12 Stories of Child Sex Abuse on Today's Global PnP List

Divorce cases, where shared care was not granted,
may contribute to child abuse in Singapore

It is heartening to note the increased attention being given to child abuse cases in Singapore and the work that social sector partners are doing (Social workers lauded for helping to curb child abuse; Oct 22).

While the Government and the social sector work at reducing the incidence in this area, every case of child abuse is one too many and it is important to also look at and address the contributory factors.

Recent reports and letters on the physical and sexual abuse of stepchildren have especially cast the spotlight on the predicament of children affected by divorce.

The disproportionate impact of abuse towards such children demands an honest, whole-of-society response that goes beyond enacting reactionary and punitive laws.

On this note, it may be helpful for the Ministry of Social and Family Development to also share how many of these abuse cases stem from divorced and broken families.

Extensive scientific research has established shared care to be in the best interest of children in the vast majority of divorce cases.

Only 4% of divorces result in shared custody of children!!!

The fact that only 4 per cent of care and control orders granted in divorce are shared may likely be a major factor contributing to the significant number of child abuse cases in Singapore (Call to ease housing rule for divorcees sharing care of kids; July 12).

In the light of the compelling scientific evidence and to truly protect children affected by their parents' divorce, the Family Justice Courts should review all past orders where shared care and control was not granted, and perhaps grant shared care arrangements for all children where both biological parents are fit and willing.

North Korea slams HRW report claiming
sex abuse rampant

North Korea slams a report by Human Rights Watch which said sexual abuse of women was rampant in the isolated nation.

In its report released Thursday, the US-based rights group said North Korean police and other officials prey on women with near-total impunity.

HRW drew on interviews with more than 50 North Korean escapees to chronicle gruesome details of rape and other abuses perpetrated by security officers such as border guards, but also civilian officials.

In its response, the North’s Korean Association for Human Rights Studies says the “preposterous” report was “a part of political scheme fabricated by the hostile forces… to tarnish the image of the DPRK,” the state Korean Central News Agency reports, using the country’s official acronym.

“It is also an extremely dangerous provocation aimed at reversing the tide of peace and prosperity on the Korean peninsula,” the statement says, branding the women interviewed as “human scum.”

In the HRW report, one anonymous former textile trader in her 40s recounted being treated like a sex toy “at the mercy of men.”

“On the days they felt like it, market guards or police officials could ask me to follow them to an empty room outside the market, or some other place they’d pick,” where they forced sexual encounters, she said.

“It happens so often nobody thinks it is a big deal. We don’t even realize when we are upset,” she added.

Pyongyang maintains that it protects and promotes “genuine human rights,” and says there is no justification for the West to try to set human rights standards for the rest of the world.

“Sexual violence in North Korea is an open, unaddressed, and widely tolerated secret,” says HRW executive director Kenneth Roth.

— AFP

Victoria’s sexual crime rate rises significantly

RACHEL BAXENDALE, Australia

Statistics cited by the Victorian opposition exaggerate the state’s crime problem by failing to ­account for a population increase of almost half a million since the last election, but correctly weighted figures remain concerning.

At his campaign launch for the November 24 election last weekend, Liberal leader Matthew Guy cited a 38 per cent increase in common assaults, a 24 per cent increase in aggravated robberies, a 33 per cent increase in sexual ­offences and a 43 per cent increase in home invasions.

The Australian’s analysis of Victorian Crime Statistics Agency data showing offences recorded by Victoria Police from December 2014 to June 2018 indicates Mr Guy’s claims are correct in terms of real numbers.

However, Victoria’s population has increased from 5,886,400 in December 2014 to 6,359,600 in September 2018.

Using a per 100,000 population metric to account for the population growth, non-family common assault violence is up 26.2 per cent, compared with 38.3 per cent in raw terms.

Aggravated robbery is up 13.2 per cent, compared with 24.1 per cent in raw terms, while sexual offences are up 20.5 per cent, compared with 33 per cent in raw terms, and residential aggravated burglary is up 31.1 per cent, compared with 43.7 per cent in raw terms.

On a per 100,000 population metric, the homicide rate, which includes murder, attempted murder, manslaughter and driving causing death has risen 6.8 per cent, but murders are down 4 per cent and manslaughter is down 48.4 per cent.

Drug dealing is up 105.3 per cent, but the more serious drug trafficking is down 14 per cent.

Rape is up 10.5 per cent, ­indecent assault 10.4 per cent, and sexual offences against children 42.7 per cent — the latter likely linked to charges arising from the child sex abuse royal commission.

German police come upon sex act in park,

migrant arrested on rape accusations

FILE PHOTO: German police near Stuttgart, Germany, May 30, 2016. © Reuters / Michaela Rehle

As Germans fume over the recent gang rape of a teen in Freiburg, police in Stuttgart have arrested a migrant caught performing sex acts with a 17-year-old girl in a park. It’s unclear, however, if there was consent.

Stuttgart police arrested a 23-year-old African migrant on Saturday afternoon, after being tipped off about sexual acts taking place in a local park. The suspect was reportedly caught “red handed,” but did not attempt to flee. The young woman told police that the sex acts had been carried out against her will.

According to local media reports, police officers “observed a part of the incident” before approaching the pair. It’s not clear whether they witnessed the victim resist or call for help, but German media have hinted that the rape accusation could be a “protective claim.” While the 23-year-old remains in custody, police say that they are hoping that witnesses will come forward.

Questions about the relationship between the victim and her alleged attacker have also been raised. The pair apparently met in a district outside of the city center and traveled to the park together, according to the Stuttgarter Zeitung. Whether the German teen went voluntarily or by force remains a pertinent question that police are still investigating.

There has been a string of high profile sexual assaults in Germany that have been blamed on asylum seekers who entered the country due to Angela Merkel’s open-door migrant policy. The recent case of an 18-year-old brutally gang raped outside a disco in Freiburg last month sparked protests. Seven of the suspects are Syrian men aged 19 to 29, and one is a German native aged 25.

While saying that there would be “zero tolerance” to sex offenders, some German authorities want to introduce “comprehensive sex education” for all incoming asylum seekers.

Paedophile used council CCTV to spy on children

playing in UK park 

Joe Roberts

A paedophile has been jailed for possessing child abuse images after he was caught using council cameras to spy on children playing in a park.

Anthony East, 68, of Balcombe Road, Peacehaven, East Sussex, was spotted using the surveillance cameras to watch children at Level Park in Brighton. The cameras, operated by the local council and police, are solely used for traffic monitoring and enforcement.

Anthony East was jailed for 16 months. He was caught spying on kids at the Level Park in Brighton.

Although his actions were not deemed to be a criminal offence, a police investigation uncovered indecent images of children on devices at his home. 

East pleaded guilty at Hove Crown Court to possessing indecent images of children and was sentenced to 16 months in prison and given a Sexual Harm Prevention Order (SHPO), which restricts his access to children and computers. He was also made a registered sex offender for life.

Jehovah's Witnesses 'dealt with allegations of

child sex abuse in house', alleged victim claims

Church elder Thomas Brian Jenkins is accused of

indecently assaulting a girl in the 1970s

By Tom Bedford

Complaints of sexual abuse against children in the Jehovah’s Witness church are dealt with “in house”, a court heard.

An alleged victim told how she waited 40 years for church elder Thomas Brian Jenkins to be charged over the campaign of abuse she claims she suffered as a young girl.

The woman, now in her late 50s, told a jury: “I’m angry at Jehovah’s Witness elders and the governing body for the lack of protection they provide to children.

“There is no safeguarding. They do not report it to the authorities because they want to deal with it in house. Then it doesn’t get dealt with.”

The woman claims she was repeatedly touched and groped by Jenkins in his car, during bible studies, and in a swimming pool in the 1970s.

The alleged sex attacks happened while the girl and her family were members of the Brecon congregation of Jehovah’s Witnesses where Jenkins was an elder.

She told the jury: “I was terrified. I tried everything I could, as a 12 or 13-year-old girl, to get out of being round that person.” But she added: “I didn’t have the power or the words to avoid it.”

Merthyr Tydfil Crown Court heard many of the alleged assaults happened when Jenkins took the schoolgirl and her brother on “door-to-door” missions to rural properties in the Powys countryside.

Jenkins, 74, is accused of sending her brother to “preach the faith” so he could force his hands up the schoolgirl’s skirt as she sat in the back of his Rover car.

The court heard Jenkins tried to get his fingers inside the girl’s costume under the waterline at Brecon swimming pool during Jehovah’s Witness outings.

She told the court: “I was made to do bible studies with Brian Jenkins and the same thing would happen – he would be groping me.

“There were so many incidents I have tried to block them out over four-and-a-half decades. I tried to tell the elders that he wouldn’t leave me alone. I was a young girl, I felt ashamed and embarrassed.”

The woman told the jury that two elders, a doctor and ex-police officer, “grinned” when she told them what was going on. She said she was “scared” of the elders and described one as a “physical and mental bully”.

The woman, who can’t be named for legal reasons, said she stopped going to church to avoid Jenkins.

She said: “They would take me to a little room in a meeting hall where I would be reprimanded by all these men. They would come to my home. I was reprimanded for not going to meetings, not knocking on doors, not doing bible studies.”

Hilary Roberts, defending, said: “This is a campaign of complaints against Jehovah’s Witness and this (the sex assaults) didn’t happen.”

She replied: “It happened.”

The woman told her husband about the alleged abuse 10 years ago and finally went to the police after seeing abused women getting justice in high-profile cases on television, the court heard.

The jury was told Jenkins was convicted of a series of sex offences at Worcester Crown Court in 1990.

Jenkins, of Landor Road, Redditch, Worcester, denies 20 charges of indecent assault in the 1970s.

The trial continues.

New Zealand sex offender remains 'undue risk'

By Rob Kidd, News Dunedin Crime

A Dunedin sex offender who befriended single mothers to gain access to their children will be behind bars for at least another 22 months.

Peter William Pearson (50) was jailed for six years four months when he appeared in the Dunedin District Court last year on a range of sex charges, which included secretly filming naked men and possessing objectionable images of children involved in sex acts.

He came before the Parole Board last month but accepted from the hearing's outset he was not ready for release.

Pearson was enrolled to do the Drug Treatment Programme and Kia Marama - sex-offender therapy - the latter of which will only begin in March 2020.

A psychiatrist's report provided to the board indicated the prisoner did not have ''a real depth of understanding of the effect of his abuse''.

Panel convener Sir Ron Young noted Pearson had reportedly abused alcohol and drugs for many years. ''We are not satisfied currently that he is anything other than an undue risk given the offending and the fact that he is currently untreated,'' he said.

Pearson sexually abused two boys and a girl, gaining the trust of their mothers until he had the children alone.

The court heard at sentencing that between April and August 2016, he often had the victims together at his home in Maryhill where he played a game he dubbed ''spoons''. The loser of each round would have to remove an article of clothing, which eventually saw Pearson end up naked in bed with the children.

When Pearson was dealt with in court, the mother of one of the boys spoke of her son's violent and sexualised behaviour since the ordeal. ''I often worry about [my child's] future and whether he will become a sexual offender,'' she said.

Pearson was unmasked when text messages about masturbation were uncovered by one of the victim's mothers on the boy's phone.

A search of his house uncovered two devices used to covertly record people. More than 130 objectionable images and videos were also discovered by officers.

Pearson had previous convictions for accessing such material and one for indecency in 1984. He will next be seen by the Parole Board in September 2020.

UK paedophile admits 14-year campaign of

sexual abuse against 3 children

A man has appeared in court to admit sexually abusing three children between 1989 and 2003.

Richard Packer, 56, committed the offences against his child victims when they were as young as seven and eight.

Leicestershire Police has praised the bravery of Packer’s victims. They contacted the force last year to disclose what he had done to them during their childhoods.

Packer, of Freemans Lane, Burbage, appeared at Leicester Crown Court today to enter guilty pleas to four counts of indecently assaulting a child under 14.

Leicestershire Police released details of the case after the hearing. In a statement, the force said of Packer: “His crimes began when they were just seven and eight years old, continuing as they became teenagers.

“However his actions were uncovered when the victims contacted Leicestershire Police last year to disclose just what they had been subjected to.”

Detective Constable Anna Blockley, the investigating officer, said: “Each of Packer’s victims have shown bravery in coming forward and telling us about the abuse they’ve suffered.

“Packer himself probably thought that they wouldn’t do such a thing and that his horrific actions would never bring him before the courts. But today he’s admitted his crimes and saved his victims from having to attend court.”

Packer will be sentenced at Leicester Crown Court on Monday, November 26.

Leicestershire Police launched the All Is Not Lost campaign last year to encourage people who have been raped or sexually assaulted to report the crimes committed against them.

Police probe sexual assault on minor in Maldives 

Ahmed Aiham

Maldives Police Service have begun an investigation over a reported case of sexual assault in reclaimed suburb Hulhumale’ that took place last Friday.

According to local media Mihaaru, a 13-year-old girl was assaulted in the park near the grand mosque in Neighborhood One.

It has been alleged that more than one person was involved in the assault.

The police have refused to comment further on the case and is yet to confirm the arrest of any suspects.

Sexual abuse against children has been on the rise in Maldives, as evident by the Ministry of Gender and Family's 2017 statistical report indicating 418 reported cases of child sexual abuse. 

Furthermore, 535 cases of physical and mental abuse, as well as 308 cases regarding the neglect of children, have been reported to the ministry.

Scottish football coach jailed over sex abuse

of boys as young as five

The coach had already been jailed for two years in 1998

for sexually abusing three boys.

AFP, LONDON

A Scottish court on Monday sentenced a former youth football coach to six years in prison after being found to have sexually abused three boys as young as five.

James Torbett helped set up and then coached Celtic Boys Club -- a team not formally associated with Scottish league champion Celtic FC -- from the late 1960s until the 1990s.

The 71-year-old was found guilty of abusing the boys over an eight-year period ending in 1994.

He denied the charges.

“What this case has shown is that you used the club as a front and a recruiting ground for boys who you could sexually abuse,” Glasgow court judge John Beckett said.

The court heard that one of the boys assaulted was five. The BBC separately reported that the other two were members of the under-14 squad.


Torbett had already been jailed for two years in 1998 for sexually abusing three boys in the 1960s and 1970s.

UK man denies sex abuse allegations against girl

By Megi Rychlikova

A YOUNG man is alleged to have sexually abused an underage girl for 10 years, a jury at York Crown Court heard.
 
Ashley Gordon Thomas, 24, committed some of the abuse when he himself was under age, claimed Nick Adlington, opening the prosecution.

Defence barrister Jason Macadam alleged the abuse never happened and the girl had made up the allegations.

He also claimed Thomas didn’t have the opportunity to commit the offences.

Thomas, of Ascot Way, Acomb, denies three charges of attempted rape, four of sexual assault of a child under 13, three of engaging in sexual activity in the presence of a child under 13, two of inciting a child under 13 to engage in sexual activity and two of sexual activity with a child.

At the start of the trial, Judge Simon Hickey told the jury the court may take more frequent breaks than normal because Thomas has a short attention span and learning difficulties.

Mr Adlington said the girl made her allegations to the police in September 2016. Mr Macadam alleged the girl had had chances to make her allegations earlier and had not done so.

The trial continues.

Aussie Man Arrested Over Alleged Online

Procurement of Child for Sex

A 63-year-old man was arrested in Penrith, Sydney, on Tuesday, November 6, over alleged online procurement of a child for sex. 

Police said the man, who thought he was engaging in “highly-sexualised conversations” with a 13-year-old girl, had made arrangements to meet her for sex and was then arrested on High Street, Penrith. 

Police alleged that the man also believed he spoke to the mother of a 10-year-old girl and “engaged in conversations about sexual acts he wished to perform on the child”. 

Following the arrest, a laptop, computer tower, a video camera, and electronic storage devices were seized from the man’s Matraville home. 

He was refused bail to appear in the Penrith Local Court on Wednesday, November 7. The arrest is part of the ongoing Strike Force Trawler investigation into child sex abuse and exploitation.