Volume 5, Issue 5
January 23, 2007
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The Child Protection eNewsletter Connecticut Attorney General calls MySpace “A Towering Danger to Kids”... MySpace is testing new software aimed at screening out predators who target young users. vol5_iss4 But the leader of a task force of 34 state attorneys general, Connecticut’s Richard Blumenthal, says the social-networking giant is not doing enough. msnbc.msn.com MySpace—which boasts 55 million users and is expected to generate some $500 million in revenue this year—recently announced that it will begin offering free monitoring software called Zephyr that will enable parents to see what age their children are claiming to be online without letting parents read their kids’ messages and profiles. According to Blumenthal’s website, ct.gov "MySpace's 'Zephyr' software is a shortsighted and ineffective response to a towering danger to kids. Children can easily evade the software's purported protections by creating profiles from computers outside the home. This software does noting (sic) to stop predators or protect kids from inappropriate material.” "Predators will continue to prey on children using MySpace until the web site and its parent company implement real age verification. I and my fellow attorneys general will continue to demand that MySpace institute age verification, safeguarding kids against explicit sexual material and adults seeking sex. MySpace needs to stop making excuses and introduce age verification, as well as increase its minimum age to 16. Age verification for users 18 and older using publicly available data is easy and effective. MySpace can confirm the ages of younger users by requiring information from a parent or guardian. "MySpace must better shield children from sexual predators and inappropriate content. Action is long overdue. MySpace must stop ignoring the elephant in the room and implement real age verification. I will continue to help lead our powerful coalition of Connecticut and 33 other states and consider every available option, including possible legal action, if the site continues to resist doing so." In its latest PR effort, MySpace.com will today begin distributing Amber alerts to members notifying them of missing children in their communities. modbee.com The online alerts, which will begin Tuesday, will be sent to all users in the ZIP codes where it was issued. They will appear in a small text box at the top of a user's portfolio. The user can click on the box for more information, including a photo of the missing child and a description of the suspect. Missouri case has more strange twists...  The man accused of kidnapping two Missouri boys and holding one of them for four years told a newspaper reporter that life was good for him during that period. abcnews.go.com Devlin said he "was never really interested in" romantic relationships but wouldn't say whether he was attracted to women. Around 2002, he started losing contact with close friends, most of whom he knew from Imo's, the pizza parlor he managed in Kirkwood. "I guess you could say I was lonely. All my friends starting getting married and having kids," he said. "Hanging out with friends just becomes a lower priority (for them)." Meanwhile, the already bizarre kidnapping case took an even weirder turn when it was reported that one of the victims, Shawn Hornbeck, had actually met with police and was carrying on a relationship with a girl. foxnews.com According to a story in the St. Louis Post Dispatch, Hornbeck spoke with a Kirkwood police officer to report his bike stolen about 10 months after he was kidnapped from nearby Washington County.It was also reported that Hornbeck, while kidnapped, carried on a relationship with a girl from one of St. Louis' most elite private schools. stltoday.com Students at Visitation Academy, an all-girls school, say Hornbeck dated a freshman there for several months. The students said Hornbeck and the girl were even spotted holding hands at an area mall. The couple even went to what's described as the "social event of the season," the Visitation-Priory Dance, at the St. Louis Priory school. The girlfriend, who lives about two miles from the Kirkwood apartment complex, is now devastated at the news about Shawn and Devlin, students said. In an even bigger twist, The New York Post reports that Shawn’s biological father, the now-deceased Walter Hornbeck, was a convicted sex offender. nypost.com The senior Hornbeck was arrested in Washington County, near St. Louis, on Sept. 30, 1992, and charged with rape, although it's unclear who the victim was. Details of the case were not available, and most of the record has been sealed. A court official said the reference number on Hornbeck's criminal conviction indicated the charge involved an assault on a minor. At the time of his arrest, Hornbeck also lived with Shawn's older sisters, Jackie and Jennifer, who were then 7 and 6, respectively. Hornbeck pleaded guilty to attempted sodomy, a felony, as well as possession of a controlled substance and he was sentenced to seven years in state prison in 1994. In other news...  An Arizona charter school alerted authorities to a 29-year-old convicted sex offender who tried to enroll there, pretending he was just 12, in what Yavapai County sheriff's officials said may have been an attempt to lure children into sexual abuse. ap.org The sheriff's office also said Neil Havens Rodreick II conned two men he was living with and having sex with into believing he was a young boy. One of them, 61-year-old Lonnie Stiffler, called himself Rodreick's grandfather when he tried to enroll him at Mingus Springs Charter School as "Casey Price." "This is the weirdest case I've seen in 18 years," sheriff's spokeswoman Susan Quayle said. "If it wasn't so sad it would be funny." The FBI should have done more to investigate former Congressman Mark Foley’s e-mails to Congressional pages or, alternatively, notified House authorities in charge of the page program, the FBI's inspector general, Glenn A. Fine, said in a report. abcnews.com "We believe the FBI should have considered taking some steps to ensure that any minors in the Congressional page program were not at risk of predatory behavior by Foley" msnbc.msn.com The full report is available online at msnbcmedia.msn.com. Meanwhile, the House of Representatives has overhauled the board supervising its teenage pages. abcnews.go.com The Catholic League is asking the U.S. Department of Justice to investigate whether the makers of the controversial 2007 Sundance Film Festival entry "Hounddog" - in which a character played by 12-year-old actress Dakota Fanning is raped - violated federal child-pornography laws. sltrib.com "It matters not a whit whether Fanning's mother, along with Fanning's teacher/child welfare worker, gave their consent," said Catholic League President William Donohue in a statement. "What matters is whether they are an accessory to a crime."A 17-year-old illegal immigrant charged with the rape of a four-year-old girl asked to be deported rather than face a potential prison term of 30 years for sex assault here in the United States. foxnews.com The Supreme Court struck down California's sentencing law, reaffirming limits on judges' discretion and presaging shorter sentences for thousands of state prisoners. latimes.com The 6-3 ruling in Cunningham v. California effectively shaves four years from the 16-year sentence of former police officer John Cunningham, who was convicted of sexually abusing his son.  The San Antonio Police Department and the San Antonio Independent School District Police Department are investigating an alleged sexual assault at DeZavala Elementary School. ksat.com A first-grade boy told family members that on January 12 he was in a bathroom when a man came underneath a stall and grabbed him by his arm, choked him and raped him.*for access to member only sites like the New York Times, use the ID "JohnDoeID" and the password "whatever". On sites asking for an email address, feel free to use "info@childprotectionprogram.org" Unsubscribe |
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