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The Child Protection eNewsletter

Nebraska Governor calls special session to fix safe haven law...

Nebraska Governor Dave Heineman called a special legislative session in the wake of numerous abandoned children at Nebraska hospitals, saying the law needs to be rewritten to focus on its original intent–protecting infants. KETV News story here

"We hoped this wouldn't happen," Heineman said. "We said it wouldn't happen. It has, and now we need to deal with it."

Most state senators in Nebraska’s unicameral legislature had expressed their support of an amendment but Heineman initially resisted calling a special session, citing cost and scheduling conflicts in convening the lawmakers. Heineman's office estimated the cost at $80,000.

But after four children were abandoned since Monday–two within hours on Tuesday–the governor's reaction came as little surprise.

Most of the state lawmakers have already agreed to put an age limit of 3 days old on the state's unique Safe Haven law. The law was aimed at infants but has no age limit.

Senator Ernie Chambers said it's "terrible" that children are being subjected to abandonment and end up possibly feeling like they're being thrown away by their parents. Chambers said Heineman made a wise decision in calling the session.

Meanwhile, as lawmakers prepare to tweak Nebraska's much-criticized law, which parents have used to abandon kids as old as 18, they'll find no nationwide consensus on what the age limit should be. MSNBC News story here

Tim Jaccard, president of the National Safe Haven Alliance, said he hopes to bring all 50 states to an agreement on a standard age limit and possibly lobby for federal legislation to establish it.

Jaccard argues the intent of the law–preventing infanticide–is sound. He started the safe haven movement in 1998, after finding a baby drowned in a toilet bowl by his mother, and others in plastic bags, buried or in recycling bins. "The bottom line is, I don't want to see another baby in a Dumpster ever again," he said.

While 15 parents or guardians have abandoned their children so far under Nebraska's law, others have also tried to do so, only to back out at the last moment. KETV News story here

911 calls obtained by KETV NewsWatch 7 show the desperation of parents who felt they had no other options than to leave their child at a hospital, and the confusion over the specifics of the Safe Haven law.

A 17-year-old boy left at an Omaha hospital is the 24th child to be abandoned under the safe haven law. AP News story here

The teenager was left at the Nebraska Medical Center Wednesday night by his grandmother, who is his legal guardian, Todd Landry, of the Division of Children and Family Services for the Department of Health and Human Services, said Thursday. Landry said the boy is a state ward but has been living with family while undergoing therapy.

Meanwhile, the 12-year-old Atlanta area boy abandoned by his mother in Nebraska is about to head home. WGCL 46 News story here The state is returning him to Georgia where he'll have a custody hearing.

Nebraska has posted alternative "resources available so that the family can remain together and the child does not experience the trauma that abandonment may cause" on its website at Nebraska family resources.

In other news...

Austrian newspapers are reporting that Josef Fritzl, the man police say held his daughter captive for 24 years in his basement, also locked up his own mother. ABC News story here "She always beat me and she never gave me any love. Sometimes she would beat me until I was lying on the floor. I always felt so humiliated and weak…." the newspapers News and Oesterreich, quoted Fritzl as saying, citing transcripts of court-ordered psychiatric evaluations they obtained. "My mother was a simple maid, and she was working all the time. She never kissed me, and she never hugged me, even though I always tried to please her," according to the transcripts." The only thing she would do was to take me to the church on Sundays." The transcript reveals that Fritzl told doctors that he yelled at his mother and locked her up in a room on the first floor. He shut the window and bricked it up so the woman had to live without daylight. His mother died in 1980, held like a prisoner by her own son, reports the News, referring to excerpts of the court-ordered psychiatric evaluation. For the history behind this story, see vol6_iss33, vol6_iss34, and vol6_iss35.

Prosecutors say Haleigh Strickland's stepfather and adoptive mother beat the 11-year-old girl so viciously she wound up in a coma and at the center of a now infamous Massachusetts right-to-die battle. ABC News story here But only the stepfather, Jason Strickland, is standing trial. Holli Strickland died in a murder-suicide days after being charged with assaulting Haleigh. Legal experts say her absence from Strickland's assault trial, which began Wednesday with jury selection in Hampden Superior Court, could be his best hope for providing reasonable doubt that he abused the girl. Neither prosecutors nor officials with the Department of Children and Families will talk about Haleigh's current condition and how much cognitive ability she has. Prosecutors had planned to call her as a witness at her stepfather's trial, but backed off that plan last month, saying they wanted to spare her further trauma. Jason Strickland's lawyer, Alan Black, has said he hasn't decided whether to call her as a witness. Haleigh is now being treated at a rehabilitation hospital in Boston. Judge Judd Carhart has said that if Haleigh is called as a witness, he would hold a hearing first to determine if Haleigh is competent to testify.

The Vatican issued new psychological screening guidelines for seminarians–the latest effort by the Roman Catholic Church to be more selective about its priesthood candidates following a series of sex abuse scandals. Fox News story here The church said it issued the new guidelines to help church leaders weed out candidates with "psychopathic disturbances." The scandals have rocked the church in recent years, triggering lawsuits that have cost hundreds of millions of dollars in settlements. "(The guidelines) became ever more urgent because of the sexual scandals," Monsignor Jean-Louis Brugues told reporters. He stressed, however, that psychological testing was used in some seminaries as far back as the 1960s–or at least a decade before the sexual abuse scandals exploded in public. "In all too many cases, psychological defects, sometimes of a pathological kind, reveal themselves only after ordination to the priesthood," the guidelines said. "Detecting defects earlier would help avoid many tragic experiences." For more information on clergy abuse, see Child Protection Guide/vol1_iss36.

Meanwhile, a wealthy Indonesian Muslim cleric faces accusations of having illegal sex with a minor after marrying a 12-year-old girl selected for him through a contest. Fox News story here Pujiono Cahyo Widianto, a 43-year-old owner of an Islamic boarding school, wed and likely slept with Lutfiana Ulfa in August after she won a contest to become Pujiono’s second wife judged by his first wife, 26, and followers, the Jakarta Post reported. The girl’s parents admitted that financial difficulties led them to marry their daughter to Pujiono and said the marriage is valid in the eyes of their religion (kawin siri), though not registered with the state, Indonesian Child Protection Commission secretary Hadi Supeno told the Post. The commission planned to immediately report Pujiono, his first wife and Lutfiana's parents to the police for a criminal investigation, Hadi told the Post. All could face a maximum of 15 years in jail and a $30,000 fine, for forcing, swindling and/or trading a minor into sex. Additionally, the commission intends to request an edict forbidding marriages to minors as Pujiono has declared plans to also marry a 7-year-old girl and 9-year-old girl, the Post reported.

Police recovered a gun Wednesday in an alley near where Jennifer Hudson's nephew was found shot to death inside a sport utility vehicle on the West Side, NBC News reported. MSNBC News story here It was not immediately known whether the gun was used in the killings of Hudson's mother, brother and nephew. Law-enforcement sources told the Chicago Tribune that more than one person might have been involved in the killings, even as police remain focused on the estranged husband of her sister. All three victims were shot to death. Her 7-year-old nephew, Julian King, was shot twice in the head with a .45-caliber weapon, the same caliber used in the slayings of his uncle and grandmother, law enforcement sources told NBC News. Officers blocked off the alley after the discovery and a forensic services team was sent to recover the weapon. Police had no additional comment.

Georgia's top court ruled that a provision in Georgia's strict new sex offender law is unconstitutional because it fails to tell homeless offenders how they can comply with the law. Fox News story here The law is designed to keep sex offenders away from children by monitoring how close they live to schools, parks and other spots where kids gather. But critics say it unfairly subjects homeless offenders to a life sentence if they fail to register a home address. The Georgia Supreme Court's 6-1 decision Monday found the law's registration requirements were "unconstitutionally vague." The opinion also held that homeless offenders are not exempt from the statute, and suggested special reporting requirements for the homeless. The case involves William James Santos, a homeless man and convicted sex offender who was kicked out of a Gainesville homeless shelter in July 2006 and was arrested three months later on charges he failed to register with Georgia's sex offender list.

A small-time New Jersey actor admitted in federal court to producing child pornography images of himself having sex with boys as young as 6 years old in Thailand. AP News story here Wayne Nelson Corliss, 59, pleaded guilty to five counts, including production and possession of child pornography and traveling to foreign countries to engage in illicit sexual activities. "This is undoubtedly among the most depraved conduct we've seen, with the extent of the victimization," said Michael Drewniak, spokesman for the U.S. Attorney's Office in Newark. Corliss, a part-time actor, has been described by friends and colleagues as an educated, witty man whose stage name was Casey Wayne. The white-haired, bespectacled man made extra money by dressing up as Santa Claus and painting faces at children's parties, colleagues said. He was arrested in May after Interpol made a rare public plea for help identifying a man seen in raw child porn images seized in Norway. Once the request was made, leads received in the first 24 hours helped authorities find Corliss in his apartment in Union City, New Jersey. See vol6_iss36.

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