The Worst Story You Will Read This Week, or Maybe, This Year

Virginia is taking a credible run at Alabama for

the worst state in the union for child sex abuse

2 sentenced to combined 108 years in prison for sexual abuse of children in Rockbridge

By Laurence Hammack

LEXINGTON — When social services workers finally removed a 3-year-old girl from her home of squalor and sexual abuse, she was wearing just a diaper, covered in dirt, her hair a matted mess.

Nearly 4 at the time, she could speak only two words. One was the name of her 8-year-old sister, to whom she clung almost constantly. The only other word she had learned to use was “no.”

“She was a feral child; that’s the only way I could describe her,” Peggy Sigler, a caseworker for the Rockbridge Area Department of Social Services, testified Tuesday.

Sigler’s description of the girls’ home life — and the profound impact it had on their early childhood — came during hearings in which two family members were sentenced to a combined 108 years in prison for repeatedly molesting the two girls.

Social Service Failure

As disturbing as the sex crimes were, the case also pointed to lapses at a social services department that had been asked to investigate conditions in a mobile home park where the girls lived in the remote Arnold Valley section of Rockbridge County.

A special grand jury investigation of the department concluded last month that the agency’s Child Protective Services unit took action only after repeated pressure from the county sheriff’s office, which became concerned about the home after responding to a neighbor’s call.

But with the grand jury unable to bring charges against any social services employees, attention turned Tuesday to Robert Eugene Clark and his half-sister, Samantha Simmons.

Rockbridge County Circuit Judge Anita Filson sentenced Clark, 39, to 65 years in prison on nine counts that included rape, aggravated sexual battery and taking indecent liberties.

Simmons, 30, was sentenced during a separate proceeding to 43 years on 11 counts that included aggravated sexual battery, sodomy and endangerment of a child. Authorities say a third family member, who has since died, also took part in the sexual assaults.

“There’s no other way to describe this than as a family orgy,” Chief Deputy Commonwealth’s Attorney Jared Moon said.

Describing the case as the most disturbing sex crime he has encountered as a prosecutor, Moon called for sentences that would keep Clark and Simmons behind bars for the rest of their lives.

In an effort to protect the victims’ identities, The Roanoke Times is not naming them or including details of their family relationships with the two defendants.

Unbelievably awful lives

Living in two mobile homes within a stone’s throw from one another, the two girls were subjected to filthy, bug-infested conditions and the whims of incest in a family that spanned three generations of sexual abuse.

“They were taught to perform sexual acts more so than they were taught to brush their teeth,” Moon said.

In September 2015, when Sigler approached the home to investigate reports of child abuse that had twice been ignored by her department, she found what she called deplorable conditions — preceded by the stench of urine and feces and confirmed when she stepped on a kitten that she first took for dead.

“There was clothing, papers, trash, feces and cockroaches everywhere,” she testified. “You walked in the home and the cockroaches would literally jump on you and crawl all over your body.”

When she opened the refrigerator, Sigler found cockroaches swarming over the food that was inside.

The children were removed from the home and placed in foster care. While they are doing much better with a family that plans to adopt them, both girls still show signs of the abuse they endured.

Now 5 years old, the younger of the two victims shows signs of developmental disorders that have prevented her from entering kindergarten. She can identify just one color, purple, and has yet to master the most basic of words and numbers, according to testimony.

Victims of child sex abuse are often voiceless. This seems to make that statement inadequate.

When she spoke shortly after being removed from the home, it was in gibberish that could only be interpreted by her older sister. The girl was prone to screaming and would stay up at night crying.

“She had no ability to verbalize what she was scared of or why she was screaming, but she was clearly fearful of something,” Lindsey Stocks, a family services worker who counseled the child, testified.

Despite what one attorney called “subhuman” conditions in the home, Rockbridge social services workers were slow to respond to complaints from concerned neighbors.

A former supervisor at the agency refused to enter the reports into a computer system as required by state policy and told caseworkers not to be bothered with the case, according to the special grand jury’s report. The Roanoke Times is not naming the supervisor because she was not charged with a crime.

“We don’t do it that way … because that’s the way I want it,” the woman reportedly said when asked to explain her inaction.

The former supervisor, who was accused of shredding some reports of child abuse that were made to the agency, also expressed little sympathy for the plight of the two young girls.

“They’re used to living that way so what’s the big deal?” she was quoted as saying in the grand jury report.

It was only after the children were removed from the home, and the older girl confided in her foster mother and counselor about what had happened there, that authorities brought charges against Clark and Simmons.

Intergenerational incest

Attorneys for the brother and sister said their clients were victims of sexual assault by family members long ago.

Unfortunately, incest often becomes intergenerational.

Having endured sexual assault by two male family members, Simmons was reduced to a “quivering rabbit” unable to recognize the severity of her actions, defense attorney Mark Claytor said.

“Deviancy to her became the normal,” Claytor said. “It was as if she took a step outside of her body, saw this happening before her, and was powerless to stop it.”

Simmons did not testify Tuesday. Although Clark did, his account did not amount to a full confession.

“I ain’t denying it, but I don’t remember because I’ve got a short memory,” he said when pressed on details during a cross-examination by Moon. “I’ve hit my head so many times on stuff that I can’t remember half of the stuff I do anymore.”

According to evidence presented by defense attorney Thomas McPherson, Clark suffers from mild mental retardation, has not held a job because of his disability, and is incapable of living in an unstructured setting.

In fact, Clark said he likes it just fine where he is, in the Rockbridge Regional Jail.

“As long as I have a roof over my head, a bed to sleep on and three meals to eat, I’m happy,” he testified.

“I want to get out someday,” he said from the witness stand, shortly before hearing his sentence from the judge. “But the way it looks I won’t be able to get out just yet.”

Arnold Valley, Rockbridge Co., VA

Group Breaks Silence About Sex for Tsleil-Waututh Youth

Passing the Feather trains youth to facilitate conversations about sex and sexual exploitation

By Rohit Joseph, Megan Devlin, for CBC News 
Cheyenne Hood started a program called Passing the Feather at Tsleil-Waututh Nation. It’s a series of workshops that train youth to offer guidance to peers about sexual exploitation (Megan Devlin)

"I've never really asked them questions about 'the birds and the bees,'" he said.

The 19-year-old thinks his parents could have been uncomfortable because of the history of residential schooling in his family. He doesn't pry.


Lexus George thinks his parents could have been uncomfortable talking about sex because of the history of residential schooling in his family. (Megan Devlin)

As a result, the young member of the Tsleil-Waututh Nation got his first introduction to sex in high school, when a teacher entered the room wearing condom on her head to demonstrate its durability. Now, he says he doesn't want to stay silent when he has kids of his own.

"I'll try to tell them everything I know, how to stay safe and protect themselves. I want to make it fun too… so maybe I'll try putting the condom on my head," he chuckles.

But silence between parents and kids around sex is common at Tsleil-Waututh — a tight-knit community of just over 500 people in North Vancouver. Many suggest the hush stems from grandparents sexually abused at residential schools.


Residential school legacy

Hundreds of Tsleil-Waututh and Squamish Nation children were boarded at St. Paul's Indian Residential School until it closed in 1958.

"Everybody in my parents' generation from Tsleil-Waututh went to residential school," says Luke Thomas, 50, Tsleil-Waututh's Family Programs Coordinator.

Luke Thomas, 50, says he grew up receiving negative messaging around sex and sexuality from his parents, who were both residential school survivors. (Megan Devlin)

Thomas says when he was growing up, his parents — devout Catholics — only spoke of sex in terms of sin.

"If you had sex before you got married, you were going to hell. If you had sex for anything other than conceiving a baby, even after you were married, it was still a sin," he says.

Residential schools did more than cast a shadow on consensual sex. Sexual abuse at the hands of priests and nuns inflicted intergenerational trauma.

Indigenous people are still disproportionately affected by sexual exploitation — 60 per cent of sexually exploited youth in Vancouver are indigenous, and sexual violence is a recurring theme in Canada's missing and murdered indigenous women cases.

But, one woman at Tsleil-Waututh is determined to change that.


'I didn't need to be a 34-year-old grandmother'

Cheyenne Hood calls herself an outlier at Tsleil-Waututh. The 41-year-old mother of three says she's atypical in the community because she made a point to talk to her kids about sex.

"Knowing what I know about statistics about teen pregnancy, I felt like I didn't want my kids to go through trial and error," she says. "I didn't need to be a 34-year-old grandmother."

'I think that the vulnerability level is extremely high

in First Nations communities for exploitation.'

- Cheyenne Hood, Tsleil-Waututh Nation

Hood is the Nation's housing manager, and found she has a knack for writing proposals. This year, she helped secure funding for a new program called Passing the Feather that trains youth workers to talk to youth about sexual exploitation.

"I think that the vulnerability level is extremely high in First Nations communities for exploitation," Hood says. "The layers are so deep and there's so much to dissect."


Focus on sexual exploitation

Passing the Feather's name comes from the idea of a sharing circle, says iris yong-pearson (who prefers not to capitalize her name), a youth worker with Peernet BC, who serves as the group's facilitator.

"In many indigenous cultures, they use the talking stick or passing the feather to give each other space to share our stories," she says. "This project is about sharing our stories and holding space so that we're able to talk about a really tough topic."


Passing the Feather members discuss a presentation on sexual exploitation in the Tsleil-Waututh elders’ lounge. (Megan Devlin)

Spotting CSA predators

But Passing the Feather is more than just talk. It's a series of workshops that gives youth the tools to spot predatory behaviour and offer guidance to peers about sexual exploitation. 

yong-pearson gets kids in the door by selling them on the concrete facilitation skills they'll learn for future careers as youth workers. She motivates them to open up about sexuality by framing the conversation with a purpose — helping potential victims of sexual exploitation.

She uses conversation cue cards to train them to open up conversation about tough topics. Listening exercises help them handle disclosures from peers. Guest presentations give youth background knowledge of the risk of sexual exploitation in Vancouver.

The group is building toward a multimedia workshop about sexual exploitation for the Tsleil-Waututh community. They're hoping to have it ready by June.


Let's talk about sex

Hood isn't sure youth heading into the workshops will understand what "sexual exploitation" even means. But by the time they're done, she hopes, they'll recognize what she calls "a long colonial history of sexual exploitation"


Cheyenne Hood's deep roots in the community have drawn youth from all over the North Shore to the program. (Megan Devlin)

"Being taught from generation to generation not to talk about sexual abuse and to be ashamed of it… that's where some of  the [hesitation] stems from," she says.

She doesn't expect grandiose changes immediately—but hopes to spur a gradual cultural shift.

"For the first time kids in this community are going to have the opportunity to say the word 'sex,'" she says. "Being realistic, my greatest hope is just to initiate the beginning of the conversation."

You are doing a great thing, Cheyenne. I hope all First Nations pick up on your example, it is so desperately needed. You are my hero today; God bless you!