The Child Protection eNewsletter

Judge fights to maintain order in biggest, most convoluted child custody hearing in US history… 

A court hearing to decide the fate of the 416 children swept up in a raid on a West Texas polygamist sect descended into farce, with hundreds of lawyers in two packed buildings shouting objections and the judge struggling to maintain order.  Read More

The case--clearly one of the biggest, most convoluted child-custody hearings in U.S. history--presented an extraordinary spectacle: big-city lawyers in suits and mothers in 19th-century, pioneer-style dresses, all packed into a courtroom and a nearby auditorium connected by video.

At issue was an attempt by the state of Texas to strip the parents of custody and place the children in foster homes because of evidence they were being physically and sexually abused by the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, a renegade Mormon splinter group suspected of forcing underage girls into marriage with older men.

Texas District Judge Barbara Walther struggled to keep order as she faced 100 lawyers in her 80-year-old Tom Green County courtroom and several hundred more participating over a grainy video feed from an ornate City Hall auditorium two blocks away.

The hearing disintegrated quickly into a barrage of shouted objections and attempts to file motions, with lawyers for the children objecting to objections made by the parents' attorneys.  When the judge sustained an objection to the prolonged questioning the state trooper, the lawyers cheered.

Upon another objection about the proper admission of medical records of the children, the judge threw up her hands.  "I assume most of you want to make the same objection.  Can I have a universal, 'Yes, Judge'?" she said.  In both buildings, the hundreds of lawyers stood and responded in unison:  "Yes, Judge."

Later in the day, a child protection supervisor testified that girls at a West Texas polygamous ranch believed that teen marriages were OK and that girls from the compound had gotten pregnant when they were as young as 13.  Read More  The girls believed there was "no age too young to be married and they wanted to have as many babies as they could," said Angie Voss, a supervisor of investigations at the Texas Department of Child Protective Services.

Voss said it would not be safe to send the children--including the boys--back to the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints compound because the culture there encourages marrying underage girls to older men in "spiritual marriages."  "I believe the boys are groomed to be perpetrators," she said.

Children on the Yearning for Zion Ranch also told a Texas state worker that they had seen the 16-year-old girl who reportedly called a domestic abuse hot line saying that she was beaten and sexually abused by her 49-year-old husband, spurring an investigation of child abuse on the polygamous compound, officials testified Thursday.  The children confirmed that she did have a baby but said that they did not know where she was, Voss said on the stand.

Officials say they have found teenagers under the age of 16 who are pregnant or who have babies, and that they fear that returning the children to the sect would put them and other children in danger of abuse.

To bolster that point, police Sergeant Danny Crawford, who took part in the search of the compound, said he found documents in a safe on the ranch that listed husbands and wives.  It included several adult men with wives who were 16, Crawford testified.

Among the names he read from the list were Jackson Jessop, who had a wife listed as 17 and a son who was 8 months old.  Crawford also cited Abraham Jeffs, 35, whose wife was listed as 16 years old.

Lawyers for Texas Child Protective Services asked the court today to require DNA tests of all the parents from the sect's ranch so they could compare it to DNA of the children and establish parent and child relationships.  State officials have said it has been difficult to determine who are the parents of individual children.

CPS also requested that the judge order psychological evaluations for all of the sect's parents, and that the judge allow the state to put the kids in foster care outside of the normal five-county range.  Most of the children are being housed in the San Angelo Coliseum, although 27 teenage boys have been sent 400 miles away to a facility for delinquent boys and girls.

Pope meets with victims of clergy sex abuse… 

Pope Benedict XVI, after urging bishops, priests and parishioners to heal the wounds caused by the clergy sex abuse scandal, talked and prayed privately with survivors in what was believed to be a first-ever meeting between a pontiff and abuse victims.  Read More

The Reverend Federico Lombardi, a papal spokesman, said that Benedict and Boston Cardinal Sean O'Malley met with a group of five or six victims for about 25 minutes in the chapel of the papal embassy, offering them encouragement and hope.

Lombardi said the pope told the survivors he would pray for them, their families and all victims of clergy sex abuse. Each of the victims spent a few minutes with Benedict privately.  Some were in tears during the meeting, Lombardi said.  For more details of this meeting, see  Read More.

Benedict has spoken repeatedly about the abuse crisis during his first trip to the United States as pope.

He called the crisis a cause of "deep shame," pledged to keep pedophiles out of the priesthood and decried the "enormous pain" that communities have suffered from such "gravely immoral behavior" by priest.

He told the nation's bishops that the crisis was "sometimes very badly handled," and said they must reach out with love and compassion to victims.  At an open air Mass on Thursday at Nationals Park, he also urged Catholic parishioners to do what they can to reach out to victims.

David Clohessy of The Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (SNAP), a priest sex abuse victims' group, was still reserving judgment.  Read More  "If--IF--this brings real reform, that's terrific," he said.  "But you know, talk can lead to complacency or change, and change is what's needed.  If he would discipline one or more corrupt bishops, it would be truly unprecedented and would send shockwaves through the hierarchy and would almost certainly make a difference."

SNAP plans a press conference to coincide with the Pope’s visit to St. Patrick’s Cathedral in New York City.  Read More

In other news… 

The California social services agency was moving to shut down nine homes used for child day care and foster care after an audit found registered sex offenders living there, in violation of state law.  Read More  The revelation came after state auditors compared the addresses of 75,000 licensed facilities, including foster family homes and in-home day care centers, with the state's database of registered sex offenders.  California Department of Social Services Director John Wagner said the audit found that the addresses of 49 sex offenders matched those of 46 child care facilities.  The department was able to confirm nine of the cases during inspections of all 46 facilities that were completed Monday, Wagner said.

When Florida teacher Stephanie Ragusa was having sex with a Davidsen Middle School student last year, she became intimate with a second student, investigators said.  Read More  Ragusa, 28, was arrested again Tuesday, accused of having a sexual relationship with another Davidsen student when the boy was 15, the Hillsborough County Sheriff's Office said.  She was first arrested March 13, charged with five counts of lewd and lascivious battery.  Investigators accused her of having sex at least three times with a then 14-year-old boy from January 2007 to May 2007.  On Tuesday, Ragusa was further charged with two counts of sex with a minor and one count of lewd and lascivious battery stemming from her relationship with the 15-year-old, sheriff's spokeswoman Debbie Carter said.  At the time of her arrest, Hillsborough County School Board members were just finishing a meeting to talk about growing numbers of teachers accused of having sex with students.  (See  vol6_iss22)  Their meeting included someone who may have some sage advice.  Read More  Owen Lafave, former husband of Debra Lafave, said he has ideas he wants to share.  Among them:  Institute mandatory training for teachers and give mandatory jail time for those convicted as sex offenders.  In 2004, Lafave's 23-year-old wife Debra Lafave, then a Greco Middle School reading teacher, was arrested after being accused of having sex with a 14-year-old student.

A seemingly divided Supreme Court struggled Wednesday over whether the rape of children should be punishable by execution, a case that could determine whether the death penalty is extended to crimes other than murder.  Read More  Arguments involving a Louisiana man's rape of his 8-year-old stepdaughter took place the same day the fractured court upheld lethal injection in the execution of condemned prisoners.  In recent years, the Supreme Court has narrowed capital punishment, overturning it for murderers who are juveniles or are mentally retarded.  Chief Justice John Roberts and Justice Antonin Scalia made clear that it's time to consider that evolving standards appear to be heading in a new direction, at least on the subject of child rape.  Justice Stephen Breyer appeared cautious about a change.  Besides Louisiana, four other states allow executions of someone convicted of child rape.  The other states--Montana, Oklahoma, South Carolina and Texas--have not applied the death penalty to child rapists.  Missouri, led by Governor Matt Blunt, is considering a similar law.

Cases of child sexual abuse in the United States have dropped five percent from 2005-2006 and more than 50 percent over the past 14 years, researchers from the Crimes Against Children Research Center at the University of New Hampshire said.  Read More  And physical abuse cases have been almost halved since 1992, according to new report based on data collected by the federal government from state child protection agencies.  "When they released the data in early April, federal authorities highlighted only a one percent decline in overall child maltreatment, and did not draw attention to the strong declines in sexual and physical abuse," said the Center’s David Finkelhor.

A former U.S. diplomat pleaded guilty to possession of child pornography in a case that also included allegations that he pressured visa applicants in Brazil for sex.  Read More  Gons Gutierrez Nachman, 42, admitted during a plea hearing in U.S. District Court that he had sex with 14- to 17-year-old girls while serving as a consular officer in Brazil and Congo, and that he documented the encounters in pictures and videos.  According to court documents, Nachman extensively documented his sexual activities from at least 2004 through 2006.  Nachman's attorney, Lorilee Gates, said Nachman likely faces nine to 11 years in prison under federal sentencing guidelines.

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