The Child Protection eNewsletter

Jurors in tears over evidence in Nixzmary Brown murder trial…

After police discovered the frail, battered body of 7-year-old Nixzmary Brown in her New York City home in 2006, authorities say her stepfather was quick to admit he had bound her to a chair with duct tape and beat her on a daily basis. Read More (See vol6_iss5 for more on the history of this case.)

Videotaped and written statements by Cesar Rodriguez -- combined with grim crime scene photos from the room where the victim was tortured, starved and forced to urinate in a litter box -- have brought jurors to tears at his high-profile murder trial in Brooklyn.

But the emotion in the jury box hasn't discouraged Rodriguez's attorney from forging ahead with a brazen strategy: effectively putting Nixzmary and her mother on trial.

The aggressive former prosecutor, Jeffrey Schwartz, has portrayed the mother as the real killer, calling her a "monster" and mocking her as "Mommy Dearest." He has also labeled Nixzmary a violent and uncontrollable "little Houdini" -- a reference to her supposed knack at slipping out of the makeshift restraints devised by her parents to keep her from attacking her younger siblings.

Earlier this week, jurors heard the defendant recount his stepdaughter's last night in a calm voice. Nixzmary had pilfered the yogurt from the refrigerator and damaged a computer printer, Rodriguez said in a taped interview played by prosecutors.

As punishment, he stuck her head under a running bathtub faucet. "I took her and threw some cold water on her ... to make her think," he said. Investigators suspect the girl's head was smashed against the faucet - something her stepfather denied doing. But in the same tape he conceded, "Sometimes she'd get me real angry, and I used to just throw her on the floor. ... She was always lying to me about everything."

At another point, Rodriguez paused at length when confronted with a Polaroid of Nixzmary's face and asked to explain why she had two black eyes. "She managed to do that to herself," he finally responded.

His last memory of Nixzmary alive he said was breathing heavily and moaning on the floor of her room. He never called for help, he added, even though, "I'd never seen her more pale."

Some watching in the jury of 10 women and two men shook their heads, held their hands to their mouths and wiped away tears. When the courtroom lights were turned on, a court officer passed them tissues.

Hard drive encryption complicates child porn prosecution…

The widespread belief that any database, hard drive or electronic device can be hacked was disproved when a man accused of having child pornography on his computer managed to keep federal authorities out of his hard drive for more than a year--for the price of an average cell phone. Read More That computer protection used by the suspect is easy to obtain, even common on most computers, and, according to security experts, is almost impossible to breach, even for the FBI.

On December 17, 2006, Sebastien Boucher was stopped by border patrol inspectors while crossing from Canada into Vermont. An inspector found a laptop in his car, which Boucher admitted belonged to him, according to an affidavit from an Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent.

After Boucher gave the agents access to his computer, they saw videos and file names that appeared to show pornography involving pre-teens, including one labeled "Two-year-old being raped during diaper change." Boucher, a Canadian citizen who is a lawful U.S. permanent resident, said he didn't know if his computer had child pornography because he could not check his temporary Internet files, the affidavit says. He was arrested and charged with transportation of child pornography, a felony that carries up to 20 years in prison.

But after Boucher's arrest, an investigator from the Vermont Department of Corrections was unable to access the images on Boucher's computer, which were stored in an encrypted drive called drive Z. For more than a year, the government has not been able to see what is in drive Z, which is protected by an encryption program that is sold under the name Pretty Good Privacy, according to court records.

Pretty Good Privacy, which is more commonly known as PGP, is an industry standard of hard-drive encryption and email encryption, according to experts. Encryption is a complex, password-protected method of keeping information, hard drives, devices--almost anything--private.

The government subpoenaed Boucher to try to force him to type in his password and give the government access to the computer. In November, Judge Jerome Niedermeier ruled that forcing Boucher to enter his password would violate his Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination. See vol6_iss5.

In other news…

An Ohio judge declared a mistrial in the case of woman accused of killing her month-old daughter by burning her in a microwave, finding that new defense witnesses bolster her claim that she is innocent. Read More Judge John Kessler made the decision after hearing testimony privately from a juvenile who said he was at the apartment complex of defendant China Arnold on the night her infant died in August 2005. Prosecutors asked Kessler to reject the evidence, questioning its truthfulness, the judge said. But Kessler said that the evidence is new and that the defense hasn't had a chance to investigate it. Ordering the trial to move forward without considering the evidence would be instant grounds for reversal of any conviction, Kessler said. Allowing the evidence during the final stages of the trial would deny prosecutors and defense attorneys a full opportunity to investigate it, he said. Kessler discharged the jury and ordered the case placed back on the court docket for further scheduling. Police investigators believe Arnold killed the girl, Paris Talley, by putting her in a microwave at her Dayton home. Coroner's officials said the baby suffered high-heat internal injuries and had no external burns. Arnold could face the death penalty if convicted. She has pleaded not guilty.

Mobile [telephone] firms from across the world have launched a new alliance which aims to block pedophiles using phones to send or receive child sexual abuse images. Read More The GSMA, the global association for mobile firms, has launched the Mobile Alliance, and says it is vital to act as web access via phones improves. Among planned measures will be a block on mobile phone access to websites which host abusive content. There will also be hotlines to report services carrying inappropriate images. The Alliance has been founded by the GSMA, Hutchison 3G Europe, mobilkom austria, Orange FT Group, Telecom Italia, Telefonica/02, Telenor Group, TeliaSonera, T-Mobile Group, Vodafone Group and dotMobi. It says its primary aim is "to create significant barriers to the misuse of mobile networks and services for hosting, accessing, or profiting from child sexual abuse content". The Alliance says that, while the vast majority of child sexual abuse content is accessed through conventional internet connections, safeguards need to be in place as broadband networks being rolled out by phone firms could lead to similar misuse by pedophiles. "As our industry rolls out mobile broadband networks that provide quick and easy access to multimedia Web sites, we must put safeguards in place to obstruct criminals looking to use mobile services as a means of accessing or hosting pictures and videos of children being sexually-abused," said Craig Ehrlich, GSMA chairman.

A 34-year-old Italian man who had sex with a 13-year-old girl has had his sentence cut by two-thirds because a court decided there was "real love" between the pair. Read More Antonio de Pascale, a butcher from Vicenza, admitted that he had a four-month long relationship with the girl, who sent him a stream of torrid text messages on his mobile phone. His lawyers argued, however, that there was a "deep tenderness" between him and the girl and that he had "fallen head over heels in love" after a sexual encounter in his car. They said the girl had consented to every action. Antonio Marziale, the president of the Association for the Protection of the Rights of Minors, said the decision was "execrable". He said: "It is not right to judge whether or not a 13-year-old girl is willing. The law should safeguard young girls who are too immature to make these decisions against adults without scruples."

Investigators say a North Carolina man has been charged with child abuse for circumcising his two infant sons with a utility knife. Read More Authorities said 32-year-old Johnny Eric Marlowe, a self-admitted polygamist, fathered children with his legal wife and another woman who lives in their home. One gave birth to a boy at their home in the rural Kings Creek community in November 2005, and the other gave birth to a boy there four months later. Marlowe had a total of 11 children with the two women. Detective Shelly Hartley said Marlowe doesn't like hospitals and denied the women prenatal care in both cases, then circumcised the boys when they were 8 days old.

A new study provides strong evidence that being bullied can cause children to develop depression and anxiety. Read More Among identical twin pairs in which one experienced bullying between the ages of 7 and 9 and the other did not, the bullied twin was significantly more likely to have symptoms of internalizing problems at age 10, Dr. Louise Arsenault of King’s College, London, and her colleagues found. Internalizing problems are psychological problems in which negativity is directed inward toward the self, such as depression, as opposed to outwardly, such as conduct disorder. For more information about bullying, see vol1_iss5.

Playing video games increases aggression in some children and young adults and normalizes killing, some doctors said. Read More Research suggests that violent video games can make children feel different. A brain scan of a teenager who has just played what was deemed a nonviolent video game was compared to the scan of a teen who had just spent 30 minutes playing a violent game. Indiana School of Medicine researchers said highlighted areas in the brains showed increased activity in the areas involved in emotional arousal. "Exposure to violent video games, even E rated video games, increases aggressive thoughts, increases pro-social behavior and increases general arousal," said Dr. Greg Snyder, a psychologist at Omaha's Children's Hospital. Snyder said exposure to violence in video games can desensitize a teen to the real thing. Research from Iowa State University, Kansas State University and the National Institutes of Health reached similar conclusions. Compared to teens who played nonviolent games, those who played violent games had a lower heart rate and lower galvanic skin response when they were exposed to videos of real violence, the studies showed.

Sarpy County, Nebraska deputies said they arrested a woman whose blood-alcohol level registered higher than five times the legal limit for drivers. Read More Deputies arrested Denise Thomson, 25, of Elkhorn, then took her to the Sarpy County Jail, where her blood-content tested at 0.415 percent. Records show this is Thomson's first DUI charge. An 8-year-old child in the vehicle was determined to be a ward of the Department of Health and Human Services, the news release said. The child wasn't harmed and was later turned over to her foster parents. "Nothing wrong with the child. The child was in the back seat seatbelted in, and fortunately, nothing bad really happened," said Captain Dan Williamson. Thomson works for Beneficial Behavior Health in Omaha which provides transportation to DHHS, the release said. Beneficial said Thomson has been suspended, and it is cooperating with DHHS. DHHS's Todd Reckling, administrator of the Policy Section in the Division of Children and Family Services, issued a statement: "The safety of state wards is our top priority, and this type of incident is totally unacceptable. This is a serious charge and we are taking immediate action. I have informed the CEO of Beneficial Behavioral Health that we are putting them on hold status pending further investigation into issues related to transportation and safety. They will not be allowed to transport any child or adult client of DHHS pending the investigation.

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