The Child Protection eNewsletter

Three cases of child torture grab headlines… 

As heartbreaking as they are horrific, three cases of extremely violent torture of children have made headlines in recent days, leaving observers to wonder how anyone could be so cruel.  ABCNews story here

In two of the cases, the children died.  In one, a man stomped and kicked a toddler, believed to be his son, in front of witnesses,  AP story here  and in the other, a 13-year-old boy was tied to a tree for two nights.  See  MSNBC story here  and  CBS video here.

In the third case, a 5-year-old Los Angeles boy was fighting for his life after suffering what police called one of the worst cases of child abuse they have seen, allegedly at the hands of his mother and her live-in girlfriend. ABCNews story here

Police said the boy had countless cigarette burns all over his body, including his genitals, was unable to open his hands because he had been forced to put them flat on a hot stove, and was repeatedly beaten and forced to sit in his own urine.

"In my time in policing in 27 years, I have never seen anybody with these kinds of injuries that has lived," Los Angeles Police Department First Assistant Chief James McDonnell said.  "And this kid must have a tremendous will to live to be able to still hang on despite what he's been through."

The boy's mother, Starkeisha Brown, 24, was arrested after she turned herself in to police.  Krystal Matthews, 19, who police described as Brown's live-in girlfriend, was arrested when she showed up for an appointment with the state Department of Children's Services, police said.

Police said they first became aware that the boy was at risk when Brown and Matthews were called to the Los Angeles Department of Children and Family Services for an appointment to check on the boy.  Brown and Matthews brought a healthy child of a mutual friend to the appointment and tried to pass him off as Brown's son, officials said.  While the three were at DCS, a stranger found the boy abandoned and notified authorities, police said.

At a news conference, McDonnell said the abuse the boy suffered included being denied basic necessities like food and water and being beaten while suspended from a door with his hands above his head.

R. Kelly acquitted…  

Much was made of whether R. Kelly was the man in the sex tape at the center of his child pornography trial.  MSNBC story here  In the end, the R&B superstar walked away because the jury wasn’t convinced the female in the graphic video was the 13-year-old girl who prosecutors said she was.

One juror even said he was certain it was Kelly on the tape.  But by no means was that the crux of the charges.  “You want to be 100 percent sure it’s Kelly and (the alleged victim),” he said.  “What we had wasn’t enough.”

Panelists said they remained split–seven for acquittal and five for conviction during an early vote–on Friday morning, just a few hours before the verdict.  One thing they all agreed on from the start:  After bookend viewings of the tape during opening and closing statements, no one needed to see it again.

“I’ve seen that videotape way too many times,” a woman from the panel said, grimacing.  “The first time was one too many.”

In other news… 

On the last day of a very unusual trial, Episcopal Bishop Charles E. Bennison Jr. continued to defend himself against charges that he concealed his brother's sexual abuse of a minor decades ago, saying that he acted within the standards of the times.  Philly Inquirer story here  "As poorly as I handled it," he said, "if I had applied today's protocols then, things might have turned out worse."  In October, the Episcopal Church USA suspended him as head of the five-county Diocese of Pennsylvania on the ground that he engaged in "conduct unbecoming a member of the clergy" by failing to protect the girl or report his brother's misbehavior.  The church alleges that Bennison did so in order to advance his career.  The trial that resulted was just the third Court for the Trial of a Bishop in the 232-year history of the Episcopal Church USA.  See  vol6_iss43  and  vol5_iss71  for more on this case.

Meanwhile, under pressure to fight child sex abuse, the Southern Baptist Convention's executive committee said that the denomination should not create its own database to help churches identity predators or establish an office to field abuse claims.  MSNBC story here  The executive committee report, "Responding to the Evil of Sexual Abuse," urges churches to conduct background checks using a U.S. Department of Justice database of sexual offenders.  But it rejected establishing a new Southern Baptist database, arguing it would be impossible to build a comprehensive list.  Referring churches to a more exhaustive federal database is better than a limited "Baptist only" system that predators could slip through, it said.

The home of a judge in Texas who ordered the removal of 440 children from a polygamist ranch is under guard after Utah and Arizona authorities warned of "enforcers" from the sect, a newspaper reported.  ABCNews story here  Police assigned to Judge Barbara Walther's San Angelo, Texas, house were provided dossiers and photos of 16 men and women deemed a threat, the Deseret News said.  "There are many individuals who are willing to give up their life for the cause and you can never underestimate what a religious fanatic is capable of," said e-mails obtained from the Washington County sheriff's office through state public records law.  For the history of this case see  vol6_iss27,  vol6_iss30,  vol6_iss40, and  vol6_iss42.

In Canada, the mother of an autistic girl says the public school board was "completely unprofessional" to formulate a theory that her daughter was being sexually abused based on a psychic's perception.  Toronto Sun story here  Barrie resident Colleen Leduc wants an apology from the Simcoe County District School Board, which called in the Children's Aid Society (CAS) to investigate.  According to the board, the case is still under investigation, although Leduc says it was closed.  Leduc immediately pulled her 11-year-old daughter, Victoria Nolet, out of Terry Fox Elementary School in north-end Barrie.  Victoria has severe autism and is nonverbal.  On May 30, Leduc picked Victoria up from school, where she's enrolled in an Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) class with several boys around the same age.  When Leduc returned home, there was an urgent call asking her to return to the Livingstone Street East School.  Frightened, Leduc rushed back to the school.  She and Victoria entered a room where they were met by the principal, the vice-principal and the teacher.  Leduc said they advised her that Victoria's educational assistant (EA) had visited a psychic, who said a youngster whose name started with "V" was being sexually abused by a man between 23 and 26 years old.  Leduc was also handed a list of recent behaviors exhibited by her daughter.  School principal Brian Tremain–who referred phone calls seeking comment to the board–advised Leduc that the CAS had been contacted.  "That's when I got sick to my stomach," she said.  "I was shocked the whole meeting."

An Alaska woman who is accused of killing her newborn baby by putting him in a bag and shoving it in a closet was booked into a jail in Grand Junction, Colorado.  Story from Denver's ABC7 News here  Morgan Hite, 22, was extradited from Alaska on charges of first-degree murder in connection with the death of her son in February, reported the Daily Sentinel.  According to the arrest affidavit, while visiting her parents on Feb. 25, Hite delivered the child in a neighbor's bathtub.  Hite had been hiding her pregnancy from her parents, the affidavit said.  She then carried the baby back to her parent's house and put it in a plastic bag.  Two months later, Hite's parents, looking for a strong smell, discovered the decaying body and contacted police, the affidavit said.  Hite had moved to Alaska and was living with her 4-year-old daughter, police said.  Her daughter is now in the custody of Hite's boyfriend in Alaska.

Two Pennsylvania women are facing charges stemming from a sleepover involving six teenage boys.  Angela Honeycutt, 38, and Lynne Long, 45, both of Bucks County, are accused of a series of allegedly sexual incidents April 14 as the teens, ages 14 to 16, attended a sleepover at Long's Lower Makefield home.  Fox News story here  Honeycutt, a mother of two young children, is accused of having sex with a 14-year-old and performed sex acts with a 15-year-old, CBS3.com reported.  She also allegedly open-mouth kissed some of the minors, exposed her breasts to the teens, entered a shower with a juvenile and engaged conversation of a sexual nature, the station reported.  Authorities were tipped off to the incident after one of the boys involved told his parents, the station reported.

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