liable if they know of alleged abuse by employees who care for children but fail to stop it, and caregivers would have to report suspected abuse regardless of whether or not the victim reports it.

In other news...  
A Florida man who was the former head of a foster-parent association has been arrested on charges of child abuse and lewd and lascivious molestation.  orlandosentinel.com  George Allen Goolde, 61, told investigators he was having inappropriate contact with a 7-year-old and a 10-year-old.

A Dayton, Ohio woman had been charged with microwaving her 28-day-old daughter to death.  wdtn.com

ABC’s Good Morning America offers advice on how to choose a safe neighborhood when you move.  abcnews.go.com  Among the advice, avoid high crime areas, areas near parks and highways, and anywhere with sneakers hanging from utility wires, and check the sex offender registry.  Instead, choose a neighborhood with narrow streets and homes with garages in the back and porches in the front, which makes it easier for intruders to be exposed.  "Those are features that encourage interaction with your neighbors, [and] I think will discourage crime," Deltorchio said.  "The primary line of defense in your community is not the police.  It's the eyes and ears of your neighbors."

Many parents across the country are swabbing the inside of their children's mouths to get a DNA sample just in case they need it if the youngster is kidnapped, runs away or suffers a terrible accident.  ap.org  News reports about child abductions and television shows such as "CSI: Crime Scene Investigation" are helping drive the interest in keeping genetic records that could be used to identify remains, hair or blood.

The state of Maryland has paid $200,000 to the parents of a slain 9-year-old boy to settle their claim that the killer, a convicted sex offender, was wrongly freed from prison five days before the child’s murder.  ap.org

Japan is dealing with a suicide epidemic caused by school bullying.  abcnews.go.com

Newsweek features a story on recovery from bulimia,  msnbc.msn.com  and ABC News has a cluster of anorexia stories, including one on its increasing occurrence in boys.  abcnews.go.com  abcnews.go.com  abcnews.go.com

A California truck driver is in custody in Pennsylvania, accused of sexually assaulting a 15-year-old runaway during a cross-country trip, after truck stop employees stalled the man until police arrived.  ap.org  The girl told a waitress Saturday at the Flying J travel plaza along Interstate 70 that she had left her California home without her mother's knowledge and was driven across the country by a trucker, state police said.

A dozen high school students were expelled for an on-campus brawl over who got invited to a party, a fight school officials said was arranged on the social-networking hub MySpace.com.   ap.org


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