Bill changes requirements for reporting child abuse&
By Kristen Doerschner
Sunday, May 11, 2014
It took nine years and a national scandal for a bill that strengthens child abuse reporting requirements for school employees to make its way through the Legislature.
The bill -- which cleared the House on March 18 and the Senate Wednesday -- was first introduced in 2005 by Sen. Wayne D. Fontana, D-42, Pittsburgh. Fontana, determined to see the bill become law, said he has re-introduced the bill every session since then.
The bill was presented to Gov. Tom Corbett Thursday, and, after it is signed, it will take effect Dec. 31.
Two of the major changes regard who is required to report suspected abuse to the authorities and what types of injuries can be investigated.
School employees and anyone who provides a school-sponsored program, activity or service will be required to report suspect child abuse directly to the Department of Public Welfare’s ChildLine and to their school administrator.
http://www.timesonline.com/news/local_news/bill-changes-requirements-for-reporting-child-abuse/article_b250587e-3076-57bf-a883-c3d2744d9b58.html
Sunday, May 11, 2014
Friday, May 9, 2014
Zim border posts conduits for human trafficking, Child abuse at George Osborne's old school and a scandal that grows ever darker
"Representing an estimated $32 billion of the illegal international trade estimated at $650 billion per annum, human trafficking is the third largest income earning transnational organised crime, coming after drugs and arms trafficking."
Zim border posts conduits for human trafficking
May 9, 2014 in Feature Story Andrew Kunambura
Stories about human trafficking often appear to be fictitious Western-style movie material set in far-away places like cities in Mexico, Argentina, Pakistan, small towns in countries across the seas like Vietnam or rural parts of Cuba, but it in reality happens in cities, towns and villages all over the world.
Zimbabwe is apparently deeply involved in the criminal activity. The United Nations Convention against Transnational Organised Crime, commonly known as the Palermo Protocol, defines human trafficking as “the recruitment, transportation, transfer, harbouring or receipt of persons, by means of threat or use of force or other means of coercion, of abduction, of fraud, of deception, of the abuse of power or of a position of vulnerability for purposes of exploitation”.
Adopted by the United Nations General Assembly in 2000, the protocol states prostitution, sexual abuse, forced labour or services, slavery, servitude or the ritual removal of organs as the major forms of exploitation victims are subjected to.
Zimbabwe’s young women, men and children are being trafficked at an alarming rate to other countries where they are forced to work as sex slaves in brothels or give slave labour in factories, mines, farms and other businesses.
Tempted by needs, hopes and dreams, victims encounter their traders who in turn are driven by profit, the need to possess and a will to deceive, exploit and violate laws. Minors are also being trafficked for ritual purposes and domestic servitude....
Representing an estimated $32 billion of the illegal international trade estimated at $650 billion per annum, human trafficking is the third largest income earning transnational organised crime, coming after drugs and arms trafficking....
https://www.newsday.co.zw/2014/05/09/zim-border-posts-conduits-human-trafficking/
Child abuse at George Osborne's old school and a scandal that grows ever darker
Allegations of historic sex abuse made against St John's School, London
Former pupils include Chancellor George Osborne and Dominic Grieve
Teacher Anthony Fuggle arrested in September after indecent images found
Arrest emerged last week, bringing abuse allegations into present day
Fellow teacher Tim Harbord was also arrested but later cleared by police
By Paul Bracchi and Tim Stewart 9 May 2014
Back in March, when the revelations first came to light, six teachers were implicated in the suspected sexual abuse of boys as young as ten between the Sixties and Eighties.
Former pupils who came forward claimed the authorities at St Paul’s hushed up the wrongdoing. Among the perpetrators, the former pupils alleged, was a housemaster who fondled boys in the dormitory, a choirmaster who paid boys half a crown after molesting them, a teacher who beat ‘naughty’ boys, and a maths tutor who kept a register of pupils he punished in private spanking sessions.
Now the number of suspects has risen from six to 18 — ten of whom taught at Colet Court and eight at St Paul’s. Some of the former schoolmasters are no longer alive.
A Scotland Yard detective, who headed the Jimmy Savile inquiry, is leading the St Paul’s investigation, which has been given its own codename: Operation Winthorpe....
It has been reported that visitors to the Elm, as it was known, included members of the Paedophile Information Exchange (PIE), the pressure group that campaigned in the Seventies to lower the age of consent to four.
A former teacher at Colet Court was also a member of PIE during this period: choir- master Alan Doggett. There was gossip among his pupils that ‘half a crown’ was the ‘going rate for a session with Doggett’. They even coined a new verb — to ‘be Doggoed’, ie, groped and fondled.
Doggett took his own life in 1978, shortly after leaving Colet Court. Just hours before his death, he appeared before West London magistrates, charged with two indecent assaults on a ten-year-old boy from another school....
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2624730/Child-abuse-George-Osbornes-old-school-scandal-grows-darker.html
Zim border posts conduits for human trafficking
May 9, 2014 in Feature Story Andrew Kunambura
Stories about human trafficking often appear to be fictitious Western-style movie material set in far-away places like cities in Mexico, Argentina, Pakistan, small towns in countries across the seas like Vietnam or rural parts of Cuba, but it in reality happens in cities, towns and villages all over the world.
Zimbabwe is apparently deeply involved in the criminal activity. The United Nations Convention against Transnational Organised Crime, commonly known as the Palermo Protocol, defines human trafficking as “the recruitment, transportation, transfer, harbouring or receipt of persons, by means of threat or use of force or other means of coercion, of abduction, of fraud, of deception, of the abuse of power or of a position of vulnerability for purposes of exploitation”.
Adopted by the United Nations General Assembly in 2000, the protocol states prostitution, sexual abuse, forced labour or services, slavery, servitude or the ritual removal of organs as the major forms of exploitation victims are subjected to.
Zimbabwe’s young women, men and children are being trafficked at an alarming rate to other countries where they are forced to work as sex slaves in brothels or give slave labour in factories, mines, farms and other businesses.
Tempted by needs, hopes and dreams, victims encounter their traders who in turn are driven by profit, the need to possess and a will to deceive, exploit and violate laws. Minors are also being trafficked for ritual purposes and domestic servitude....
Representing an estimated $32 billion of the illegal international trade estimated at $650 billion per annum, human trafficking is the third largest income earning transnational organised crime, coming after drugs and arms trafficking....
https://www.newsday.co.zw/2014/05/09/zim-border-posts-conduits-human-trafficking/
Child abuse at George Osborne's old school and a scandal that grows ever darker
Allegations of historic sex abuse made against St John's School, London
Former pupils include Chancellor George Osborne and Dominic Grieve
Teacher Anthony Fuggle arrested in September after indecent images found
Arrest emerged last week, bringing abuse allegations into present day
Fellow teacher Tim Harbord was also arrested but later cleared by police
By Paul Bracchi and Tim Stewart 9 May 2014
Back in March, when the revelations first came to light, six teachers were implicated in the suspected sexual abuse of boys as young as ten between the Sixties and Eighties.
Former pupils who came forward claimed the authorities at St Paul’s hushed up the wrongdoing. Among the perpetrators, the former pupils alleged, was a housemaster who fondled boys in the dormitory, a choirmaster who paid boys half a crown after molesting them, a teacher who beat ‘naughty’ boys, and a maths tutor who kept a register of pupils he punished in private spanking sessions.
Now the number of suspects has risen from six to 18 — ten of whom taught at Colet Court and eight at St Paul’s. Some of the former schoolmasters are no longer alive.
A Scotland Yard detective, who headed the Jimmy Savile inquiry, is leading the St Paul’s investigation, which has been given its own codename: Operation Winthorpe....
It has been reported that visitors to the Elm, as it was known, included members of the Paedophile Information Exchange (PIE), the pressure group that campaigned in the Seventies to lower the age of consent to four.
A former teacher at Colet Court was also a member of PIE during this period: choir- master Alan Doggett. There was gossip among his pupils that ‘half a crown’ was the ‘going rate for a session with Doggett’. They even coined a new verb — to ‘be Doggoed’, ie, groped and fondled.
Doggett took his own life in 1978, shortly after leaving Colet Court. Just hours before his death, he appeared before West London magistrates, charged with two indecent assaults on a ten-year-old boy from another school....
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2624730/Child-abuse-George-Osbornes-old-school-scandal-grows-darker.html
Thursday, May 8, 2014
Child Sexual Exploitation Ring: 22 arrested, Amanda Spencer found guilty of running child sex ring in Sheffield, Prostitute raped, tortured, crucified in Italy, serial killer. speculation that the murder could have been a ritual killing
- Child Sexual Exploitation Ring: 22 arrested
- Amanda Spencer found guilty of running child sex ring in Sheffield
- Prostitute raped, tortured, crucified in Italy; case mirrors 2013 attack
- Italy: Florence gripped by fear as police hunt serial killer "speculation that the murder could have been a ritual killing"
CHILD SEXUAL EXPLOITATION RING: 22 arrested
By Folkestone Herald May 07, 2014
POLICE have arrested 22 people in connection with an investigation into child sexual exploitation across the UK.
Officers carried out a series of early morning raids at addresses in Kent, the Midlands and Yorkshire, in an operation focused on an organised criminal network believed to be involved with the sexual exploitation of young girls from the Slovakian Roma community, in Margate, Folkestone, Dover and Gravesend.
Chief Superintendent Alison Roden of Kent Police, who has been co-ordinating the operation, said: ‘We have arrested a number of people across the country as part of an ongoing investigation into child exploitation offences.
‘This is part of an in-depth investigation and today’s operation is a response to reports from the community and intelligence gathered about allegations of child exploitation in Margate, Dover, Folkestone and Gravesend. Arrests have also been made in Leeds and Birmingham.
‘The protection of children and vulnerable young victims is a key priority for Kent Police and our partner agencies....
http://www.folkestoneherald.co.uk/Police/story-21067808-detail/story.html
Amanda Spencer found guilty of running child sex ring in Sheffield
Kashmira Gander Author Biography
Friday 02 May 2014
A woman from Sheffield has been found guilty of running a child sex ring, after she reportedly coaxed “weak and vulnerable” underage girls into prostitution using drugs and alcohol.
23-year-old Amanda Spencer was found guilty of 16 counts relating to child prostitution at Sheffield Crown Court on 1 May.
On Friday, the jury was discharged after failing to reach a verdict on 14 remaining charges, according BBC News.
She was cleared of seven charges including arranging or facilitating child prostitution, intentionally causing or inciting a person to become a prostitute, and one count of trafficking within the UK for sexual exploitation.
Spencer ran the ring between 2006 and 2011, and made girls have sex with men, both at her own flat, and at other homes across South Yorkshire.
During the trial which lasted over two months, Prosecutor Michelle Colborne QC told the court that Spencer supplied the girls with alcohol and drugs and “when [they were] weak, introduced them to a life of prostitution,” according to BBC News.
"She hung around the town centre identifying and befriending vulnerable children.
“She made them feel loved, she gave them a shoulder to cry on, a friend who purported to understand whatever sadness they were experiencing in their lives and in turn lured them into a life of abuse, which she exploited and profited from.”....
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/crime/amanda-spencer-found-guilty-of-running-child-sex-ring-in-sheffield-9318958.html
Amanda Spencer trial: 'Grotesque' abuse of Sheffield child sex ring victims 6 May 2014
A victim of child sex ring leader Amanda Spencer has described the shocking physical and psychological brutality she used to trap vulnerable girls in a life of prostitution.
Spencer, 23, from Sheffield, has been convicted of 16 charges relating to child prostitution after jurors heard her victims were controlled using drugs, alcohol and violence.
She was just 16 when she began befriending her victims - some as young as 13 - and forcing them to have sex for cash.
One girl, who had been sleeping rough in the city's Abbeyfield Park, told Sheffield Crown Court she thought Spencer would protect her but was left fearing for her life when she was locked in a room where seven men paid to abuse her....
http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-south-yorkshire-27290220
Prostitute raped, tortured, crucified in Italy; case mirrors 2013 attack
Romanian immigrant Andrea Cristina Zamfir was found dead Monday morning, her wrists taped to an overpass in Florence. Authorities say the 26-year-old's murder is similar to the near murder of 46-year-old Alle Bartoline, who was found naked and screaming, her wrists taped to the same barrier.
BY Meg Wagner NEW YORK DAILY NEWS Wednesday, May 7, 2014
talian police are hunting for a monstrous serial attacker who raped and tortured a prostitute in Florence before "crucifying" her naked body on a bridge.
The brutal killing mirrors another attack on the same overpass last March.
Police found the body of Romanian immigrant Andrea Cristina Zamfir on Monday morning. The 26-year-old had been forced to kneel with her outstretched arms taped to a horizontal barrier under the bridge, Italy's Corriere della Sera newspaper reported.
Police said she had been sexually tortured before she was left to die, and bruising showed she struggled throughout the horrific assault, police say. Her clothes and purse were found about a half-mile away....
During the past 10 years, six or seven more prostitutes have been killed in the area, Florence investigator Lorenzo Bucossi told the Daily Beast....
http://www.nydailynews.com/news/crime/prostitute-raped-tortured-crucified-italy-article-1.1783067
Italy: Florence gripped by fear as police hunt serial killer
gbtimes Italy, Milan
Wednesday, May 7, 2014
A mysterious homicide is reviving painful memories in Florence after the body of a prostitute was found under a bridge on Monday. Andrea Cristina Zamfir, 26, a Romanian national, was strapped to a bar, tortured and left to die slowly, her wrists tied in a crucifixion-like pose.
There is “a real possibility that a new serial killer is on a rampage,” ANSA news agency writes, quoting sources close to the investigation. According to the Italian press, six other attacks on women over the past 8 years bear resemblance to this latest incident, but only this one ended in the victim's death.
There are similarities between the killings in the choice of the victims, who are all drug-addicted prostitutes, and in the area where the crimes took place as well as the use of torture. The proximity of a cemetery is also fueling speculation that the murder could have been a ritual killing....
http://gbtimes.com/world/italy-florence-gripped-fear-police-hunt-serial-killer
- Amanda Spencer found guilty of running child sex ring in Sheffield
- Prostitute raped, tortured, crucified in Italy; case mirrors 2013 attack
- Italy: Florence gripped by fear as police hunt serial killer "speculation that the murder could have been a ritual killing"
CHILD SEXUAL EXPLOITATION RING: 22 arrested
By Folkestone Herald May 07, 2014
POLICE have arrested 22 people in connection with an investigation into child sexual exploitation across the UK.
Officers carried out a series of early morning raids at addresses in Kent, the Midlands and Yorkshire, in an operation focused on an organised criminal network believed to be involved with the sexual exploitation of young girls from the Slovakian Roma community, in Margate, Folkestone, Dover and Gravesend.
Chief Superintendent Alison Roden of Kent Police, who has been co-ordinating the operation, said: ‘We have arrested a number of people across the country as part of an ongoing investigation into child exploitation offences.
‘This is part of an in-depth investigation and today’s operation is a response to reports from the community and intelligence gathered about allegations of child exploitation in Margate, Dover, Folkestone and Gravesend. Arrests have also been made in Leeds and Birmingham.
‘The protection of children and vulnerable young victims is a key priority for Kent Police and our partner agencies....
http://www.folkestoneherald.co.uk/Police/story-21067808-detail/story.html
Amanda Spencer found guilty of running child sex ring in Sheffield
Kashmira Gander Author Biography
Friday 02 May 2014
A woman from Sheffield has been found guilty of running a child sex ring, after she reportedly coaxed “weak and vulnerable” underage girls into prostitution using drugs and alcohol.
23-year-old Amanda Spencer was found guilty of 16 counts relating to child prostitution at Sheffield Crown Court on 1 May.
On Friday, the jury was discharged after failing to reach a verdict on 14 remaining charges, according BBC News.
She was cleared of seven charges including arranging or facilitating child prostitution, intentionally causing or inciting a person to become a prostitute, and one count of trafficking within the UK for sexual exploitation.
Spencer ran the ring between 2006 and 2011, and made girls have sex with men, both at her own flat, and at other homes across South Yorkshire.
During the trial which lasted over two months, Prosecutor Michelle Colborne QC told the court that Spencer supplied the girls with alcohol and drugs and “when [they were] weak, introduced them to a life of prostitution,” according to BBC News.
"She hung around the town centre identifying and befriending vulnerable children.
“She made them feel loved, she gave them a shoulder to cry on, a friend who purported to understand whatever sadness they were experiencing in their lives and in turn lured them into a life of abuse, which she exploited and profited from.”....
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/crime/amanda-spencer-found-guilty-of-running-child-sex-ring-in-sheffield-9318958.html
Amanda Spencer trial: 'Grotesque' abuse of Sheffield child sex ring victims 6 May 2014
A victim of child sex ring leader Amanda Spencer has described the shocking physical and psychological brutality she used to trap vulnerable girls in a life of prostitution.
Spencer, 23, from Sheffield, has been convicted of 16 charges relating to child prostitution after jurors heard her victims were controlled using drugs, alcohol and violence.
She was just 16 when she began befriending her victims - some as young as 13 - and forcing them to have sex for cash.
One girl, who had been sleeping rough in the city's Abbeyfield Park, told Sheffield Crown Court she thought Spencer would protect her but was left fearing for her life when she was locked in a room where seven men paid to abuse her....
http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-south-yorkshire-27290220
Prostitute raped, tortured, crucified in Italy; case mirrors 2013 attack
Romanian immigrant Andrea Cristina Zamfir was found dead Monday morning, her wrists taped to an overpass in Florence. Authorities say the 26-year-old's murder is similar to the near murder of 46-year-old Alle Bartoline, who was found naked and screaming, her wrists taped to the same barrier.
BY Meg Wagner NEW YORK DAILY NEWS Wednesday, May 7, 2014
talian police are hunting for a monstrous serial attacker who raped and tortured a prostitute in Florence before "crucifying" her naked body on a bridge.
The brutal killing mirrors another attack on the same overpass last March.
Police found the body of Romanian immigrant Andrea Cristina Zamfir on Monday morning. The 26-year-old had been forced to kneel with her outstretched arms taped to a horizontal barrier under the bridge, Italy's Corriere della Sera newspaper reported.
Police said she had been sexually tortured before she was left to die, and bruising showed she struggled throughout the horrific assault, police say. Her clothes and purse were found about a half-mile away....
During the past 10 years, six or seven more prostitutes have been killed in the area, Florence investigator Lorenzo Bucossi told the Daily Beast....
http://www.nydailynews.com/news/crime/prostitute-raped-tortured-crucified-italy-article-1.1783067
Italy: Florence gripped by fear as police hunt serial killer
gbtimes Italy, Milan
Wednesday, May 7, 2014
A mysterious homicide is reviving painful memories in Florence after the body of a prostitute was found under a bridge on Monday. Andrea Cristina Zamfir, 26, a Romanian national, was strapped to a bar, tortured and left to die slowly, her wrists tied in a crucifixion-like pose.
There is “a real possibility that a new serial killer is on a rampage,” ANSA news agency writes, quoting sources close to the investigation. According to the Italian press, six other attacks on women over the past 8 years bear resemblance to this latest incident, but only this one ended in the victim's death.
There are similarities between the killings in the choice of the victims, who are all drug-addicted prostitutes, and in the area where the crimes took place as well as the use of torture. The proximity of a cemetery is also fueling speculation that the murder could have been a ritual killing....
http://gbtimes.com/world/italy-florence-gripped-fear-police-hunt-serial-killer
Tuesday, May 6, 2014
At UN, Vatican sex abuse compared with torture, Vatican Defrocks 848 Priests in 10 Years of Abuse, Disturbing new internet child abuse sees toddlers raped and burned live on webcam
- At UN, Vatican sex abuse compared with torture
- Vatican Defrocks 848 Priests in 10 Years of Abuse
- Disturbing new internet child abuse sees toddlers raped and burned live on webcam as paedophiles use Bitcoin to stop being traced, warns police chief
At UN, Vatican sex abuse compared with torture Monday, May 5, 2014
GENEVA — A U.N. committee compared the Vatican's handling of the global priest sex abuse scandal with torture Monday, raising the possibility that its failure to investigate clergy and their superiors could have broader legal implications.
But the Vatican's top envoy in Geneva, Archbishop Silvano Tomasi, claimed that the Holy See was getting its house in order after a decade-long effort to deal with a global priest sex abuse scandal.
"There has been, in several documentable areas, stabilization and even a decline of cases in pedophilia," he told a committee of experts in charge of the U.N. Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment, which the Vatican ratified in 2002.
At the Holy See's first appearance before the committee, experts mainly peppered the Vatican with tough questions to be answered Tuesday. For instance, they asked why the report on its implementation of the treaty was almost a decade late, and why the Vatican believes its responsibility for protecting against torture only applies within tiny Vatican City, a nation of less than 1,000 inhabitants....
http://bostonherald.com/news_opinion/international/2014/05/at_un_vatican_sex_abuse_compared_with_torture
Vatican Defrocks 848 Priests in 10 Years of Abuse
GENEVA May 6, 2014 By JOHN HEILPRIN and NICOLE WINFIELD Associated Press
The Vatican revealed Tuesday that over the past decade, it has defrocked 848 priests who raped or molested children and sanctioned another 2,572 with lesser penalties, providing the first ever breakdown of how it handled the more than 3,400 cases of abuse reported to the Holy See since 2004.
The Vatican's U.N. ambassador in Geneva, Archbishop Silvano Tomasi, released the figures during a second day of grilling by a U.N. committee monitoring implementation of the U.N. treaty against torture.
http://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory/vatican-defrocks-848-priests-10-years-abuse-23605974
Disturbing new internet child abuse sees toddlers raped and burned live on webcam as paedophiles use Bitcoin to stop being traced, warns police chief
Rob Wainwright, director of Europol, warned of depraved new trend
Paedophiles pay for sick online 'shows' using untraceable Bitcoin
Mr Wainwright warned that police and politicians struggle to keep up
by Kieran Corcoran 21 April 2014
One of Europe's top police officers has warned of a sickening online trade in child torture porn.
Rob Wainwright, the director of Europol, said offenders are using the untraceable online currency Bitcoin to pay for depraved 'shows', performed live on webcams, which see young children raped and burned.
He said: 'The level of depravity seems to be descending year on year, frankly, including what seems to be in vogue now, which is live webcam 'shows' of toddlers not just being raped but being burnt with cigarettes.
Sorry, but it's happening online and it's extremely difficult for us to identify.'
Mr Wainwright warned that Bitcoin - a 'crypto-currency' based on mathematical formulae and independent of any government or central bank - is propping up a criminal black market.
He also warned that police and politicians were struggling to keep up with the pace of online crime, thanks to widespread anonymity online, and easy access to encryption technology which can make criminals almost impossible to track down....
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2609971/Disturbing-new-internet-child-abuse-sees-toddlers-raped-burned-live-webcam-paedophiles-use-Bitcoin-stop-traced-warns-police-chief.html
- Vatican Defrocks 848 Priests in 10 Years of Abuse
- Disturbing new internet child abuse sees toddlers raped and burned live on webcam as paedophiles use Bitcoin to stop being traced, warns police chief
At UN, Vatican sex abuse compared with torture Monday, May 5, 2014
GENEVA — A U.N. committee compared the Vatican's handling of the global priest sex abuse scandal with torture Monday, raising the possibility that its failure to investigate clergy and their superiors could have broader legal implications.
But the Vatican's top envoy in Geneva, Archbishop Silvano Tomasi, claimed that the Holy See was getting its house in order after a decade-long effort to deal with a global priest sex abuse scandal.
"There has been, in several documentable areas, stabilization and even a decline of cases in pedophilia," he told a committee of experts in charge of the U.N. Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment, which the Vatican ratified in 2002.
At the Holy See's first appearance before the committee, experts mainly peppered the Vatican with tough questions to be answered Tuesday. For instance, they asked why the report on its implementation of the treaty was almost a decade late, and why the Vatican believes its responsibility for protecting against torture only applies within tiny Vatican City, a nation of less than 1,000 inhabitants....
http://bostonherald.com/news_opinion/international/2014/05/at_un_vatican_sex_abuse_compared_with_torture
Vatican Defrocks 848 Priests in 10 Years of Abuse
GENEVA May 6, 2014 By JOHN HEILPRIN and NICOLE WINFIELD Associated Press
The Vatican revealed Tuesday that over the past decade, it has defrocked 848 priests who raped or molested children and sanctioned another 2,572 with lesser penalties, providing the first ever breakdown of how it handled the more than 3,400 cases of abuse reported to the Holy See since 2004.
The Vatican's U.N. ambassador in Geneva, Archbishop Silvano Tomasi, released the figures during a second day of grilling by a U.N. committee monitoring implementation of the U.N. treaty against torture.
http://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory/vatican-defrocks-848-priests-10-years-abuse-23605974
Disturbing new internet child abuse sees toddlers raped and burned live on webcam as paedophiles use Bitcoin to stop being traced, warns police chief
Rob Wainwright, director of Europol, warned of depraved new trend
Paedophiles pay for sick online 'shows' using untraceable Bitcoin
Mr Wainwright warned that police and politicians struggle to keep up
by Kieran Corcoran 21 April 2014
One of Europe's top police officers has warned of a sickening online trade in child torture porn.
Rob Wainwright, the director of Europol, said offenders are using the untraceable online currency Bitcoin to pay for depraved 'shows', performed live on webcams, which see young children raped and burned.
He said: 'The level of depravity seems to be descending year on year, frankly, including what seems to be in vogue now, which is live webcam 'shows' of toddlers not just being raped but being burnt with cigarettes.
Sorry, but it's happening online and it's extremely difficult for us to identify.'
Mr Wainwright warned that Bitcoin - a 'crypto-currency' based on mathematical formulae and independent of any government or central bank - is propping up a criminal black market.
He also warned that police and politicians were struggling to keep up with the pace of online crime, thanks to widespread anonymity online, and easy access to encryption technology which can make criminals almost impossible to track down....
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2609971/Disturbing-new-internet-child-abuse-sees-toddlers-raped-burned-live-webcam-paedophiles-use-Bitcoin-stop-traced-warns-police-chief.html
Monday, May 5, 2014
Demand for return of hundreds of abducted schoolgirls in Nigeria mounts, Heartbroken father claims his married daughter, 32, was 'driven to suicide' by a 'death dance cult leader' who made her his 'sex slave'
Demand for return of hundreds of abducted schoolgirls in Nigeria mounts
By Azadeh Ansari and Tia Brueggeman, CNN May 4, 2014
Washington (CNN) -- International pressure on Nigeria is mounting with protesters taking to the streets around the world to demand the rescue of hundreds of schoolgirls abducted by the terror group Boko Haram....
In Nigeria, angry citizens contend authorities are not doing enough. They took to social media using hashtags #BringBackOurGirls and #BringBackOurDaughters to demand more from the government, a move that appears to have ignited a global call for action.
Despite the recent public outcries, the Nigeria's Defense Ministry said it is committed to the search.
Even so, protesters have said not enough is being done....
"Can you imagine if 234 girls were abducted from their school in Paris or in Chicago? This would be a nightmare, this would be an uproar," Nicole Lee, president of TransAfrica, an African-American foreign policy organization, said at the Washington demonstration.
"... People would care, people would take action and we would want the same for the girls in Nigeria."....
http://edition.cnn.com/2014/05/03/world/africa/nigeria-abducted-girls/
Heartbroken father claims his married daughter, 32, was 'driven to suicide' by a 'death dance cult leader' who made her his 'sex slave and plied her with mind-bending drugs'
Sharon Stern, 32, from Hollywood, Florida, committed suicide after being driven insane by her 'butoh' master, Katsura Kan, her family claims
Butoh is a form of Japanese dance that explores themes of pedophilia, homosexuality and death
Stern fell in thrall of Kan after she moved with her software engineer husband to Boulder, Colorado
She began to travel the world with him to put on dances and then he also allegedly began to ask her for money - totaling $30,000
In 2011 her distraught family found her in a psych ward in Denmark - her father claims Kan had given her mind-altering drugs
She divorced her husband to prove her love for Kan, and after one last disturbing email, committed suicide in 2012
Family is suing Kan for wrongful death claiming he 'stripped her of her free will' and 'used her as a sex slave'. She called him 'god'
By Donna Andersen 5 May 2014
....'Katsura Kan brainwashed her against her family and her life,' her heartbroken father told MailOnline, echoing the claims he made in the lawsuit.
He alleged: 'He made her forget everything that was happy about life, and told her she needed to experience pain and suffering, until he had full control over her. She called him god.'
The lawsuit, which Kan has not responded to, alleges that Kan 'systematically stripped away Stern's human dignity, free will and self-respect by subjugating Stern to Kan's total control.'
It reads: 'Kan seduced Stern to engage in a sexual relationship with him, abused, publicly humiliated, criticized, insulted and derogated Stern, induced Stern to ingest narcotic drugs.'
Kan has not responded to a request for comment by MailOnline.
Before meeting Katsura Kan, Sharon Stern never had a mental health issue in her life.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2618266/EXCLUSIVE-Heartbroken-father-claims-married-daughter-32-driven-suicide-death-dance-cult-leader-sex-slave-plied-mind-bending-drugs.html
By Azadeh Ansari and Tia Brueggeman, CNN May 4, 2014
Washington (CNN) -- International pressure on Nigeria is mounting with protesters taking to the streets around the world to demand the rescue of hundreds of schoolgirls abducted by the terror group Boko Haram....
In Nigeria, angry citizens contend authorities are not doing enough. They took to social media using hashtags #BringBackOurGirls and #BringBackOurDaughters to demand more from the government, a move that appears to have ignited a global call for action.
Despite the recent public outcries, the Nigeria's Defense Ministry said it is committed to the search.
Even so, protesters have said not enough is being done....
"Can you imagine if 234 girls were abducted from their school in Paris or in Chicago? This would be a nightmare, this would be an uproar," Nicole Lee, president of TransAfrica, an African-American foreign policy organization, said at the Washington demonstration.
"... People would care, people would take action and we would want the same for the girls in Nigeria."....
http://edition.cnn.com/2014/05/03/world/africa/nigeria-abducted-girls/
Heartbroken father claims his married daughter, 32, was 'driven to suicide' by a 'death dance cult leader' who made her his 'sex slave and plied her with mind-bending drugs'
Sharon Stern, 32, from Hollywood, Florida, committed suicide after being driven insane by her 'butoh' master, Katsura Kan, her family claims
Butoh is a form of Japanese dance that explores themes of pedophilia, homosexuality and death
Stern fell in thrall of Kan after she moved with her software engineer husband to Boulder, Colorado
She began to travel the world with him to put on dances and then he also allegedly began to ask her for money - totaling $30,000
In 2011 her distraught family found her in a psych ward in Denmark - her father claims Kan had given her mind-altering drugs
She divorced her husband to prove her love for Kan, and after one last disturbing email, committed suicide in 2012
Family is suing Kan for wrongful death claiming he 'stripped her of her free will' and 'used her as a sex slave'. She called him 'god'
By Donna Andersen 5 May 2014
....'Katsura Kan brainwashed her against her family and her life,' her heartbroken father told MailOnline, echoing the claims he made in the lawsuit.
He alleged: 'He made her forget everything that was happy about life, and told her she needed to experience pain and suffering, until he had full control over her. She called him god.'
The lawsuit, which Kan has not responded to, alleges that Kan 'systematically stripped away Stern's human dignity, free will and self-respect by subjugating Stern to Kan's total control.'
It reads: 'Kan seduced Stern to engage in a sexual relationship with him, abused, publicly humiliated, criticized, insulted and derogated Stern, induced Stern to ingest narcotic drugs.'
Kan has not responded to a request for comment by MailOnline.
Before meeting Katsura Kan, Sharon Stern never had a mental health issue in her life.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2618266/EXCLUSIVE-Heartbroken-father-claims-married-daughter-32-driven-suicide-death-dance-cult-leader-sex-slave-plied-mind-bending-drugs.html
Sunday, May 4, 2014
Vatican to craft sex abuse protocols
Vatican to craft sex abuse protocols
May 3, 2014 VATICAN CITY (AP) - Members of Pope Francis' sexual abuse advisory board said Saturday they will develop "clear and effective" protocols to hold bishops and other church authorities accountable if they fail to report suspected abuse or protect children from pedophile priests.Victims groups have long blasted the Vatican for refusing to sanction any bishop or superior who covered up for priests who raped and molested children. They have listed accountability as one of the key issues facing Francis and a key test for his new advisory board....
Victims groups have long cited the case of O'Malley's predecessor in Boston, Cardinal Bernard Law, who resigned in disgrace as archbishop after the sex abuse scandal exploded publicly there in 2002. But Pope John Paul II then appointed Law to the plum assignment as archpriest of one of the Vatican's four major basilicas in Rome. Even today, another U.S. bishop remains in office despite having been convicted of misdemeanor failure to report suspected child abuse....
The commission met on the eve of a U.N. committee meeting in Geneva in which the Vatican is expected to come under a second round of criticism for its handling of abuse. A U.N. committee monitoring implementation of a key treaty on children's rights blasted the Holy See earlier this year, accusing it of systematically placing its own interests over those of victims by enabling priests to rape and molest tens of thousands of children through its own policies and code of silence.
It recommended the Vatican immediately remove any priest suspected or known to have abused children, open its archives on abusers and the bishops who covered up for them, and turn the cases over to law enforcement.
http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/world/2014/05/03/vatican-sexual-abuse/2128958/
May 3, 2014 VATICAN CITY (AP) - Members of Pope Francis' sexual abuse advisory board said Saturday they will develop "clear and effective" protocols to hold bishops and other church authorities accountable if they fail to report suspected abuse or protect children from pedophile priests.Victims groups have long blasted the Vatican for refusing to sanction any bishop or superior who covered up for priests who raped and molested children. They have listed accountability as one of the key issues facing Francis and a key test for his new advisory board....
Victims groups have long cited the case of O'Malley's predecessor in Boston, Cardinal Bernard Law, who resigned in disgrace as archbishop after the sex abuse scandal exploded publicly there in 2002. But Pope John Paul II then appointed Law to the plum assignment as archpriest of one of the Vatican's four major basilicas in Rome. Even today, another U.S. bishop remains in office despite having been convicted of misdemeanor failure to report suspected child abuse....
The commission met on the eve of a U.N. committee meeting in Geneva in which the Vatican is expected to come under a second round of criticism for its handling of abuse. A U.N. committee monitoring implementation of a key treaty on children's rights blasted the Holy See earlier this year, accusing it of systematically placing its own interests over those of victims by enabling priests to rape and molest tens of thousands of children through its own policies and code of silence.
It recommended the Vatican immediately remove any priest suspected or known to have abused children, open its archives on abusers and the bishops who covered up for them, and turn the cases over to law enforcement.
http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/world/2014/05/03/vatican-sexual-abuse/2128958/
Friday, May 2, 2014
The Witch-Hunt Narrative, LAUSD Admits To Destroying Over Two Decades Of Child Abuse Records, The findings indicate that DID does not have a sociocultural (e.g. iatrogenic) origin
- Book review: A scholarly, engaging look at ‘witch-hunt’ narratives
- LAUSD Admits To Destroying Over Two Decades Of Child Abuse Records
- Court dismisses case against former Miramonte teacher
- Dissociative Identity Disorder and Fantasy Proneness: A Positron Emission Tomography Study of Authentic and Enacted Dissociative Identity States (findings indicate that DID does not have a sociocultural (e.g. iatrogenic) origin)
Book review: A scholarly, engaging look at ‘witch-hunt’ narratives April 27, 2014 By Anne Grant Special to the Journal
“THE WITCH-HUNT NARRATIVE: Politics, Psychology, and the Sexual Abuse of Children,” by Ross E. Cheit. Oxford University Press. 508 pages. $49.95.
Ross E. Cheit’s book begins with the 1983 charges against staff at the McMartin Preschool. The case stretched over seven years, but produced no convictions — only a widespread consensus that it had been a “witch-hunt” and had unfairly targeted the accused. That narrative prevailed until now.
In 1992, Cheit recovered his own memory of sexual abuse in adolescence, more than two decades earlier, at a summer camp. By then, he held a law degree and a professor’s chair at Brown University. He eventually won civil suits against the individual and the institution that had betrayed him.
Cheit found that a single storyline clung tenaciously even when medical evidence showed children had been harmed. In academia, courts and the media, those who should have looked further failed to challenge the popular myth that considers children suggestible, unreliable witnesses to their own abuse.
Recognizing that his personal experience could bias him, Cheit closely examined the original evidence and court records in three large childcare sex-abuse cases and dozens of smaller ones — identifying some instances of people falsely accused and many where guilt went unpunished. He recounts evidence with scholarly precision that is emotionally engaging and eminently readable....
http://www.providencejournal.com/features/entertainment/books/20140427-book-review-a-scholarly-engaging-look-at-witch-hunt-narratives.ece
LAUSD Admits To Destroying Over Two Decades Of Child Abuse Records
The L.A. Unified School District (LAUSD) has admitted that it destroyed decades of alleged child abuse records.
This is linked to the investigation into former Miramonte Elementary School teacher Mark Berndt’s sexual abuse of children. John Manly, one of the victims’ eight lawyers, accused the District of destroying documents earlier this month in court.
L.A. Unified spokesman Sean Rossall told KPCC that the District did indeed destroy the records of sexual abuse cases at L.A. public schools in 2008, with files going back to 1988. There may be no way of knowing whether other reports of allegations against Berndt exist.
The question that Manly, and frankly, everyone, is asking is why LAUSD would destroy these records. Rossall said it was because the District felt like they should not have the reports. In 2008, the school district lawyers determined, based on a section of the penal code, that they shouldn’t have the documents, resulting in the destruction of all reports. However, the section they referenced is saying that they merely shouldn't disclose the reports, not that they shouldn't keep the reports.
....Berndt pleaded no contest to his charges and was sentenced to 25 years in prison in November 2013....
http://laist.com/2014/05/01/lausd_admits_to_destroying_over_two.php
Court dismisses case against former Miramonte teacher
Rina Palta with KPCC staff February 5th, 2014
he criminal case against a former teacher at Miramonte Elementary School in Los Angeles who was charged with inappropriately touching a female student has been dismissed by the court after the prosecution's key witness said she would not testify.
The case against Martin Springer involved only one alleged victim, who was 9 or 10 at the time the abuse occurred. Prosecutors considered testimony from the girl, now 12, to be essential to the case, and without it they decided they could not proceed, said Alison Meyers, an L.A. County deputy district attorney in the sex crimes division.
"She felt very traumatized by the process and as the days approached to the trial she had expressed to us that she felt coming to court would cause her further trauma," Meyers said....
http://www.scpr.org/news/2014/02/05/42014/court-dismisses-case-against-former-miramonte-teac/
Case Dropped Against Second Miramonte Teacher Accused Of Sexual Abuse
....The trial for former third-grad teacher Martin Springer, 51, began this week, but was dismissed today when prosecutors were told by the victim's family that the 12-year-old girl was too traumatized to testify in court, according to the Los Angeles Times and KTTV.
....The L.A. Unified District fired Springer (who had taught at the school for 26 years) from his job and took away his state teaching credential, the Times reported. They had paid a $470,000 settlement to six other children who claimed they were molested by Springer.
http://laist.com/2014/02/05/case_against_miramonte_teacher_sexu.php
Dissociative Identity Disorder and Fantasy Proneness: A Positron Emission Tomography Study of Authentic and Enacted Dissociative Identity States
A. A. T. Simone Reinders PhD, Antoon T. M. Willemsen PhD
PET and SPECT in Psychiatry 2014, pp 411-431
Abstract
Dissociative identity disorder (DID) is a disputed psychiatric disorder. Research findings and clinical observations suggest that DID involves an authentic mental disorder related to factors such as traumatisation and disrupted attachment. A competing view indicates that DID is due to fantasy proneness, suggestibility, suggestion and role-playing. Here, we investigate whether dissociative identity state-dependent psychobiological features in DID can be induced in high- or low-fantasy-prone individuals by instructed and motivated role-playing and suggestion. Differences in neural activation patterns were found between the DID patients and both high- and low-fantasy-prone controls. That is, the identity states in DID were not convincingly enacted by DID simulating controls. The findings indicate that DID does not have a sociocultural (e.g. iatrogenic) origin.
http://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-3-642-40384-2_16
- LAUSD Admits To Destroying Over Two Decades Of Child Abuse Records
- Court dismisses case against former Miramonte teacher
- Dissociative Identity Disorder and Fantasy Proneness: A Positron Emission Tomography Study of Authentic and Enacted Dissociative Identity States (findings indicate that DID does not have a sociocultural (e.g. iatrogenic) origin)
Book review: A scholarly, engaging look at ‘witch-hunt’ narratives April 27, 2014 By Anne Grant Special to the Journal
“THE WITCH-HUNT NARRATIVE: Politics, Psychology, and the Sexual Abuse of Children,” by Ross E. Cheit. Oxford University Press. 508 pages. $49.95.
Ross E. Cheit’s book begins with the 1983 charges against staff at the McMartin Preschool. The case stretched over seven years, but produced no convictions — only a widespread consensus that it had been a “witch-hunt” and had unfairly targeted the accused. That narrative prevailed until now.
In 1992, Cheit recovered his own memory of sexual abuse in adolescence, more than two decades earlier, at a summer camp. By then, he held a law degree and a professor’s chair at Brown University. He eventually won civil suits against the individual and the institution that had betrayed him.
Cheit found that a single storyline clung tenaciously even when medical evidence showed children had been harmed. In academia, courts and the media, those who should have looked further failed to challenge the popular myth that considers children suggestible, unreliable witnesses to their own abuse.
Recognizing that his personal experience could bias him, Cheit closely examined the original evidence and court records in three large childcare sex-abuse cases and dozens of smaller ones — identifying some instances of people falsely accused and many where guilt went unpunished. He recounts evidence with scholarly precision that is emotionally engaging and eminently readable....
http://www.providencejournal.com/features/entertainment/books/20140427-book-review-a-scholarly-engaging-look-at-witch-hunt-narratives.ece
LAUSD Admits To Destroying Over Two Decades Of Child Abuse Records
The L.A. Unified School District (LAUSD) has admitted that it destroyed decades of alleged child abuse records.
This is linked to the investigation into former Miramonte Elementary School teacher Mark Berndt’s sexual abuse of children. John Manly, one of the victims’ eight lawyers, accused the District of destroying documents earlier this month in court.
L.A. Unified spokesman Sean Rossall told KPCC that the District did indeed destroy the records of sexual abuse cases at L.A. public schools in 2008, with files going back to 1988. There may be no way of knowing whether other reports of allegations against Berndt exist.
The question that Manly, and frankly, everyone, is asking is why LAUSD would destroy these records. Rossall said it was because the District felt like they should not have the reports. In 2008, the school district lawyers determined, based on a section of the penal code, that they shouldn’t have the documents, resulting in the destruction of all reports. However, the section they referenced is saying that they merely shouldn't disclose the reports, not that they shouldn't keep the reports.
....Berndt pleaded no contest to his charges and was sentenced to 25 years in prison in November 2013....
http://laist.com/2014/05/01/lausd_admits_to_destroying_over_two.php
Court dismisses case against former Miramonte teacher
Rina Palta with KPCC staff February 5th, 2014
he criminal case against a former teacher at Miramonte Elementary School in Los Angeles who was charged with inappropriately touching a female student has been dismissed by the court after the prosecution's key witness said she would not testify.
The case against Martin Springer involved only one alleged victim, who was 9 or 10 at the time the abuse occurred. Prosecutors considered testimony from the girl, now 12, to be essential to the case, and without it they decided they could not proceed, said Alison Meyers, an L.A. County deputy district attorney in the sex crimes division.
"She felt very traumatized by the process and as the days approached to the trial she had expressed to us that she felt coming to court would cause her further trauma," Meyers said....
http://www.scpr.org/news/2014/02/05/42014/court-dismisses-case-against-former-miramonte-teac/
Case Dropped Against Second Miramonte Teacher Accused Of Sexual Abuse
....The trial for former third-grad teacher Martin Springer, 51, began this week, but was dismissed today when prosecutors were told by the victim's family that the 12-year-old girl was too traumatized to testify in court, according to the Los Angeles Times and KTTV.
....The L.A. Unified District fired Springer (who had taught at the school for 26 years) from his job and took away his state teaching credential, the Times reported. They had paid a $470,000 settlement to six other children who claimed they were molested by Springer.
http://laist.com/2014/02/05/case_against_miramonte_teacher_sexu.php
Dissociative Identity Disorder and Fantasy Proneness: A Positron Emission Tomography Study of Authentic and Enacted Dissociative Identity States
A. A. T. Simone Reinders PhD, Antoon T. M. Willemsen PhD
PET and SPECT in Psychiatry 2014, pp 411-431
Abstract
Dissociative identity disorder (DID) is a disputed psychiatric disorder. Research findings and clinical observations suggest that DID involves an authentic mental disorder related to factors such as traumatisation and disrupted attachment. A competing view indicates that DID is due to fantasy proneness, suggestibility, suggestion and role-playing. Here, we investigate whether dissociative identity state-dependent psychobiological features in DID can be induced in high- or low-fantasy-prone individuals by instructed and motivated role-playing and suggestion. Differences in neural activation patterns were found between the DID patients and both high- and low-fantasy-prone controls. That is, the identity states in DID were not convincingly enacted by DID simulating controls. The findings indicate that DID does not have a sociocultural (e.g. iatrogenic) origin.
http://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-3-642-40384-2_16
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