12yo takes own life after alleged ‘period shaming’ by school teacher in India
© Puneet Vikram Singh / Getty Images
Police in India have charged a 26-year-old schoolteacher with ‘abetment of suicide’ after a 12-year-old girl took her own life Monday as a result of consistent harassment which culminated in ‘period-shaming’ in front of her classmates.
“After she experienced menstruation in the classroom, the teacher sent her out with a stern rebuke. The school management did not even provide a sanitary napkin citing non-availability of an ayah (nanny) and just gave her a piece of cloth to use,” a source within the District Child Protection Unit said, confirming the period-shaming The New Indian Express.
“We have also learned that the victim was depressed as one of her classmates said she had shared her intention of committing suicide,” the source added.
The 12-year-old girl jumped from a rooftop Sunday after ongoing problems with her teacher at school.
"Her friends pointed out that she had stained her uniform and so she asked her class teacher Ilakiya for help," the girl's mother told The News Minute.
"The teacher did not even take into account that there were boys in the class. She asked my daughter to lift [the] top of her salwar up and then gave her duster cloth to use as a pad," she said outraged.
The girl left a note but did not mention her teacher by name, police said.
Palayamkottai police said the suicide was the result of the overzealous scolding of the young girl due to poor academic performance.
“Among the 52 students from Class VII, we spoke to all 11 girl students to know more about the alleged menstruation incident," investigating officer Inspector Periyasamy of Palayamkottai told The New Indian Express.
"[None] of them mentioned it. As the victim claimed her teacher was torturing her, we have altered the case from suicide to abetment of suicide.”
Menstruation is still considered taboo in parts of Southeast Asia, including India.
Palayamkottai, India
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90% of Iraqi children have lost a relative,
orphans exposed to rape & abuse
The battle against ISIS in Iraq has devastated civilian lives, particularly those of children. While some have been reunited with surviving relatives, hundreds of them remain abandoned or in dire need of psychological help in Iraqi orphanages.
Over the past months, together with Iraqi and Russian authorities, RT has been leading a “Bring them home” campaign, focused on returning Russian speaking orphans back home. Some of the children, recognized by their relatives after being shown on RT, have already been sent to their families.
“We already managed to return six children [to Russia],” Iraq's ambassador to Russia, Haidar Mansour Hadi, told RT.
The ambassador explained that once children, whose parents are believed to have been killed while fighting in IS ranks are discovered, they are put in government run children’s homes in Baghdad, where “they are provided with the best services, looked after and given food, clothing and good caring until we find their relatives and they prove the kinship.”
There are several such children’s homes in the Iraqi capital, but the plan is to put all of those children in one home, so it is easier to coordinate the efforts of various government entities involved in the process and speed it up. Iraq is also in the process of setting up a database “to know exactly how many children, how many people the Iraqi government and the Iraqi embassy can help through diplomatic and legal channels, to return those children safely home.”
Just this week, two more children, whose parents are believed to be Russian-speaking, were brought into the orphanage in Baghdad. However, getting the new arrivals to open up and talk has proved to be a difficult process.
Mouhamed allegedly speaks a mixture of Russian and Arabic, but says nothing to reveal his identity. He has an injury on one of his knees.
Haddja says nothing at all. She is suffering from a wound to her ankle, in what appears to be a severe burn.
One of their mates said both children were brought into the orphanage at night, and she has not heard either of them speak Russian since. The team working on the ground is now trying to establish if the children are of Russian descent.
Many Iraqi children have endured more bloodshed and agony than most adults will in a lifetime. Children living in violent environments experience horrors which most others are not subjected to, such as destruction of their homes, the death of parents, siblings and friends. Those who end up by themselves are forced to make critical survival decisions at a young age to live through situations where they believe they will die.
“Nearly 90 percent of children have lost a member of their family – either they were kidnapped or killed. When they were escaping – they were shot at from behind, or fell on booby traps,” Aram Shakaram, from Save The Children, told RT.
Once found by authorities and brought to relative safety, the children require both psychological and physical help, support which orphanages in Iraq are struggling to provide.
“We are helping those children, certainly we don’t have enough resources. Children are almost everywhere,” Shakaram noted. “But ultimately, the support comes from family, from government and from extended family. Once we connect the children, everyone is keen to receive them and support them.”
The problem, as RT's Murad Gazdiev has found out in Erbil, Iraq, is making that connection with the lost relatives, especially since most of them suffer from psychological trauma and don’t talk much.
“As soon as a helicopter flies around, the children drop to the floor and cry. Some of them cry at night. Some fear when they see foreigners. Some fear when they see strangers. Some shut up and say no word for a long time, until they open up,” Maulid Warfa from the United Nations Children’s Fund told RT.
“It’s severe distress. And many of them are wounded – some of the hospitals we visit confirm that the biggest number of civilians they have in the hospitals are children,” Warfa added.
Previous studies of psychological problems in persons who have witnessed and experienced the horrors of war noted a wide range of conditions. Post traumatic stress disorder and various forms of anxiety disorders are most common, in addition to depression and prolonged grief disorder.
Helping children of foreign ISIS fighters find homes is no easier than helping Iraqi orphans reunite with loved ones.
“It is much better if foreign children were reunited with their families. They will have problems here – with documents, in schools, with healthcare. They need their families love,” the director of Mosul's orphanage, Tahin Ami, told RT.
Even those children who live with relatives are prone to abuse and various dangers of the war-torn country, RT has found.
“They are vulnerable to abuse. They are vulnerable to trafficking, they are vulnerable to any danger that children are exposed to,” Warfa noted. “With today’s technology, a bad group could go get those children and harm them.”
To protect them, Warfa says, social care workers teach them not to talk to strangers. Charities also try avoiding to needlessly show children on camera in order to protect their identities.
The Iraqi government is meanwhile trying to return children of foreign ISIS fighters back home, and is in the process of setting up a database to help the repatriation process, Ambassador Hadi told RT.
“There were terrorists from almost 100 countries, including from the US, Europe, and even as far as China, who we were fighting in Iraq,” Hadi said. “We believe there is probably more.” So far, about 500 children of those terrorists have been discovered in areas previously controlled by IS, the diplomat noted.
The ambassador also expressed hope that more countries will join Russia’s initiative to help return home the innocent children of their radicalized parents, who chose to die in Iraq fighting alongside the terrorist group.
“We believe that once we clear up all the areas and find [such] children there, more countries will come forward and contact us asking for their children back.”
Cambodian court imprisons Korean pastor for
sexual abuse of children
THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
PHNOM PENH, Cambodia (AP) — A Cambodian court has found a 63-year-old Korean man guilty of child sex offenses and sentenced him to 14 years in prison.
A spokesman for Siem Reap provincial court said Park Youl was found guilty on Thursday of child prostitution and sexual intercourse with girls under 15 years of age.
Cambodian newspapers, citing anti-human trafficking police, said Park was a pastor of a Christian church in Siem Reap in northwestern Cambodia.
The court spokesman, Yim Srang, said Park was also ordered to pay a total of $70,000 in compensation to seven of the nine known victims, and would be deported after serving his prison term. Two other victims did not request compensation.
Cambodia has a reputation as a haven for foreign pedophiles largely because of lax and corrupt law enforcement.
Jury retires in Kiwi caregiver sex abuse case
Hawkes Bay Today
The jury in the trial of a male caregiver alleged to have sexually offended against disabled and mentally impaired children in his care has retired to consider its verdicts.
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| Napier District Courthouse |
The man, who cannot be named, is standing trial in the Napier District Court this week for allegedly abusing children and youth with significant disabilities over the course of several years.
The man was charged with five counts of sexually exploiting a person with a significant impairment, six of rape, two of indecent assault and three each of attempted rape and sexual conduct with a child under 12-years-old.
Yesterday the charges were amended to reflect the evidence given; the defendant discharged on one count each of rape, attempted rape and sexual conduct with a child under 12-years-old. One charge of unlawful sexual connection was added.
Judge Bridget Mackintosh has summed up the week-long trial for the jury of eight men and four women this morning.
Judge Mackintosh told the jury it's only human to feel sorry for people who are disabled and have those challenges in their lives, and they can feel equally sorry for people accused in cases like these. However, there is no room for that in this case and they have to put aside any feelings of sympathy and prejudice, the judge said.
In her summing up, the judge told the court the Crown alleges many of the sex acts were committed by the caregiver in the family home and in vehicles when they were alone. She said the Crown have highlighted there is a pattern to the allegations - the complainants are all female, they were all in his care, they were all vulnerable, each described similar sexual acts and they were all told not to tell anyone.
The defence argue that the allegations are "absurd" and simply did not happen. The complainants were influenced by one child who was deeply troubled, and who was motivated by wanting to get away from the household, the judge said.
Judge Mackintosh said the defence claim the complainants were unreliable because of their significant impairments, and there was no opportunity for the defendant to carry out any of the alleged offending because the household was very busy with lots of people coming and going.
Prosecutor Jo Rielly closed the Crown's case on Thursday, saying the defendant must by his "very nature be opportunistic" as he would wait until the females were left in his sole care before he sexually abused them.
Ms Rielly said each of these defence witness's testimonies, while well-meaning, seemed "contrived" and asked that the jury consider the fact the alleged abuse happened in private when no-one else was around.
"It's clear that all of the defence witness love the defendant, care about him and respect him. It's also clear he has done a lot of good for his family and community over the years...but what I'd say to you is many otherwise-good people do bad things."
And pedophiles often appear to be very good people. It's part of grooming the community.
In his closing submissions defence lawyer Scott Jefferson cautioned the jury to check themselves if they started "feeling sorry" for the complainants in light of their impairments.
"You wouldn't be human if you hadn't some feelings of sympathy...but you can't apply prejudice to your determinations."
Mr Jefferson called numerous witnesses for the defence case who each told the court they never had never seen anything untoward about the defendant's behaviour towards those in his care.
The court heard the children entrusted in the man's care had very good lives, with birthday parties one had to see to believe, and that he cared for them like they were his own.
B.C. ruling that found ministry failed to protect
kids from sex abuse overturned
Laura Kane
VANCOUVER - A court ruling that found social workers in British Columbia failed to protect kids from sexual abuse by their father, which sparked widespread condemnation of the Children's Ministry and triggered an independent review, has been overturned.
The B.C. Court of Appeal has also dismissed a family court decision that found the father had sexually abused his children, ruling that the judge largely relied on evidence from an expert witness who misrepresented her credentials, and ordered the man a new trial.
Justice Daphne Smith, writing on behalf of a three-judge panel, found there was no evidence to support any of the mother's claims, including that a social worker maliciously tried to discredit her allegations of sexual abuse with police and child welfare staff.
She also tossed findings that the director of child welfare was reckless and negligent in allowing the father to have unsupervised access and that he sexually abused his toddler during those visits.
"There was no evidence that the social workers deliberately disregarded the interests of the children in favour of the father. Rather, the evidence is clear that the director prioritized the safety and well-being of the children," she wrote.
The mother's lawyer, Jack Hittrich, said his client was "shocked and completely disappointed" by the decision and that she has asked him to file leave to appeal to the Supreme Court of Canada.
She will retain custody of the children pending the outcome of the new trial in the family court case. None of the family members can be named due to a publication ban.
The father has never been criminally charged.
B.C. Supreme Court Justice Paul Walker issued both the decisions that were overturned on Thursday. He delivered the family court decision in 2012 and relied on evidence from that case to decide the mother's lawsuit against the Ministry of Children and Family Development in 2015.
The appeals filed by the father and the ministry were heard together over five days in November.
In the 133-page decision, Smith wrote that Walker accepted evidence in the family court case from Claire Reeves, the U.S.-based founder of an advocacy group called Mothers Against Sexual Abuse, who described herself as a licensed psychologist and an expert.
After posting the report on the link just above, I reported Reeves to the FBI, but have not so much as received an acknowledgement. It grieves me to think that she may still be operating as an 'expert' in the field of child sex abuse, when the only thing she is expert at is fraud.
However, Smith wrote, there were "obvious spelling errors" in her report and "red flags" that the judge and the mother's lawyer should have noticed. Reeves testified that she supported chemical castration for sex offenders, had done extensive media including with CNN but had declined a request to be on the Jerry Springer Show, and described herself as "Michael Jackson's nemesis," the ruling says.
Reeves did not interview any of the children or the father in reaching her conclusion that sexual abuse occurred, the ruling says, and her degrees were all obtained from unaccredited diploma mills that provide credentials for a fee without requirements for exams or study.
"Ms. Reeves knowingly misrepresented her qualifications to the court, was untruthful about her expertise, employment and court experience, and offered opinion evidence that was based on discredited science," Smith wrote.
Much of the opinion evidence brought by the mother was highly prejudicial to the father, distorted the fact-finding process and fundamentally undermined the fairness of the trial, and a new trial must be granted, the ruling says.
The judge's decision to roll most of the evidence from the family court trial into the civil trial created significant unfairness, the appeal court found, and findings against the ministry of misfeasance in public office, negligence and breach of fiduciary duty must all be tossed.
When Walker's ruling was released in 2015, it prompted outrage at the ministry and calls for action to be taken against social workers named in the decision. It led to a wide-ranging review of the child-welfare system by retired deputy minister Bob Plecas.
Plecas recommended boosting staff, funding and oversight, while also criticizing the provincial children's watchdog and a "culture of relentless accusation" where there is great appetite for blaming the ministry and workers for "perceived and real failings."
Child sexual abuse in Malaysia:
Is punishment deterrent enough?
By ADIB POVERA -
THE scene at the Sessions Court in Kota Samarahan, Malaysia, was rather busy as reporters swarmed the complex, waiting for an important proceedings last Friday.
It was on that very day judge Marutin Pagan ended a six-year-long torment of a teenager and her younger sister from a village in Tebedu, near Serian, through his verdict against the girls’ grandfather, father and two uncles.
He had sentenced the four farmers, aged between 26 and 57, to 335 years of imprisonment after they pleaded guilty to 13 counts of committing incest with the victims between June 1, 2011 until last month.
The victims’ grandfather, father and the third defendant, the sisters’ 26-year-old uncle, were sentenced to 25 years’ jail for each offence.
The victims’ other uncle, 28, who faced four charges of having sexual intercourse with the sisters, was sentenced to 25 years’ imprisonment each for the first two charges and 30 years’ jail each for the other two charges.
All jail sentences for all of the accused were to run concurrently from the date of their arrest.
The four were also slapped with 24 strokes of the rotan each.
The older victim, who is 19, is 26 weeks’ pregnant. She was 13 when she became the object of lust of her grandfather, father and uncles.
Her younger sister is 14. Both victims have been placed at two protection shelters, supervised by the state Welfare Department.
As the department turns its focus to help the victims overcome the traumatic experience, the authorities were again confronted with a similar case involving a Form Three student of a religious school in Saratok.
The teenager, 15, confided in her school counsellor that she was raped on seven occasions by her father for the past three years. The father was arrested and has been remanded until Friday.
Preliminary investigations into the case, which is being probed under Section 376B of the Penal Code for incest, however, revealed a disturbing detail — the mother of the victim, who was the only child in the family, knew of her husband’s heinous act. The woman claimed she turned a “blind eye” after she was threatened not to expose her husband’s wrongdoings.
Although there was no information how bad the threat was, the state’s statistics on domestic violence cases do not paint a good picture.
A total of 279 domestic violence cases were reported in 2015, and the figures drastically rose to 427 cases the following year. In the first seven months of this year, 323 cases have been reported.
The recurrence of sexual assault cases against children and teenagers by their own family members has sparked many arguments on social media.
Among the questions repeatedly asked was whether the present legislation is deterrent enough to set a lesson for others from committing the same offence.
Women, Family and Community Development Minister Datuk Seri Rohani Abdul Karim said she personally believed that no punishment was equivalent to the crime committed by sexual offenders against their kin.
“Personally, I don’t think the punishments stipulated in the present law are enough to punish these irresponsible people. This is irrational. How can they do this to their own children? I don’t know what to say, I am angered by this.
“We (the ministry) have carried out campaigns promoting good parenting and creating awareness of sexual crimes against children, but these cases still persist. I am baffled,” said the minister recently.
Nevertheless, Rohani said the government was doing everything in its power to punish offenders of sexual crimes against children. Such commitment, she said, was reflected in the setting up of a special court for sexual crimes against children in Putrajaya on July 4.
The court helps the prosecution team establish stronger cases against those accused of committing such offences due to the nature of the court. Similar courts will also be established in every state soon.
The state government has also conducted two surveys to look for ways to address problems relating to statutory rape cases and incest.
At this juncture, it is imperative to continue to educate children and teenagers about incest and sexual abuse. Children and teenagers need to be thought to be brave to discuss problems, which are not related to academic issues, with their teachers and counsellors so that they don’t suffer in silence.
Kota Samarahan, Malaysia
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