The Child Protection eNewsletter

Appeals Court tosses 10 year sentence for renting a 9-year-old… 

A federal appeals court tossed out the 10-year prison sentence of a St. Louis, Missouri woman who rented her 9-year-old daughter out to a pedophile more than 200 times at $20 a session.  foxnews.com  The court said the woman's punishment was too lenient.  The woman, whose name is being withheld to protect her daughter's identity, often held the girl down in their home while Joe J. Champion of Granite City, Illinois molested her, according to court documents.  The daughter testified the molestation occurred about twice a week, either in the bathroom or her mother's bedroom.  A copy of the 8th Circuit Appellate Court’s decision is available online at  www.ca8.uscourts.gov.

Elizabeth Smart kidnapper refuses to come to court… 

A man accused of kidnapping Elizabeth Smart refused to leave a psychiatric hospital Monday for a court hearing to review his competency to stand trial.  foxnews.com  Third District Judge Judith Atherton ordered sheriff's deputies to transport Brian David Mitchell from Utah State Hospital.  Atherton said Mitchell "cannot refuse to come to court."  Mitchell screamed at Atherton, telling her, "forsake those robes and kneel in the dust."  Mitchell and his estranged wife, Wanda Barzee, are charged with kidnapping Smart from her home in June 2002.  She was 14 at the time.

In other news... 

The Houston Chronicle details the difficulty male victims of sexual abuse by older women have in garner sympathy from peers, judges and juries.  chron.com  Houston Chronicle analysis of sexual crimes registered through the Texas Sex Offenders Database indicates that, despite the publicity of some high-profile cases, such cases remain rare.  According to the database, 267 registered sex crimes in the past 10 years included older women and teenage boys.  Such cases made up less than half a percent of all sex offenses registered in 1996 and about 1.5 percent of sex crimes the first part of this year.  Sex offenses by incarcerated offenders are not in the database.  At least 26 of the registered female sex offenders in Texas once held teaching certificates.

Attorneys representing 45 people who sued the nation's largest Roman Catholic archdiocese, accusing clergy members of sex abuse, signed off Friday on a $60 million settlement, according to the lead plaintiffs' lawyer.  baltimoresun.com  The Archdiocese of Los Angeles said this month that it would pay $60 million to settle 45 cases that dated from prior to the mid-1950s and after 1987 -- periods when the archdiocese had little or no sexual abuse insurance.  Meanwhile, the Archdiocese of Washington has agreed to pay $1.3 million to 16 men who said they were sexually abused by eight priests from 1962 to 1982.  baltimoresun.com

Two children have been removed from their home after a man reportedly ran a clothes dryer with the toddlers inside.  foxnews.com  A 3-year-old boy was treated for second-degree burns, but a 2-year-old girl was not injured after the Nov. 28 incident, the Reno County district attorney's office said.  Police investigators alleged the man stuffed the children into the dryer and turned it on, reportedly after the boy wet his pants. The boy was not treated for his injuries until he was taken into protective custody on Dec. 6.

A veteran Dauphin County, Pennsylvania (Harrisburg) Sheriff's Department deputy has been charged with additional sex crimes against children.  wgal.com  Steve Lincoln has already been charged with raping three girls.  Thursday, he was in court, facing charges in two more cases.  One of those cases involved an 11-year-old girl.

Parents charged with forcing some of their 11 special-needs adoptive children to sleep in cages  vol4_iss49, vol3_iss54, vol3_iss53, and vol3_iss52  managed to improve the youngsters' behavior with the enclosed bunks, according to testimony from a social worker also charged in the case.  abcnews.go.com  Elaine Thompson, an independent social worker, did not appear at the trial of Michael and Sharen Gravelle, but her testimony from a custody hearing last year was read to jurors.

Polygamist sect leader Warren Jeffs was ordered to stand trial on two counts of rape as an accomplice.  hosted.ap.org  He is accused of forcing a 14-year-old girl to marry and have sex with an older cousin.

A former editor for the company that publishes the children's newspaper Weekly Reader was sentenced Wednesday to six years in prison for soliciting sex from a minor.  hosted.ap.org  Noel Neff, 47, of Norwalk, Conn., was arrested in 2005 in a shopping mall parking lot. Investigators said he had arranged to meet with a 14-year-old boy for sex; the boy was actually an FBI agent who had been exchanging instant messages with Neff for two months.

The Child Protection eNewsletter will not publish next week but will return just after the New Year.


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