The Child Protection eNewsletter

Explicit police reports detail child porn case against Bernie Ward…

When California radio talk show host Bernie Ward was arrested last year on child pornography charges, his lawyers downplayed the federal rap, saying that his client was merely doing research for a book when he accessed and distributed illicit images. Read More

But police reports indicate that Ward, a 56-year-old former Catholic priest, began a graphic online correspondence with a San Francisco-area dominatrix who used the name "Sexfairy" and called cops when Ward sent her a lewd digital image featuring a topless woman, a nude boy, and a young girl.

According to the Oakdale Police Department reports, the woman, Linda Figueiredo, informed investigators that she never told Ward of a desire to "see or hear about sexual activities among minors." The documents note that in his 2004-05 instant message exchanges with the 33-year-old Figueiredo, Ward, using the alias "Vincentlio," made reference "that he might be sexually abusing minors" or allowing them to "engage in sexual acts in his presence."

As first reported by San Francisco's ABC7, armed with the explicit IM exchanges and the image received by the woman, investigators obtained a search warrant for Ward's AOL account, which yielded other alleged photos of child pornography. Several of those images, an investigator noted, "depicted children engaged in or simulating sexual acts with adults or other children." The minors seen in the photos were between four and 17 years old, according to a police estimate. The photographs resulted in Ward's indictment last year on three federal felony counts. Currently free on $250,000 bail, Ward was fired last December from his job at KGO Radio, where he built a reputation as an outspoken liberal voice and harsh critic of the Bush administration. See vol5_iss80.

Students fight back against gossip site…

The Cornell University junior was in his dorm between classes when the text message came in from a friend. Check out JuicyCampus.com, it said. Read More

The student found his name on the Web site beside a rambling, filthy passage about his sexual exploits, posted by an anonymous student on campus. The young man could only hope the commentary was so ridiculous nobody would believe it.

"I thought, Is this going to affect my job employment? Is this going to make people on campus look at me? Are people going to talk about me behind my back?" said the student, who asked not to be identified. He also wondered about his 11-year-old sister, who is spending more time on the Internet. "What if she Googles me? What will she think about her big brother?" he said.

JuicyCampus' endless threads of anonymous innuendo have been a popular Web destination on the seven college campuses where the site launched last fall, including Duke, UCLA and Loyola Marymount. It recently expanded to 50 more, and many of the postings show they've been viewed hundreds and even thousands of times.

But JuicyCampus has proved so poisonous there are signs of a backlash.

In campus debates over Internet freedom, students normally take the side of openness and access. This time, however, student leaders, newspaper editorials and posters on the site are fighting back -- with some even asking administrators to ban JuicyCampus. It's a kind of plea to save the students, or at least their reputations, from themselves.

"It is an expression from our student body that we don't want this junk in our community," said Andy Canales, leader of the student government at Pepperdine, which recently voted 23-5 to ask for a ban. The vote came after a long and emotional debate on the limits of free speech, and was swayed by stories from students such as Haley Frazier, a junior residential adviser. She had recently come across a teary transfer student who had been humiliated on the site barely a week after arriving on campus.

"I can't imagine the disgust she must have for Pepperdine if that's what (students) say," Frazier said. College administrators say they are appalled by the site but have no control over it since students can see it outside the campus computer network. They say all they can do is urge students not to post items or troll for malicious gossip -- and hope that in the process they learn about how to get along.

Meanwhile, ABC News reports on "Drunken College Girls Immortalizing Their Nights on Facebook." Read More It appears that drunken antics are no longer a source of acute embarrassment for girls; in fact boasting to the world on social networking sites is a way to gain social standing among one's peers. Apparently these students are less worried about future potential employers than their peers at Pepperdine.

In other news…

A distraught Georgia mother made an emotional plea to her husband for the safe return of her 4-year-old daughter after cops say the man took off with the girl. Read More “I know you love Madison," Renee Kerr said to her husband during an interview with MyFOXAtlanta.com. "You need to think what is best for her at this point.” Police said the girl, Madison Kerr, was last seen Friday night with her father Jerry Jones, 51. Jones was an elementary school teacher in Hall County until last December, when he resigned after being arrested and charged with inappropriately touching four female students in his third grade class, MyFOXAtlanta.com reported. Jones, who doesn't have legal custody of Madison, is believed to be driving a white 1996 Ford Taurus with Georgia wildlife tags BW6B02. The rear passenger side of the car is believed to be damaged with red paint.

The typical online sexual predator is not someone posing as a teen to lure unsuspecting victims into face-to-face meetings that result in violent rapes, U.S. researchers said. Read More Rather, they tend to be adults who make their intentions of a sexual encounter quite plain to vulnerable young teens who often believe they are in love with the predator, they said. "A lot of the characterizations that you see in Internet safety information suggests that sex offenders are targeting very young children and using violence and deception against their victims," said Janis Wolak of the Crimes Against Children Research Center at the University of New Hampshire in Durham. Instead, she said most cases arise from risky online interactions such as talking online about sex to strangers. "The great majority of cases we have seen involved young teenagers, mostly 13-, 14-, 15-year-old girls who are targeted by adults on the Internet who are straightforward about being interested in sex," she said.

A 15-year-old Polk County, Florida boy was arrested on multiple sexual-abuse charges after a 3-year-old girl told her mother and detectives he inappropriately touched her. Read More Russell Joseph Rioux, who lives in Dundee, is being held without bond at the Polk County Jail on four counts of sexual battery and two counts of lewd/lascivious molestation. According to the arrest report, the toddler told detectives Rioux inappropriately touched her and also made her touch him. The girl told a detective that Rioux's actions made her hurt and that he "did not say he was sorry."

School shootings like the one at Northern Illinois University are usually linked to a mental disorder of the gunman, whose anger, social isolation or desire for attention bursts into violence, experts told the ABC News Law & Justice Unit. Read More Some of those experts recommend that schools make mental health a criterion for admissions, while others say steps as simple as locking classroom doors go a long way toward safer schools. And while media coverage no doubt prompts some "copycat" incidents, the experts say news coverage also provides important information that can make prevention possible. See vol6_iss13 for details of the NIU shooting.

*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"