Shattered Dreams: Child Sexual Abuse

Shattered Dreams: Child Sexual Abuse Published on Wed, March 17, 2010 by Robert Spinks, Sequim (WA) Police Chief http://www.sequimgazette.com/spinks www.ci.sequim.wa.us/police As a law enforcement officer for 30 years you come across the bloody, the unusual, the horrific and the shattered. Here’s a story about shattered dreams.

According to the American Academy of Child & Adolescent Psychiatry, child sexual abuse is reported almost 90,000 times a year.

The mother remarried and thought she had a better life in store for her now teenage daughters. Over the ensuing years, both teenagers were routinely sexually assaulted by their step-father. Again, the police were never called.

Is the sky falling, no. But, there are more than enough sad stories in our city, our county, our state to be told.

As adult women, both sisters have been the victims of domestic violence; one sister is on her fourth marriage with multiple affairs throughout, while the other sister has drifted from ‘relationship’ to relationship from week-to-week or month-to-month. At one point the domestic violence was reported, while the other sister came to the attention of law enforcement because of her own abuse of drugs . . . not surprising.

A Sad Story

There is no happy ending.

Here’s a story about a young girl who grew up in a home where domestic violence was tolerated and not reported. She was sexually assaulted by her biological father before divorce finally came into play after years of abuse. The police were never called.

Victims of childhood sexual abuse are many times too young to just cry out for help. Other times they have been groomed to be sex victims by their attacker for years.

In Sequim last year, we investigated rapes, child neglect, child sexual assaults and abuse. More than a dozen more kids ran away from home for a host of reasons, but they ran from something or someone.

Having a healthy network of family, friends and community ties is critical. One thing that sexual

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abuse victims seem to share is an environment that is walled off from the outside world, usually by their attacker who wants to keep the victim isolated, controlled and trained to believe that the sexual abuse is somehow normal.

According to one study, most children are abused by someone they know and trust, although boys are more likely than girls to be abused outside of the family. A study in three states found 96% of reported rape survivors under age 12 knew the attacker. Four percent of the offenders were strangers, 20 percent were fathers, 16 percent were relatives and 50% were acquaintances or friends.

Organizations like the Boys and Girls Club of the Olympic Peninsula have demonstrated their value time and time again; providing a safe place to play, study and learn as well as providing staff that can engage children and to whom children can come to trust and report the unthinkable to.

Just as important as a nurturing experience at the Boys and Girls Club is making time for the critical one-on-one time with your children. While the hustle and bustle of life can sometimes be draining and challenging, making investments of time, love and fun with your children are the best crime prevention program you could ever invest in.

Could It Happen Here It already does. Sixty-seven percent of all victims of reported sexual assault are under the age of 18 according to a Bureau of Justice Statistics report. Thirty-four percent of all victims were under age 12. One of every seven victims of sexual assault was under 6.

On the flip side of the coin, the abusers range from stereo-typical male; father, step-father, boyfriends, uncles, and grand-fathers, but 40% of the offenders who victimized children under age 6 were also under the age of 18 themselves. Even more common is that the abuser tends to have been a victim of sexual or physical assault themselves.

It is estimated that 1 in 4 girls and 1 in 6 boys will have experienced an episode of sexual abuse before they turn 18.

Shattered Dreams Yet in all cases, these victims share the common result of having shattered childhood dreams. At a time when support and nurturing is critical to the development of a child’s future adult framework, these instances of rape and abuse leave damage that will follow them for decades regardless of how much make-up or cover-up is attempted.

So should we lock the kids up to protect them?

Quite the opposite, you want children involved in well supervised activities, out in the light of day, and engaged with other kids as well as adults.

But, the light needs to be on, the windows open so that there is no opportunity for an assault to occur or remain a secret.

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