Child sexual abuse - Michael Salter - "empirical basis of the moral panic account of sexual abuse has been shown to be substantially untrue"

Child sexual abuse
by  Michael Salter

Salter, M. (2017) Child sexual abuse. In Dekeseredy, W. and Dragiewicz, M. Routledge Handbook of Critical Criminology, Routledge: London and New York

Despite its popularity amongst critical criminologists, the empirical basis of the moral panic account of sexual abuse has been shown to be substantially untrue. There is no evidence of an increase in reckless or baseless sexual abuse prosecutions during the 1990s, which was supposedly the height of the “moral panic” (Cross, Walsh, Simone, & Jones, 2003). Child sexual abuse, whether recent or historical, remains very difficult to prosecute, with low rates of reporting, high rates of attrition, and low rates of prosecution across jurisdictions (e.g. Connolly & Don Read, 2006; Fitzgerald, 2006; Kelly, Lovett, & Regan, 2005). In order to establish the narrative that innocent men have been the victims of an epidemic of false allegations, “moral panic” advocates have misrepresented child protection interventions and legal cases in significant ways (R. Cheit, 2014; Kitzinger, 2004; Michael Salter, 2016). This has included championing the cause of convicted sex offenders despite overwhelming evidence of guilt (R. Cheit, 2014; R. E. Cheit, 2001; Olio & Cornell, 1998)....

It is clear that “panic” is an insufficient descriptor of social responses to child sexual abuse, and captures only the most visible tabloid responses to child sex offending. While the “moral panic” literature advances a view of society united in condemnation, the social and legal response to child sexual abuse remains uncertain and contradictory. Most abused children do not disclose at the time because it is unsafe to do so, and those who disclose are routinely disbelieved and left unprotected (Swingle et al., 2016). When child or adult survivors of sexual abuse disclose, they can face a hostile response from families or communities who rally in support of the alleged or convicted offender (e.g. Adcock, 2016; Salter 2017a). Daly (2014) offers a compelling explanation of polarised responses to sexual violence, suggesting that “a minimization of sex offending and victimization, on one hand, and a demonization of certain groups as ‘sex offenders’, on the other hand” are “mutually reinforcing” (p 378 – 379)....

An over-reliance on moral panic theory can blind scholars to the power dynamics, vested interests and discursive struggles that shape public understanding and responses to child sexual abuse.....
https://www.academia.edu/33470865/Child_sexual_abuse

Jerry Sandusky's adopted son to detail sexual abuse in Oprah interview, Are Child Sexual Abuse Cases More Common Than We Think?, Ex-senior judge Butler-Sloss to head child sex abuse inquiry, investigation into Knowl View 'cover-up'

Jerry Sandusky's adopted son to detail sexual abuse in Oprah interview

    Matthew Sandusky previously told investigators that he suffered seven
years of sexual abuse at the hands of his adopted father
    On Thursday, he will speak out in his first TV interview since Jerry
Sandusky was convicted and sentenced to 30-60 years in 2012

By Lydia Warren 8 July 2014

'At bedtime, his ritual began,' he says in a 30-second preview clip for the show. Ahead of the show's airing, OWN explained that Matthew would be sharing 'a deeply personal account of the grooming, methodical control and manipulation he faced as a child'....

Sandusky, who retired in June 30, 1999 as Penn State's defensive coordinator,  was convicted in 2012 of molesting 10 boys over 15 years, some in the football  team's showers on campus. The 70-year-old is now serving a 30- to 60-year state prison sentence....

The interview comes two weeks after Pennsylvania's attorney general released a review of the prosecution but found no evidence of political interference by  then Governor Tom Corbett.

The report, however, did reveal three years of 'inexplicable delays' to
prosecute the former Penn State football coach on child abuse charges.
The pedophile's home was not searched and the report notes that it took a full year, from March 2009 until March 2010, for the office to recommend charging Sandusky when 'Victim 1' came forward....
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2685127/Jerry-Sanduskys-adopted-son-sexual-abuse-Oprah-interview.html    


The Leonard Lopate Show
Are Child Sexual Abuse Cases More Common Than We Think?
Tuesday, July 08, 2014

Court documents reveal surprising leniency in trials of child molestors, claims Cheit

In the early 1990s, a new narrative emerged that child sex abuse cases were part of a “moral panic” that produced a witch hunt, and the children who testified were not reliable and easily swayed by prosecutors. But Ross Cheit reveals that the issue had not been blown out of proportion at all. His book The Witch Hunt Narrative, shows that child sex abuse convictions were regular occurrences and that the crime occurred far more frequently than many believed.
http://www.wnyc.org/story/behind-narrative-child-sex-abuse-convictions/


Ex-senior judge Butler-Sloss to head child sex abuse inquiry 8 July 2014 

Retired senior judge Elizabeth Butler-Sloss has been named as the chairwoman of a wide-ranging review into historical child sex abuse. The inquiry will examine how state institutions handled their duty of care to protect children from paedophiles.....

It comes after Mark Sedwill, the Home Office's top civil servant, answered MPs' questions about historical child abuse allegations. He was asked by the Commons Home Affairs Select Committee how his department lost or destroyed 114 files that could have shed light on alleged abuse. Mark Sedwill: "I am concerned about all material that we can't find" Mr Sedwill told the committee the files, which relate to the 1980s and 1990s, were discovered missing after an expert investigator was drafted in to look into the Home Office's handling of paedophile allegations in February last year.

He said the investigator discovered they were missing after he trawled a database of 750,000 files using search terms including "child abuse", "paedophilia" and "PIE", an anagram for the Paedophile Information Exchange....

Lady Butler-Sloss's broader, independent inquiry, will look at how seriously public bodies and other important institutions have taken their duty of care to protect children from sexual abuse.

The probe aims to address public concern over failings exposed by recent child sex abuse cases involving celebrities such as Jimmy Savile and Rolf Harris.... http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-politics-28203914


Police announce wider investigation into Knowl View 'cover-up'  7 July 2014

Police have said there will be a wider investigation into an alleged cover-up  of sexual abuse claims at a school linked to the late MP Cyril Smith. Greater Manchester Police (GMP) has been looking at claims of abuse at Knowl View residential school for boys in Rochdale from the 1970s....

The Crown Prosecution Service has also released letters detailing why Cyril Smith was not prosecuted in 1998 and 1999, however much of the detail was released in 2012. On both occasions the files were passed to prosecutors but no charges were brought. Seven men have alleged they were abused by the former Rochdale MP at a residential school in Greater Manchester, police have said. Greater Manchester Police has said the men claimed they were abused by Smith at Knowl View in Rochdale in the 1970s and 1980s. Smith's family said he had always denied the abuse claims. http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-manchester-28203463

Politics had no role in Sandusky probe, Friedman Sex Abuse Conviction

Report: Politics had no role in Sandusky probe
By MARK SCOLFORO Associated Press June 23, 2014

HARRISBURG — A report released Monday detailing the handling of the Jerry Sandusky child molestation case faults police and prosecutors for long delays in bringing charges but found no evidence that politics affected the investigation.

The report, commissioned by Democratic Attorney General Kathleen Kane and written by former federal prosecutor Geoff Moulton, blamed a three-year time lapse in filing charges on communication problems, an expungement of a 1998 complaint about the former Penn State coach and a failure to take certain investigative steps early on.

“The facts show an inexcusable lack of urgency in charging and stopping a serial sexual predator,” said Kane, who had vowed to conduct a review of the investigation while running for office. “The report documents that more investigative work took place in just one month in 2011 than in all of either 2009 or 2010.”

Moulton said his review, including internal emails by state prosecutors, “revealed no direct evidence that electoral politics influenced any important decision made in the Sandusky investigation.”....

Sandusky was convicted in 2012 of sexually abusing 10 boys and is serving a long prison sentence....
http://www.tribune-democrat.com/latestnews/x1396897838/Report-Politics-had-no-role-in-Sandusky-probe


Jesse Friedman, Who Pleaded Guilty To Child Abuse In 1988, Fights For Exoneration June 24, 2014

MINEOLA, N.Y. (CBSNewYork/AP) – A man portrayed in an Oscar-nominated documentary about a notorious 1988 sex abuse case has launched another attempt to clear his name.

Jesse Friedman and his attorney filed a motion Tuesday in Nassau County Court. They want a judge to hold a hearing to review evidence in the case.

Friedman and his father, Arnold Friedman, pleaded guilty in 1988 to abusing 13 children during a computer class that the elder Friedman taught at their Great Neck home. But Jesse Friedman has maintained that he was coerced into confessing....

Last year, Rice determined that Friedman was properly convicted.

“By any impartial analysis, the re-investigation process prompted by Jesse Friedman, his advocates and the 2nd Circuit, has only increased confidence in the integrity of Jesse Friedman’s guilty plea and adjudication as a sex offender,” Rice’s report  stated.

About a half-dozen prosecutors, supplemented by an independent review team that included noted defense attorney Barry Scheck, investigated claims that police used flawed interview techniques, employed hypnotism to elicit victims’ memories and took advantage of a moral panic that was sweeping the country in the late 1980s.

It also examined whether Friedman had caved to pressure from a county court judge and prosecutors to plead guilty, and methodically addressed that and all the other criticisms.

The report said during the first two weeks of the investigation, at least 35 children were interviewed by a team of 12 detectives working in two-person teams. No single detective dominated the investigation and different teams obtained incriminating statements from different victims, the report said.

The review team also said it found no credible evidence that hypnosis was used by investigators on any child....
http://newyork.cbslocal.com/2014/06/24/jesse-friedman-who-pleaded-guilty-to-child-abuse-in-1988-fights-for-exoneration/


Rice: No Reason To Overturn Friedman Sex Abuse Conviction
Friedman Claims There's 'Nothing But Lies In The Report' June 24, 2013

MINEOLA, N.Y. (CBSNewYork/AP) – There is no reason to overturn the conviction of a man in a notorious 1980s sex abuse scandal, New York prosecutors announced Monday after a three-year review....

But Nassau County District Attorney Kathleen Rice released a 168-page report Monday that concluded there was strong reason to investigate and prosecute both Friedman and his father, Arnold, when the scandal erupted in 1987. The new inquiry also concluded that the two abused young boys taking computer classes in the basement of their Great Neck home....

Friedman, speaking at a news conference on Monday, said he’s disappointed in the DA’s report but added he’ll continue his battle to clear his name....

“By any impartial analysis, the re-investigation process prompted by Jesse Friedman, his advocates and the 2nd Circuit, has only increased confidence in the integrity of Jesse Friedman’s guilty plea and adjudication as a sex offender,” the report stated....

The panel also noted that after his guilty plea, Friedman went on “The Geraldo Rivera Show” against his attorney’s advice and re-affirmed his guilt and discussed the abuse he and his father inflicted on the children.

The panel also re-interviewed parents of some of the victims and found none “have any reason today to disbelieve that their sons were victims of the Friedmans.”

The parents described their children having emotional problems, including bed wetting, defecating in their clothing, sleeplessness, nightmares, stuttering, a decline in school performance, separation anxiety and an overwhelming sense of fear....
http://newyork.cbslocal.com/2013/06/24/rice-no-reason-to-overturn-friedman-sex-abuse-conviction/


Capturing the Friedmans
http://www.leadershipcouncil.org/1/ctf/1.html

Deconstructing the Myths Advanced by the Film "CApturing the Friedmans"
http://www.leadershipcouncil.org/1/ctf/myths.html

In Their Own Words:  Jesse's Victims Speak Out
http://www.leadershipcouncil.org/1/ctf/vict.html

Four arrested for ritual killing, The Witch-Hunt Narrative Untrue, Loftus Misrepresents Important Case

Four arrested for ritual killing of five-year-old in Nigeria  Africa  Saturday 26 October 2013

KANO - Four people were arrested in south-eastern Nigeria in the ritual killing of a five-year-old boy whose body was mutilated before being dumped in a water tank, police said Saturday....

Kidnappings for ritual killings are rampant in Nigeria, particularly during election campaigns....
http://www.enca.com/africa/four-arrested-ritual-killing-5-year-old-nigeria


The Witch-Hunt Narrative: Politics, Psychology, and the Sexual Abuse of Children Hardcover – February 13, 2014
by Ross E. Cheit

In the 1980s, a series of child sex abuse cases rocked the United States....In the early 1990s, a new narrative with remarkable staying power emerged: the child sex abuse cases were symptomatic of a 'moral panic' that had produced a witch hunt. A central claim in this new witch hunt narrative was that the children who testified were not reliable and easily swayed by prosecutorial suggestion. In time, the notion that child sex abuse was a product of sensationalized over-reporting and far less endemic than originally thought became the new common sense.

But did the new witch hunt narrative accurately represent reality? As Ross Cheit demonstrates in his exhaustive account of child sex abuse cases in the past two and a half decades, purveyors of the witch hunt narrative never did the hard work of examining court records in the many cases that reached the courts throughout the nation. Instead, they treated a couple of cases as representative and concluded that the issue was blown far out of proportion. Drawing on years of research into cases in a number of states, Cheit shows that the issue had not been blown out of proportion at all. In fact, child sex abuse convictions were regular occurrences, and the crime occurred far more frequently than conventional wisdom would have us believe....
http://www.amazon.com/The-Witch-Hunt-Narrative-Politics-Psychology/dp/0199931224


Loftus Misrepresents Important Case
September 26th, 2013
In a recent TED talk about memory, psychology professor Elizabeth Loftus misrepresented the basic facts of a case study that led her to hire a private investigator and write an article that caused the subject of the case study to sue her for invasion of privacy. Loftus has mentioned the civil suit frequently in recent appearances and told audiences how terribly unfair it was that she was sued. Given the importance of these events to Professor Loftus, one wonders why she misrepresented the basic facts of the underlying case.

Loftus said the case was about a women who “accused her mother of sexual abuse based on a repressed memory” (See the 13-minute mark of this talk). That is not true. The accusation against her mother came in an evaluation when the child was 6 years old! What makes the underlying case so important is that the girl forgot the details, which had been videotaped at the time, and recalled them spontaneously at age 17....
http://blogs.brown.edu/recoveredmemory/2013/09/26/loftus-misrepresents-important-case/

Organized abuse and the politics of disbelief

from http://ritualabuse.us

Organized abuse and the politics of disbelief by Michael Salter (p.243 - 283) Faculty of Law - Faculty of Medicine - University of New South Wales in Proceedings of the 2nd Australian & New Zealand Critical Criminology Conference 19 - 20 June 2008 Sydney, Australia - Presented by the Crime & Justice Research Network and the Australian and New Zealand Critical Criminology Network Edited by Chris Cunneen & Michael Salter - Published by The Crime and Justice research Newtork University of New South Wales December, 2008 http://www.cjrn.unsw.edu.au ISBN: 9780646507378 (pdf)

“Since the 1980s, disclosures of organised abuse have been disparaged by a range of activists, journalists and researchers who have focused, in particular, on cases in which sexually abusive groups were alleged to have behaved in ritualistic or ceremonial ways...Whilst these authors claimed to be writing in the interests of science and social justice, what has emerged from their writing are a familiar set of arguments about the credibility of women and children’s testimony of sexual violence; in short, that women and children are prone to a range of memory and cognitive errors that lead them to make false allegations of rape.

This paper argues that this body of literature has systematically misconstrued allegations of organised abuse, and used organised abuse as a lens through which the debate on child abuse could be re-envisioned along very traditional lines, attributing victim status to accused men and constructing liars out of women and children complaining of sexual abuse. The instability, the uncertainty, and the complexity of cases of organised abuse have made it an important discursive site for a number of actors with ideological objections to the changes wrought by feminism and child protection. In particular, by framing allegations of organised abuse as bizarre and beyond belief, they sought to reassert an older politics of disbelief that contests the notion that women and children are reliable witnesses....

During a period in which women and children’s testimony of incest and sexual abuse were gaining an increasingly sympathetic hearing, lobby groups of people accused of child abuse construed and positioned “ritual abuse” as the new frontier of disbelief. The term “ritual abuse” arose from child protection and psychotherapy practice with adults and children disclosing organised abuse, only to be discursively encircled by backlash groups with the rhetoric of “recovered memories”, “false allegations” and “moral panic”. Seeking to recast the debate on child abuse according to an older politics of disbelief, these groups and activists attempted to characterise sexual abuse testimony, as a whole, through the lens of “ritual abuse." http://www.cjrn.unsw.edu.au/critcrimproceedings2008.pdf

PRESS RELEASE - Wikipedia “Satanic Ritual Abuse” article promotes PEDOPHILIA

PRESS RELEASE

Wikipedia “Satanic Ritual Abuse” article promotes PEDOPHILIA


For Immediate Release

Contact: S.M.A.R.T.
Email: smartnews@aol.com
http://ritualabuse.us

November 8, 2008. Easthampton, MA:
Intimidation, bullying, sarcasm: such are the tactics used by the current editors of Wikipedia’s “Satanic Ritual Abuse” article (and other related articles) to promote pedophilia: (1) by discounting the existence of sexual crimes against children associated with true or staged satanic worship; and (2) by undoing all references in Wikipedia articles by editors who present findings from research and legal cases that support the existence of ritual/sexual crimes against children by organized groups of pedophiles. (See article and discussion pages at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Satanic_ritual_abuse).

The article describes Satanic Ritual Abuse (SRA) as “a moral panic.” References by persons associated with child pornography or false memory type organizations that have been known to defend accused and convicted pedophiles, make it appear that the article is structured to cover up for pedophiles and their criminal perversions.

Findings from the 2007 international online Extreme Abuse Survey (http://extreme-abuse-survey.net) indicate that satanic ritual abuse is widespread. Of 1471 respondents from 31 countries who reported extreme abuse in childhood, 543 reported that they were ritually abused in a satanic cult. This number of SRA reports cited from a highly credible source, Karnac Books, of London was among many findings supporting the existence of ritual abuse deleted by editors who consider such viewpoints as having a “fringe focus.”

When children disclose to trusted persons that they have been physically and sexually tortured by groups of pedophiles using satanic garb and accoutrements, it is reasonable to assume that those persons would turn to the Internet to learn more about such bizarre reports. Because of this entry’s heavily-biased portrayal against the reality of satanic ritual abuse, the bodies, minds, and souls of terrified children – who may under threat of death tell about the perverted acts of their perpetrators using satanic rituals – are placed in jeopardy.

For a research-based rebuttal to Wikipedia’s article, “Satanic Ritual Abuse,” see The Truth about Satanic Ritual Abuse (http://ritualabuse.us/ritualabuse/articles/the-truth-about-satanic-ritual-abuse).

The Truth about Satanic Ritual Abuse - Wikipedia rebuttal

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