--------------- FIDO MESSAGE AREA==> TOPIC: 210 VICTIMS/FALSEACC Ref: D2L00000Date: 02/16/96 From: CLARA BOGGS Time: 02:25pm \/To: RICK THOMA (Read 1 times) Subj: Re: Testify Vs. Not On 13 Feb 96 12:51pm, Rick Thoma wrote to Reid Kimbrough: RT> * Forwarded from "CHILD_ABUSE_ISSUES" RT> * Originally by James Mackay RT> * Originally to All RT> * Originally dated 12 Feb 1996, 10:07 RT> I am curious to read if there have been any studies done to determine RT> the long range impact of a child testifying in court for sexual/physical RT> abuse. In particular the comparison of how well children recover if RT> they do testify against their abuser, or if they do not testify (for RT> various reasons). RT> If anyone has such a file online or can recommend a book which covers RT> this topic I would appreciate it. Rick, Your post was to Reid, but perhaps you can forward the following to the original fellow asking for the effects of testifying or not on children. On the internet site of witchhnt (no "U"), there are _many_ professionals working in and around this subject. They can either directly answer the question, citing sources, or direct him to books, if he prefers. If this person has an internet provider, he can subscribe (free) to witchhnt thusly: Send email to: listserv@mitvma.mit.edu In "subject" line, type: subscribe witchhnt In "text" area, type: subscribe witchhnt I have only one confusion about it: whether or not it's necessary to type one's name in the text area after "subscribe witchhnt" I wound up doing it both ways, and one worked: i.e., with no name in text (the return address name may suffice). hope this helps. Blessings from Clara T. * Evaluation copy of Silver Xpress. Day # 45 * Silver Xpress V4.01 --- Maximus 2.01wb * Origin: The Health Center (1:106/2223) --------------- FIDO MESSAGE AREA==> TOPIC: 210 VICTIMS/FALSEACC Ref: D2L00001Date: 02/16/96 From: CLARA BOGGS Time: 02:25pm \/To: RICK THOMA /ALL (Read 1 times) Subj: Question To All What is Your Opinion? Most of you here know something about my daughter, Kriseya's case. That she was falsely accused (as a "tag-on") of the fatal abuse to her baby, which was done by the father, secretly, and about which she knew nothing. We have gone through more than 3 years of legal mazes, double- talk, and further insults by the "system." Most attorneys in Reno, NV, who know of Kriseya's case, know she is innocent and was used by the former D.A. as a re-election boost. I ask myself, why can't I just write to ALL the district judges, the state Justices, to All government people involved and say something like, Our daughter is INNOCENT, and we demand a full investigation of the wrongful prosecution which led to her conviction and imprisonment. The system, under color of "process" delays justice. Instead of *investigating* a victim's claim of innocence, the system decides cases based on the errors made upon the first errors resulting in wrongful prosecution: surely not the most intelligent or reasonable way to find out whether or not someone is truly innocent. ************************ That's roughly what burns inside me to shout to those in the system who hold our innocent people hostage to a bankrupt, obviously flawed legal system. I've been told that if I say such things, I'll only anger those august "honorables" who play God with people's lives without God-like skills. I see the sense in this because I've observed up close that many of these "impartial" guardians of "Truth" are slaves to their own egos and prejudices. If we have no people in these positions who honor Truth and Justice above their careers or egos, we may bow and scrape in vain for Justice. I suppressed myself when the lawyers said not to go the media, and now wonder if I was misled. The system suppressed me because when I wrote to the district judge directly, my letter was returned unread to the attorney, claiming my communication was improper. Friends urged me to keep quiet lest I make it worse for my daughter. I have not complained about the many insults and injustices my daughter has suffered while incarcerated because I've known that others who complained had reason to be sorry. I'm speaking my heart. In this forum, I trust that I'm doing so with people I can trust to a greater degree than those entrenched in the system. I do not want to hurt my daughter any more than she has already been hurt, and for this reason, I've been cautious, asking for input, inviting opinions, trying to weigh everything I should. Why should I not speak aloud like this? Clara T. Boggs, a mother who is outraged, usually calm, succumbing today to pure instinct to defend her young. * Evaluation copy of Silver Xpress. Day # 46 * Silver Xpress V4.01 --- Maximus 2.01wb * Origin: The Health Center (1:106/2223) --------------- FIDO MESSAGE AREA==> TOPIC: 210 VICTIMS/FALSEACC Ref: D2L00002Date: 02/16/96 From: RICK THOMA Time: 08:59pm \/To: JAMES BOLICK (Read 1 times) Subj: ONLINE RESOURCES > Rick, I've not seen you mention it, so I will. :) Please do. :)-~ > Have you seen an electronic database called "Front Page News"? > It's one of the few electronic resources the public library > has here. Haven't seen it. Is it something we can access via modem? I did spend some hours searching the Net for similar resources. What I found was that Landmark Communications, which owns the Virginian-Pilot and the Ledger Star, maintains an archive of newspaper articles which is fully key-word searchable. Sorry, the HTTP address is not something I have handy, but it ought to be "findable" via a number of Net searching tools. I think these folks ought be nominated for an award for providing this service free of charge. --- FMail/386 1.0g * Origin: Parens patriae Resource Center for Parents 540-896-4356 (1:2629/124) --------------- FIDO MESSAGE AREA==> TOPIC: 210 VICTIMS/FALSEACC Ref: D2P00000Date: 02/19/96 From: RICK THOMA Time: 02:46am \/To: ALL (Read 1 times) Subj: Failure to teach & Protect * Forwarded from "LEGAL_LAW" * Originally by Richard Donovan * Originally to All * Originally dated 17 Feb 1996, 23:52 from the NYT, Sat, 2/17/96 pg 25 A Failure to Teach and Protect How A School for Child Welfare Workers Fell Apart Nearly a decade ago, at a moment when NYC was seized with anguish about child abuse, an academy was opened in Queens to train workers responsible for investigating cases of neglect and abuse. The new school had its own multimillion dollar budget and was expected to be a model for the rest of the country. "There was a great deal of excitement and hope," recalled Susan Notkin, who had drawn up the city's plan for the school, the James B, Satterwhite Academy in Jamaica. [ part of Queens ] " There was a sense that within the walls of that school something serious was going to happen." But caseworkers, city officials and foster care providers say that the Child Welfare Administration's academy quickly became a victim itself. The spotlight faded, administrations changed, budgets were cut, union concerns intruded, and as a result meaningful training standards were never enforced. " The history of the training academy is a classic case of a government response to a problem, a response that was allowed to degrade because of negligence after the heat disappeared," said Comptroller Alan G. Hevesi, whose office has conducted several critial audits of the academy. " The academy was allowed to fade into oblivion." Its staff of 76 trainers shrank over a decade to just half a dozen last year. Something trainers said that teaching new recruits about handling paperwork grew to be emphasized over diagnosing abuse. Entire classes of caseworkers were hired, even though many failed the academy's nonbinding test at the end of training. Training was limited to 20 days, and the initial aim of having caseworkers and their supervisors return for additional instruction was effectively abandoned. 2 recent cases of child abuse have again put the school in the spotlight. The beating deathy of 6 y.o. Elisa Izquierdo and the apparently botched casework involving a badly abused 11 y.o. Brooklyn boy have contributed to the scramble to repair the city's child protection system. Early this month, Guiliani administration officials quietly met with members of Mr. Hevesi's office to address the question of training. The effort could well result in formal legislation, Mr. Hevesi's staff aid. And under the legislative proposals now being discussed, the school could finally be required to undergo indepedent accreditation and oversight. Child protective workers might be required to be certified by examination at the end of their training and probation. The story of the academy, created in the aftermath of Lisa Steinberg's death at the hands of Joel Steinberg, is one of crisis-driven policy, good ideas, bad planning and mized messages. The potential prrice of the failed project, many child protection professionals say, is obvious: poorly trained caseworkers ,aking mistakes in delicate but often life-decising investigations. A recent study of the city's foster care system by a women's advocacy group found that from 1990 to 1994 reports of abuse or neglect that became active cases fell to 12,000 from 25,000. The number of cases in Family Court in which the city tried to have a child removed from a family tumbled to 9,50 from 18,000 during those years, and experts agree that only a portion of the decline could be attributed to the elimination of the state mandate requiring children born with drugs in their system automatically come under the city's care. The numbers have caused critics to question the competence of the academy-trained caseworkers, people who for many years were not screened, needed only a college degre and did not have to take a bidning test at the end of their training. 1 former supervisor, who spent years working in the agency's Bronx field office, said the caliber of graduates varied wildly. " The worst of the caseworkers was extraordinarily bad - unable to spell, to write sentences, : said Cathy Gross, who spent a decade at the CWA. " And there were some seriously troubled, dysfunctional people. They were the people knocking on the doors of others and asking how they were treating their children. You had to ask yourself: What is this madness?" Few dispute that academy trainers were often qualified and dedicated, and that the training was effective for at least some caseworkers. Guiliani administration officials, while acknowledging their own budget cuts and buyout retirement packages had exacted a toll on the academy's staff, said that improvements had been made. In the last several months the training staff has grown to 18, and city officials say prospective caseworkers are now being screened more carefully. In fact, in the last month the previously nonbinding test has been used to fail several recruits. " I don't think the deterioration of the academy was something consciously allowed to happen," said Barbara Blum, a former head of the CWA and a current member of Gov. George E. Pataki's Commission on Child Abuse. " But training is always inadequately funded. The academy came to be perceived as not being critical to protecting children. It is hard to believe that could be so." ... " It was started as a political answer to a scandal - it was public relations," said Linda Schleicher, a spokewoman for the union that represents the Child Welfare Administration's caseworkers and supervisors. " From the outset, the place was buffeted by budget cuts, experienced people leaving, a lack of interest on the part of the child welfare agency itself." ... In November 1994, the average score on the multiple choice exam - 1 that had been purged of its most difficult questions - was 66. One particular exam question underscores the problem. Asked before their training began to indetify the best techniques to be used in interviewing children, 75 % of the Nov. 1994 class answered the basic question correctly. After 20 days of training, varely 50 % of the class answered the same question correctly. ************* A SAMPLING OF TEST QUESTIONS given to caseworker recruits at the CWA Training Cener ( nonbinding): 1. A 10 year old child's injurt requires a thorough assessment to determine if it is accidental or non-accidental. Which of the following is MOST LIKELY to be an indicator of non-accidental abuse? a. A patch of scaly red skin on the hand. b. Bruises on both sides of the face. c. Fracture of a wrist. d. Black and blue marks on knees and sjins. 2. In interviwing a child, it is most important to: a. Engage the child by being warm and empathetic. b. Be at eye level with the child. c. Use plain, simpl language and ask the child if he/she understood. d. All of the above. 3. A family that has recently experienced a sexual abuse incident may typically exhibit all of the following EXCEPT: a. Denial behavior b. Disntegration of the family system. c. Feelings of shame or guilt. d. The perpetrator acnowledging and accepting responsibility for the act. ANSWERS: 1 - b 2 - d 3 - d ... Injustice fights with 2 weapons - force & fraud. --Cicero --- FMail/386 1.0g * Origin: Parens patriae Resource Center for Parents 540-896-4356 (1:2629/124) --------------- FIDO MESSAGE AREA==> TOPIC: 210 VICTIMS/FALSEACC Ref: D2P00001Date: 02/19/96 From: PHIL BLANSETT Time: 09:11am \/To: ZAYNAB RICHMOND (Read 1 times) Subj: Convention on Rights of C ZR>Subject: Rights of the Child Op-Ed There is much more substantive and proper work being done in the House and Senate of our country on the Rights of Parents. The "Rights of the Child" although fuzzy and feel-good on the surface, directly opposes the fundamental rights of parents to raise their children. ZR>This treaty resonates well with national dialogue This treaty resonates with the double talk heard by liberals and N.E.A. "experts" who have brought us a failed school system, the highest rate of teenage suicide, the highest teen murder rate, the largest number of incarcerated juveniles in the world, the largest number of juveniles committed to mental institutions in the world, and the largest number of failed marriages. ZR>Rather than infringing on the rights of parents, the Convention actually >strengthens parental rights. Its provisions are binding for governments tha >ratify it, not for individuals within the states. The "convention" directly infringes upon public, private and home school methods of controlling behavior of children. And, here is how it is done: ZR>U.S. ratification would require our government to assess >and report regularly on the condition of our children Parents would be even more subject than at present to losing their children if they employed corporal punishment. Homes would be open for inspection and assessment as regular reports are made to the very people who have brought us a failed public school system, and a failed juvenile justice and rehabilitation system. >As a direct result of the reporting process of >the Convention, Sudan has announced its intention to abolish flogging of >children. Flogging is a hot-button word used by those opposing spanking of children. England has discovered it is currently under condemnation because the government has not imposed severe sanctions against PRIVATE schools in England which still spank students. But this so-called "rights of the child" directly opposes the many supreme court decisions upholding the parents' right to impose corporal punishment on their children. * QMPro 1.51 * Behavior Modification in HomeSchool BBS:615-860-3044 --- WM v3.10/93-1207 * Origin: KERYGMA BBS Nashville (615)860-3044(FIDO) (1:116/160) --------------- FIDO MESSAGE AREA==> TOPIC: 210 VICTIMS/FALSEACC Ref: D2P00002Date: 02/19/96 From: JAMES BOLICK Time: 11:23pm \/To: RICK THOMA (Read 1 times) Subj: ONLINE RESOURCES RT> > Have you seen an electronic database called "Front Page News"? > > It's one of the few electronic resources the public library > > has here. RT>Haven't seen it. Is it something we can access via modem? Around here, no. I'm not sure about a more urban area. It is a service in our public library and college library that put's newspaper articles on CD from 26 different sources. It allows full keyword searches and saving the articles to floppy. Here, the service is free, and really has some useful stuff. It is updated with a new CD quarterly, and the library keeps the older CD's on file. Although not accessible online here, it is worth an occasional trip to the library. RT>I did spend some hours searching the Net for similar resources. What I foun >was that Landmark Communications, which owns the Virginian-Pilot and the >Ledger Star, maintains an archive of newspaper articles which is fully >key-word searchable. >Sorry, the HTTP address is not something I have handy, but it ought to be >"findable" via a number of Net searching tools. I think these folks ought b >nominated for an award for providing this service free of charge. I'll find it. :) Blessings, james --- QMPro 1.52 I just had a mental breakdown. Got any jumper cables? --- QScan/PCB v1.19a / 01-0661 * Origin: Synergistics * Hickory, NC * 704-294-6675 * (1:3666/106) --------------- FIDO MESSAGE AREA==> TOPIC: 210 VICTIMS/FALSEACC Ref: D2R00000Date: 02/20/96 From: RICK THOMA Time: 05:04pm \/To: JAMES BOLICK (Read 1 times) Subj: ONLINE RESOURCES > in our public library and college library that put's newspaper > articles on CD from 26 different sources. It allows full keyword > searches and saving the articles to floppy. Rockingham County Library, the largest of consequence in my area, is planning several such additions, including Net access. Alas, this won't come to pass until such time as they move into a newer building. The local college won't allow public access to the computers by virtue of an, in my opinion, insane provision of their "standard" contract with West, Lexis, et al. Have you collected a number of these articles yourself? If so, I'd be happy to make some arrangements to make them more readily available to others. :) --- FMail/386 1.0g * Origin: Parens patriae Resource Center for Parents 540-896-4356 (1:2629/124) --------------- FIDO MESSAGE AREA==> TOPIC: 210 VICTIMS/FALSEACC Ref: D2R00001Date: 02/21/96 From: REID KIMBROUGH Time: 11:07am \/To: VALERY FROSTY (Read 1 times) Subj: Michigan VOCAL Valery, Noticed your message dated 2/11/96 on the lack of VOCAL in Michigan. This is from my state data files and I do not know if these people are still active r if the phone numbers are still good. I do have last names and in some cases, addresses, but prefer not to provide them without permission. In any event, here's some info that may help: - Craig B (ex-policeman): Group was/is VOCAL orientated, called Protecting Parent's and Children's Rights at (616) 621-4402. - Joette O: Group was/is Families United Not Divided. Was once listed as a VOCAL group in Wayne County at (313) 846-9496. - Linda D: Was listed as VOCAL in Berrien County at (616) 545-2434. Did much work with her about 7 years ago regarding a self-proclaimed "expert". - Sharon B: Was listed as VOCAL at (313) 261-9749. - No names available but these have been listed as VOCAL groups: Bay County at (517) 684-3482, Cass County at (616) 684-2508, Ingham County at (517) 482-7533, Kent County at (616) 676-1092, Wayne County at (313) 388-4054. Good luck, Reid Kimbrough--- * Origin: 411 The Information BBS - Sanford,Fl - (407)323-0025 (1:363/77) --------------- FIDO MESSAGE AREA==> TOPIC: 210 VICTIMS/FALSEACC Ref: D2T00000Date: 02/21/96 From: VALERY FROSTY Time: 09:25pm \/To: ALL (Read 1 times) Subj: Support Needed Hello Everyone, I am writing this message on behalf of a friend of mine, Ann Smith. She and her husband are going through a really bad time right now. Ann would like to write, but she is afraid, and she does not feel comfortable with it yet. She is going to be reading messages though. Most of you (except for the new people) know about my son Daryl. Well Ann and her husband have a son about the same age, and he is very much like Daryl. In fact, the two boys were friends shortly before all the cr@p happened in both families. While in a psychiatric ward, Ann's son made false accusations of abuse against his parents. CPS put him in foster care (against the advice of the psychiatrist). The boy then claimed his father sodomized him repeatedly and regularly over a period of many years. Medical exams provide absolutely NO EVIDENCE to back up the claim. (Note: The boy weighed less than 100 pounds when this allegedly took place!!! There WOULD have been evidence IF it really happened!) Ann and her husband have been put through h@ll. CPS took their little girl away, and yesterday, the father was arrested based on the false allegations of sexual abuse. He is in jail now and will be arraigned today, after being assigned a public defender. I would appreciate it so much if some of you would send a message to Ann letting her know that she's not alone. She feels very isolated and her life has literally been ripped apart. She needs a lot of support. I was with her until 1:30 AM last night, setting her up on a BBS and showing her how to use it. Needless to say, I will be giving her as much support as I can. Perhaps sharing your own stories again will help her too. I believe in these people 100%. They have my FULL support. I have spent a great deal of time with them and I know them to be honest and kind people. They are welcome in my home anytime, and I trust them 100%. I know I didn't need to say all that, but after all we've been through I still feel the need to vindicate myself and those that I care about. Well, I better run. It's time to get ready for court. I'll keep you posted as things progess. Thank You! Val ... Child Savers-Another name for the SS and we know what happened there. ~~~ ReneWave v1.00.wb2 (unregistered) --- Mankind = One Family * Origin: Family Rights Advocacy Online (510) 439-0712 (1:161/19) --------------- FIDO MESSAGE AREA==> TOPIC: 210 VICTIMS/FALSEACC Ref: D2T00001Date: 02/22/96 From: ZAYNAB RICHMOND Time: 10:06am \/To: PHIL BLANSETT (Read 1 times) Subj: Re: Convention on Rights of C PB> ZR>Subject: Rights of the Child Op-Ed PB> [.....] PB> ZR>This treaty resonates well with national dialogue PB> PB> This treaty resonates with the double talk heard by liberals and N.E.A. I posted that text file to inform people of it, and not to argue about it. Zaynab --- Renegade v10-05 Exp * Origin: Family Rights Advocacy Online (510) 439-0712 (1:161/19)