[Cool Teen Sites]
Women Who Rape
Source: (http://www.fathermag.com/news/rape/greenfield.shtml)
This site provides links and archived stories involving women who abuse males.
Boston Globe Western Massachusetts Brief
By the Associated Press, 02/26/97; 13:19
(PERMANENT ARCHIVE - Original Story Deleted by Source)
GREENFIELD, Mass. (AP) - A woman who formerly worked at a private school for troubled boys
in Wendell has been
released on $10,000 bail after pleading innocent to statutory rape charges involving a
14-year-old student.
Authorities said Ronda C., 29, of Brown Summit, N.C., was dismissed by the Lake Grove
School following her alleged
encounters with the boy in November and December.
She was arraigned in Franklin Superior Court on three counts of statutory rape.
Paul Palazzo, a state police investigator assigned to the Northwestern District Attorney's
Office, said the boy was under
the legal age of consent.
Headmaster Roland Paulauskas declined to comment on the case.
He said the school is for boys who have been charged with abusive behavior and sexual offenses. (!!)
Former area teacher sentenced for statutory rape of student
By KIM KOZLOWSKI - The Kansas City Star Date: 06/18/99 22:15
PERMANENT ARCHIVE TO PREVENT NEWS ARTICLE LOSS
FROM: (http://www.kcstar.com/item/pages/home.pat,local/30db130c.618,.html)
A Jackson County Circuit Court judge said Friday that Amy Rodriguez
appeared to be a good person who did some bad things.
Nonetheless, he sent the former Raymore-Peculiar teacher to prison for
having sex with a 12-year-old student.
Circuit Court Judge John Moran sentenced Rodriguez, 39, to 10 years on
each of three counts of statutory rape. The sentences will run concurrently.
Moran also ordered Rodriguez to attend a sex-offender treatment program
and requested a report in 90 days.
"I am responsible no matter what," Rodriguez told the judge. "What I did
was
wrong."
As an officer escorted Rodriguez from the courtroom, her teen-age son and
daughter wept.
Rodriguez had faced life in prison for taking a boy, one of her sixth-grade
students, to her Greenwood home and having a sex with him on three
occasions in the spring of 1998. She pleaded guilty in March.
Her attorney, W. Geary Jaco, had sought probation for his client. After the
hearing he said there was a slight chance that the judge would release her after
he read the 90-day report. Otherwise, Rodriguez is likely to serve at least
three years.
"She was glad that the judge allowed her to accept the responsibility," Jaco
said. "She was glad the victim and the family did not have to bear further trials
because of this, and she wanted to sincerely apologize.
"It was a good result for her, and justice was done."
Ted Hunt, an assistant Jackson County prosecutor, agreed. He added that
probation would have been inappropriate.
"This is rape," Hunt said. "I'm glad the judge recognized the need for
treatment. It's the proper sentence under the circumstances."
Before sentencing, attorneys called several witnesses, including the boy, now
13, and his mother.
The boy testified that he did not initiate the relationship. Rodriguez kept him
after class, gave him rides home and took him to a lake, he said.
"She told me to lie to my parents and say I was going to a friend's," the boy
said, looking down at times.
His mother told the court that Rodriguez posed as the parent of a classmate
so she and the boy could spend time together without arousing suspicion. But
the mother sensed something was wrong.
She notified school officials after she found romantic cards and letters.
"Whatever happens, our lives will never be the same," his mother said, her
voice cracking. "She's taken something from him he'll never understand."
Several people took the stand to vouch for Rodriguez.
Melvin Miller, a psychologist, testified that he had counseled Rodriguez for
about a year. She immediately took responsibility, he said, but it was several
months before she recognized the harm she had done.
Rodriguez, the last to take the stand, said she was ashamed of the humiliation
she had brought to the victim, his family, her family and the school district.
"I would like to ask these people to somehow forgive me someday," she said.
Woman Charged in Net Seduction of Boys
Accused of Going Online to Invite Minors Home for Sex
FROM: (http://www.apbnews.com/newscenter/breakingnews/2000/02/11/netsex0211_01.html)
Feb. 11, 2000 By Randy Dotinga
SAN DIEGO (APBnews.com) -- A 39-year-old mother of three wooed teenage boys over the
Internet and had sex with them at her home, police allege.
The suspect, Joyce Smith, was arrested Thursday after she surrendered to San Diego police.
She faces sex charges involving three boys, ages 14 to 17.
The case is apparently the first Internet-related underage seduction in San Diego
involving a female suspect and male victims, Lt. Bill Edwards said.
"It's a role reversal," he said. "Typically, similar cases involve a male
suspect and a female victim."
The investigation began when someone phoned an anonymous tip to a county child abuse hot
line about a month ago, Edwards said. On Feb. 2, police served a search warrant on Smith's
home and seized computer equipment and evidence that tied the victims to the scene,
Edwards said.
Boys allegedly served alcohol The alleged incidents occurred
during the last half of 1999, Edwards said. Smith allegedly talked to the boys in
Internet chat rooms and invited them to her home in the Mira Mesa neighborhood of San
Diego. There, she gave alcohol to the teens and had sex with them, he said.
"At this point we definitely have three victims, but we're concerned that there are
additional victims," he said. "So we're trying to get them to come
forward."
Smith has been charged with multiple counts of unlawful sexual intercourse with a minor.
The maximum sentence for having sex with a child under 16 is four years, according to
California law.
Played street games with youngsters
Smith was no stranger to youth culture, Edwards said. She participated in street racing
contests in her neighborhood that were popular among teens, he said.
Parents need to be more observant about their children's activities, especially what young
people do on the Internet, Edwards said.
"It's a great tool, but it's becoming harder to monitor and manage," he said.
Wednesday, April 29, 1998
Teacher accused of rape, sex offenses
FROM: (http://www.fayettevilleobserver.com/news/archives/1998/tx98apr/n29teach.htm)
By Michelle Brien
Staff writer
Sheriff’s detectives filed statutory rape and sex offense charges Tuesday against a
woman who taught ninth grade at the New
Hope Christian Academy.
Laurie Christine Rehrer is accused of having sex and committing other sex acts with a
14-year-old boy who was a student in
her class. One of the warrants charges her with taking indecent liberties with another
boy, who was 15. Rehrer, who goes by
her middle name, Christine, is 32.
She is charged with three counts of statutory rape, three counts of statutory sexual
offense, and four counts of taking indecent
liberties with minors. She was jailed with bond set at $75,000.
Sheriff’s detectives have been investigating the case about a week, said Maj. Ray
Davis, head of the detective division.
Warrants said the incidents occurred during March and April.
Carl Rehrer, who is Laurie Rehrer’s father and the principal and pastor at New Hope
Christian Academy, said she was
dismissed from her job on April 22, when he first heard the allegations.
“She’s my daughter, and I love her,” he said. “But when she was in
school I was not her dad. She got no special preference.”
Davis said the sex was consensual and occurred at Rehrer’s home on Ridge Road. There
was no threat or coercion, he said.
New Hope Christian Academy is affiliated with New Hope Baptist Church, which is at 3675
Rosehill Road. It is a private
school for kindergarten through 12th grades, and has operated for six years, Carl Rehrer
said. It has 182 students enrolled.
Rehrer said the school is a ministry, and provides scholarship money to students who
otherwise could not afford to attend.
Both of the boys named as victims in the warrants withdrew from the school, Carl Rehrer
said. One child had been enrolled for
three years, he said. The other child had attended the school less than six months.
Carl Rehrer said he had not talked with his daughter or to the two students about the
charges.
“All we had was the accusations,” he said. “I just gave back to the
Lord.”
Detectives arrested Christine Rehrer at her home about 5:45 p.m. Tuesday. She refused to
talk to reporters as detectives led
her to the magistrate’s office.
She appeared nervous, and wrung her hands as she waited for the elevator. She wore red
sweatpants, a white, red and black
plaid shirt and a baseball cap. She had to take off the hat when she appeared before a
magistrate. She answered his questions
with a barely perceptible nod.
The magistrate said that if she posted the $75,000 bond, she would not be allowed near
either of the boys named as victims.
Carl Rehrer said he could not afford to post her bond.
Christine Rehrer has two children. Her father said he was caring for the boys.
Court records showed no previous convictions against Christine Rehrer.
She is scheduled to make her first appearance in court today.
Published Wednesday, October 14, 1998
Foster Mother Charged with Rape
By ALIAH D. WRIGHT / Associated Press Writer
From: (http://www.gac.edu/~kchampio/femsex.html)
Permanent archive to prevent news article loss.
PALMYRA, Pa. (AP) -- A 33-year-old woman who bore a child with her 13-year-old
foster son has been charged with having sex with the boy more than 100 times since he
was 7 years old.
Esther M. Boyle, who was arraigned Tuesday, confessed the relationship to a doctor
whom she was seeing because she had stopped having her periods, authorities said.
According to an affidavit, she believed she was going through menopause.
When her doctor told her she was pregnant, Ms. Boyle was reluctant to reveal the father,
but eventually admitted that it was a 13-year-old boy, according to court papers. The
doctor and a social worker reported the incident to Lebanon County Children and Youth
Services, who notified detectives.
About three weeks later, Ms. Boyle gave birth to an 8-pound, 2-ounce boy. Officials say
blood tests confirmed nearly a 100 percent chance that the baby is the teen-ager's son.
Authorities would not say who is now taking care of the 2-month-old infant.
Ms. Boyle was charged last week with one count each of rape, statutory rape, involuntary
deviate sexual intercourse, indecent assault, corruption of minors and two counts of
endangering the welfare of children, according to Lebanon County detectives.
Her lawyer, William Sturm, had no comment this morning. She waived her right to a
preliminary hearing Tuesday before District Justice Lee Lehman and was released on
$25,000 bail. She is now in a psychiatric facility in Lewisburg, Lehman said.
Detectives said Ms. Boyle admitted to police that she began "a sexual
relationship" with
her foster child about two months after the boy was placed in her care.
The boy was "very detailed as to what had occurred sexually with Esther Boyle,"
according to affidavits in the case. The boy was adopted by another family in July 1994,
but the pair continued to have sexual intercourse and oral sex during visits at her home
from last November to this April, court documents said.
The boy was placed in Ms. Boyle's care through the Philadelphia-based Children's
Choice, a private child-care agency that has placed 526 children in New Jersey,
Maryland, Delaware and Connecticut. In April, another Children's Choice foster mother
was arrested in Bear, Del., for beating 5-year-old twins in her care with an electrical
cord
and spoon.
Agency founder Carolyn Eberwein said all foster care applicants go through an extensive
screening process that includes a "childabuse clearance and a state police
criminal"
background check.
After children are placed in a foster home, follow up visits vary, she said but are done,
"based on the intensity of the need of the child."
Ms. Boyle's case is similar to several recent cases that garnered national attention.
In September, a 35-year-old New York woman was sentenced to five years of probation
and designated a level one sex offender after she pleaded guilty to raping a 14-year-old
boy whose child she bore. Before that, Mary Kay Letourneau, a suburban Seattle
teacher, was jailed for having a sexual relationship with a 13-year-old student whose
child
she bore.
Ms. Letourneau reportedly became pregnant again by the boy while out on parole. She
was arrested again and is serving a seven-year, five-month prison sentence.
Woman Charged With Statutory Rape of Husband
Had Sex With 13-Year-Old Before Marrying Him
By Amy Worden apbnews.com Aug. 23, 2000
FROM: (http://www.stirling.u-net.com/asex20.htm)
Permanent archive to prevent news article loss
CONYERS, Ga. (APBnews.com) -- A 21-year-old woman is charged with statutory
rape after giving birth to a child she conceived with a 13-year-old -- who she has now
legally married, authorities said.
Summer Jessica Strickland could face a maximum sentence of 20 years for having
sex with Tony Goss, who is now 14 years old. The couple married earlier this month,
only weeks after she gave birth to their baby.
The charges are based on an Oct. 10 sexual encounter in which their child was
conceived, said Rockland County Sheriff's Lt. Mike Ransom.
Law enforcement officials were notified by the Department of Family and Children's
Services following the birth of Strickland's child in July, Ransom said.
Strickland was arrested Aug. 17 and was released later that day on $5,000 bond,
authorities said.
'There is no case'
Prosecutors argue that just because the two are now married does not make their
earlier sexual encounter legal. In Georgia, having sex with anyone under the age of
16 who is not a spouse is considered statutory rape.
Authorities said there is no age limit on marriage with the consent of the child's
parents.
"There is no case," said Strickland's attorney, Sal Serio, who declined to
elaborate,
saying there were "privacy issues" involved.
Authorities said the only thing unusual about this case is that it involves a woman
and a teenage boy. "It's common when the tables are turned and it's an older
male,"
said Ransom.
Outdated, conflicting laws?
Legal scholars say the case raises compelling issues about sex and society today.
"You have two [conflicting] policies here protecting underage minors from having
underage sex and a policy of keeping families together," said Linda Elrod, a law
professor at Washburn University in Nebraska who specializes in family law. "I'm
not sure a sex act should put someone in jail so that they can't raise the child they
created."
Elrod said there was a related case in Kansas that considered whether a 16-year-old
boy should have to pay child support for a child he fathered when he was 12. "You
have public policy against people too young to form consent."
She said she would not be surprised if the case raises challenges to what may be
considered outdated statutory rape laws.
"In many states you have a mature minor provision that allows minors to have
abortions without their parents' consent," said Elrod, adding that sexual acts should
be given the same legal consideration.
Introduction:
FROM: (http://www.stirling.u-net.com/amclaire.htm)
Female paedophiles are possibly society's darkest secrets. Reviled for crimes against
nature or simply
ignored as though their actions are unthinkable, very little is known about them and even
less done to
help them. Transition Place pioneering centre for women child abusers, but it's patients
have always
been too wary to give interviews. Now, for the first time, they have chosen to speak out -
to Marie
Claire - and discuss their lives frankly, with Jonathan Green.
To other parents Minneapolis's downtown 19 bus, the mother with her baggy patterned
clothes and
frizzy hair, smiling and joshing with their children, made them smile. They would grin
conspiratorially at
her, sharing the bond of motherhood, happy that another mother was taking an interest in
their
children. Yet Shelley hid a dark secret that none of the other parents could possibly
suspect. "All these
sexual fantasies were going through my head when I was talking to the children," she
admits, in her
gentle Midwest- American accent. "It was very sexual for me."
Shelley, a single mother, had her own son. He, too, had become 'not a child, but an
object,' she now
admits. Her maternal instincts had become warped and sexual. Shelly, 41, is not sure when
it started,
but it was probably when she tried to needlessly breast feed him at the age of eighteen
months. She
would later beat him when he refused. Over time her sexual urges became increasingly
powerful and
the sexual abuse escalated, taking many forms. "I would have him lay on top of me or
on my breasts,"
she says. "I would put my finger in his rectum and suck on his penis," At this
point her son, Troy, was
three years old.
At first, the abuse was confined to her son, but soon it centred on other children too.
She was asked to
baby-sit regularly for her best friend's one-year-old son. "I had to change his
diaper and as soon as I
opened it, and he became playful, it began," she says. "I started to fondle his
penis, then all of a
sudden I stopped and thought, "why am I doing this?"
Her reasons for abusing children, particularly her son, are complex. "He was the one
thing in my life
nobody could take away," she says. Troy's father left before he was born. "I
just wanted to be loved
and held and the only way I knew how to get that was to have sex even with a kid. It was
like an
addiction," she says. "I felt as if I were a monster and there was nothing I
could do to stop it."
Although she is recounting events that happened fifteen years ago, tears roll down her
cheeks.
On the banks of Mississippi in the heart of Midwest, Minneapolis is where middle America
comes to
purge itself of it's addictions and psychoses. Locals joke that the Minnesota State number
plates,
which proudly says that it is the state of ten thousand lakes. It should say it's the
state of ten thousand
treatment centres. Alcoholics Anonymous was started here and paved the way for Minneapolis
to
become the centre of not only Alcohol and Drug centres, but a world wide centre for
counseling and
therapy.
Inside an unassuming block in the south east of the city, which also houses lawyers and
small
businesses, is Transition Place, a pioneering clinic where society's ultimate taboo is
dealt with. The
women who are being treated there have been offered large sums of money to talk in the
past, but
have instead chosen to speak for the first time, to Marie Claire, out of a desire to
encourage
awareness of the issue.
A room of peculiar ordinariness, with an atmosphere of a well heeled dentist's waiting
room, is where
female sex offenders, such as Shelley, receive treatment for abusing children. One of
them, Nancy, a
matter of fact woman in her early forties, was demonised by the US media for encouraging
her fiancé,
Steve, to sleep with her 17 year old mentally retarded daughter so that she could bear
them a child.
Nancy, who has got children from different fathers, has a typically complicated story,
although she did
not sexually abuse her child herself. She admits she felt "ugly and worthless"
after a history of failed
relationships. She was also terrified that she would lose Steve, because she had had a
hysterectomy
and could not have any more children herself. It was Steve's own daughter who told
classmates what
was going on and the police were called. Steve was eventually sentenced to fifty two
months in prison,
Nancy was jailed for six months and the seventeen year old has since had an abortion and
is in
protective custody. "I just didn't think about the consequences," Nancy says
now.
The prosecuting authorities view these women as the devil, says Jayne Matthews, a
psychologist who
has made female sex offenders her life's work. She has treated seventy women since opening
the clinic
in 1992. When she began her research in 1985, her work was met with derision, if not
outright
aggression.
Challenging the idea that only men are sexual predators was not easy. When we gave talks
on this to
women's groups, some would just walk out. And we had problems with feminists who claimed
that
women were victims, not abusers.
Ruth, 48, an articulate ex-school teacher is another of the centre's patients. She reviled
in her local
town after appearing on the front page of the regional paper eight times for abusing a 16
year old girl
who became her foster daughter. Ruth taught at the local high school and had special
responsibility for
looking after trouble makers. Among them was Claire, who had been sexually abused by her
entire
family and came to rely on Ruth as confidante. At the same time, Ruth was being treated
for severe
depression. Her own marriage was in difficulties - her husband worked away from home,
leaving her to
bring up two young children alone. Claire eventually ended up moving in permanently with
Ruth and
her family. It was at this point that Ruth first crossed the line.
"We would sit on the couch and she would want to hold my hand as she told me things
about her
childhood", says Ruth. "We would cry and become very touchy feely and then we
became more
involved sexually. Initially it felt good, like any teenage sex, but afterwards I would
feel really guilty. I
would ask her and she would say it was okay," Ruth admitted that she instigated the
sex.
They first had full lesbian sex when Claire was 16. Some nights, Ruth would even leave her
marital bed
to creep into Claire's room for sex. I was the adult and should have known the boundaries,
but being in
the vulnerable position I was in, I didn't," she says. "I was enamoured with
this person and this caring
overflowed the boundaries. She was maybe looking for a friend of her own age and because
of my own
vulnerability, my mental age may have matched hers."
Ruth grew up in a stable middle class family and had no lesbian inclinations She denied
she'd ever
been interested in sex with children "I never bought nudie magazines or
anything." She can only say
now, "I guess we just loved each other." Eventually the sex stopped, but
thirteen years later, Claire
decided to speak out about her abuse. In a bizarre and sordid twist, it became apparent
that Ruth's
husband had also had sex with Claire. The case went to court and Ruth and her husband were
both
sentenced to a year in jail. Despite everything, in addition to being ordered to pay their
victim $38,000
and coping with other legal debts, they have managed to stay together. Both have lost
their teaching
posts and are now working in menial jobs. Ruth says; "There is no rationalising why
we did what we
did. We knew we were the bad guys and it wasn't right."
According to Jayne Matthews, the women who commit these crimes can broadly be divided into
three
categories. One is the teacher/lover who has had unsatisfying sexual relationships with
adults and finds
a child whom she can mould through sex into the partner of her dreams. There are also
those who are
predisposed to abuse because they themselves were abused as children, and finally, there
are those
who are coerced into the behaviour by a male. Yet coercion is far rarer than is commonly
imagined.
Most women, like Elsie, act on their own. A single mother in her early forties, she was
recently
released after serving four years in prison. She is clearly nervous recounting a story she
knows will
repulse. Her son Daniel, was ten and, like other youngsters, scared of thunderstorms. One
night, he
crawled into her bed as a storm battered their apartment. 'I was in a half-asleep and
half-awake state
and I had sex with him.' says Elsie. The next morning, her son didn't react at all,
leading Elsie - who
was then working as a call-girl and spending most of her time drunk or high - to wonder if
she had
abused him before without even remembering it.
She had a history of unsuccessful relationships and her life was a mess. 'I started taking
everything
out on my son even my sexual frustrations'. she admits. The abuse continued for years.
'When I didn't
have anybody in my life my son became a substitute. At first I couldn't believe I was
capable of it and I
would drink or pill it away so that I felt it didn't happen." She saw Daniel as an
equal. "He was never a
child to me," she explains. "He was very much the man about the house. I don't
remember him
resisting and he was always very protective of me and would hate it when other men came
here. A lot
of it was loneliness and wanting to be loved. He was totally accepting of me'.
During this time, Elsie also had sex with a thirteen year old friend of Daniel's. Despite
all this, she
believes it was never a child thing she suffered from. "My sexual fantasies don't
revolve around
children," she insists. "All I knew was that if you love somebody, you have sex
with them"
Elsie, like many female sex offenders, had herself bee the victim of abuse as a child. She
grew up on a
farm in California, where her alcoholic step father repeatedly raped her over a number of
years,
starting when she was seven. At the age of eleven, when she'd threatened to tell her
mother, he made
her watch him kill the rabbit she had been given for Easter , and then laid it out on the
kitchen table.
He'd threatened to cut her throat in the same way if she told anyone. Another time, he
broke her
ankles when she struggled to avoid his advances and told her mother that she had fallen
down the
stairs. There was a brief respite at the age of thirteen when he got her pregnant. He took
her on a
business trip and paid a man $50 to abort the foetus in a hotel bedroom. The abuse started
up again a
few months later, but to Elsie's relief it came to end shortly afterwards when he died.
When Daniel was fourteen, he was sexually molested by a stranger in the local swimming
pool.
Interestingly, his mother insisted he prosecute. The subsequent trial saw the man
convicted but
afterwards, Daniel confessed that he couldn't see what all the fuss was about, "My
Mom does it to me
all the time," he confided. Being caught was a relief for Elsie. Her mind no longer
clouded by drugs or
alcohol, she began to see the full horror of what she had done. "I'd become the
monster my stepdad
was," she says. "The best thing that ever happened to me was getting arrested
and going to prison,
and realising I had choices," she says now. "If that hadn't happened, I know I
would still be doing it,
and abusing drugs and alcohol, to this day. I was on the road to destruction and I was
taking my son
with me."
She was convicted of first degree criminal sex conduct and sentenced to sic years in
prison. Her son
was taken into protective custody and, to spare him a public trial, Elsie pleaded guilty.
Sadly, but
unsuprisingly, the cycle of abuse is continuing, with Daniel, now twenty, facing criminal
charges for
abusing his younger female cousin.
Elise knew she was doing wrong. At times, she contemplated giving Daniel up for adoption.
"I spoke to
him recently and he said maybe I didn't make all the right choices, but he understood
where it came
from." Despite everything, he said I was still his mother and he loved me," she
says, tears trickling
own her face.
Shelley, the woman from the Minneapolis school bus, was also abused as a child. She was
thirteen
when her father made her pregnant. The first she knew of it was when she began bleeding
and
miscarried. "I wanted to die," she says. She made numerous suicide attempts and
her only respite was
staying with her grandparents in the school holidays. When she confided in her
grandfather, he
sexually abused her too. She began taking drugs and drinking too much and was in a hostel
for
alcoholics when she started abusing her son, Troy. She began to hit him so he would cry
for her
attention. "I wanted him to need me," she says. "I thought, well, my dad
got away with it so I will too."
Finally, Shelley confessed to her therapist, who informed the authorities, and child
protection officers
interviewed Troy. "I thought, what would a three year old remember?"
"Afterwards I say the report
and was devastated. He remembered everything and even things I don't remember doing.
The case against Shelley was not enough to send her to prison, but as she began treatment
and Troy
was taken into protective custody, she remembers thinking, "I was bringing him up
with the same
abuse I had. How did it start and how did I end up here?"
Michelle is another woman who suffered abuse at home before sexually abusing a child.
Michelle had
been kept as a virtual prisoner in her family home, allowed out to go to church and
school, until she
was finally rejected by her mother who had a new boyfriend top concentrate on. At
nineteen, Michelle
went to live with nearby family friends who had other foster children in their care. She
became close to
twelve year old Jamie and her sexual abuse consisted of having regular oral sex with him
until she was
caught and jailed for 6 months. Now on probation for 20 years, all she can say, sadly, is
that she fell in
love with him.
Victims of female sexual abuse have to suffer in silence, often more than those abused by
a man,
because either no one believes them or they think no one will. Abusers also think that
there's no help
available. But of the seventy women Jayne Matthews has treated since 1985, only one has
gone on to
re-offend and all the women in this article categorically denied they had any interest in
re-offending.
The depths of the problem are only just beginning to be probed. No evidence has yet been
found of
women who target a number of children to abuse in the way that many male paedophiles do.
But as
Jayne Matthews says, "I think they're out there." "It is probably only a
matter of time."
Some of the names in this article have been changed
U.K.
Home Truths
In Britain as in the US, the abuse of children by women is a crime that goes largely
unacknowledged,
statistics show negligible numbers of women child abusers, yet the evidence from experts
tells a
different story. Here Marie Claire launches a campaign to raise awareness of the issue
Elizabeth
Udall, reports.
Culturally, women are seen as nature's nurturers. Yet significant numbers of women abuse
their
position of trust, causing a serious trauma that will affect a child for the rest of his
or her life. So why
can we not accept that women sexually abuse children?
Of the sixty-six thousand prison, only three thousand are women, and the Home Office
estimates that
only twenty of those are convicted sexual offenders. Home Office statistics show that in
1997 (the most
recent figures available), one 166 men and six women were accused in Magistrates Courts of
gross
indecency with children. Of this, 40 men and none of the women were found guilty.
However, Eileen Gallagher, a psychotherapist working at the NSPCC's child sexual abuse
consultancy
in Manchester, says that there has been a steady rise in the number of female sexual
offenders in the
United States, and we're going to see more and more women abusing here, too. The Rose West
case
made the female sexual abuse a very public issue and that prompted many victims to come
forward.
And professionals are finally getting better at seeing it, more willing to hear about it.
Michelle Elliott, the author of 'Female Sexual Abuse Of Children' (£19.99, The Guildford
Press), who
works for the charity Kidscape, says, "Statistics show that it rarely happens, and if
no one has
reported it, then the theory is that it doesn't happen." Some of those who do come
forward feel it
necessary to pretend their abuser was a man. As Elliott explains, "What is disturbing
is that by
surpressing discussions and acknowledgement of female sexual abuse, people have been
prevented
from disclosing it, for fear of going against established opinion." Yet those who
have been attacked by
their mother, stepmother or grandmother are some of the most damaged people she has ever
seen.
ChildLine reports that of nearly 11,000 calls received over the last year, 660 were from
children
claiming abuse by their mother alone. The figure almost doubles when sisters, aunts and
female
acquaintances are taken into account.
Styal Women's Prison in Cheshire has recently launched the first accredited programme in
England for
female sex offenders. The aim is not only child protection, but also to understand the
woman as a
victim. A spokesman for the prison says it has undertaken four studies that variously
estimated that
between 50 and 100 per cent of paedophiles have been abused themselves.
Peter Saunders, of the National Association for People Abused in Childhood, estimates that
around 10
percent of abuse victims go on to abuse others. And each of those to abuse 100, to 200
children
themselves, and they in turn will do the same it's like cancer. I had a letter from a
woman in her late
50's with her elderly mother, who had only just felt able to go to the police about the
horrendous
catalogue of abuse she had suffered at her mother's hands. There are a lot of people
walking around
with that burden. Marie Claire's campaign to raise awareness is so valuable, the last
thing abusers
want is exposure, and society needs to take every aspect of this issue on board. So much
more can be
done to make the world a safer place for the children of today and tomorrow.
Victim's Story.
Julia, 32, was abused by her babysitter when she was small. Here, she tells Sharon Mayers
how she
coped with her ordeal.
"I don't remember much about my childhood, but my memories of the encounters with the
18 year old
babysitter who sexually abused me are still vivid. My mother trusted her implicitly and
she babysat for
us several times a month from as far back as I can remember. We always thing of sex
offenders a
oddballs, but se didn't seem weird. I remember her being slim and attractive, with dark,
curly, shoulder
length hair. Her parents were close friends with mine.
"The first time it happened I was only 4 years old. I was watching television with my
9 year old brother
and my sister, who was 7. Suddenly, the babysitter said, it was time for bed and took me
upstairs. I had
my own room, and she sat behind the door so no one else could come in. I felt frightened
and confused.
Out of the blue she said, "I want you to lick me"
My memory is blurred but I was crying as she forced me down. I remember the taste being
revolting
and I gagged. Afterwards she sent me into the bathroom to wash my mouth and then she
handed me
some Smarties. She spoke to me about special relationships and secrets, saying that I
mustn't tell and
that no one would believe me anyway. But I knew it was naughty and not right. After that
"our secret"
became a regular thing. I would get upstairs ad start crying as soon as she arrived, but
my mother
would just say, "Don't be silly."
The abuse went on until we moved 100 miles away wen I was six. I never told anyone. I
assumed I'd
get in trouble and no one would believe me. It was only when I was 14 and saw ChildLine on
TV that I
realized I wasn't alone. I told my sister, who admitted that the babysitter had also made
her play
games with her breasts, throwing plastic rings to see if they would land on her nipples.
But as far as
she could remember, it hadn't gone any further.
On one occasion, when I was 19 I had to go to the babysitter's house, by this time she was
34 and
married with 2 children. She seemed very embarrassed and avoided my gaze. I felt somehow
empowered by her awkwardness but at the same time sickened.
It took one year before my Mum found out. I needed to get rid of the guilt and fear and
let everyone
know. My mother immediately tried to ring the babysitter's family, but they'd moved away.
My mother
still finds it hard to talk about it. She feels really guilty.
I was lucky enough to marry my childhood sweetheart, but obviously our sex life was
affected. I would
get flashbacks, seeing her face, which made me feel inhibited. He was very understanding
and
eventually we sorted out our problems. He works for the Police Family Protection Unit and
often deals
with abused children, so it has given him even greater awareness.
What frightened me most when I became a mother was that the cycle can continue, with
victims
becoming the abusers. I was relieved when I realized that I loved my son simply as a baby
and didn't
have any fantasies about him. But in the back of my mind I'd watch my husband and friends
to see if
there was anything suspicious when they played with him. I was much more relaxed with my
second
child.
I still don't understand why she did it. Women are mothers., carers and protectors. Yet it
goes on. All
we can do is be aware and do our best.
The victim's name has been changed.
Woman Accused of Sex With Teens Lured Them From Bus Stops With Booze, Porn
Cops Say By Lisa Holewa A.P.B. News March 17, 2000
From: (http://www.stirling.u-net.com/asex01.htm)
Permanent archive to prevent loss of news article
TAMPA, Fla. -- A woman accused of befriending teenagers at a school bus stop and
then bringing them home for sex faces new charges, and police believe there are
more victims out there.
Police say Patricia Burmeister, 32, seduced the boys and girls, ages 12 to 15, by
allowing them to skip school, drink alcohol and watch pornographic movies at her
Tampa home.
"She befriended them by allowing them to do ... all the things that society and their
parents would not allow them to do," police spokesman Joe Durkin said. "And then
she committed the lewd and lascivious acts. Without going into the details, some of
these things she did with these kids are just disgusting."
Burmeister was arrested and charged earlier this week with performing lewd and
lascivious acts on a child, unlawful acts on a child, contributing to the delinquency of
a minor and providing alcohol to a minor. Those counts involved six adolescent
victims, Durkin said.
Charged with abusing own child
Police filed additional charges Thursday after finding three more young victims,
Durkin said.
Burmeister also was charged with one count of child abuse involving alleged physical
abuse of her own 4-year-old daughter. She also has a 9-year-old son, Durkin said.
The children have been removed from her home and placed with relatives.
"Right now, there's nothing to indicate her own kids were involved in the lewd
acts,"
Durkin said.
Burmeister was released from jail after posting bond Tuesday night but was jailed
again after the new charges were filed. She remained behind bars today in lieu of
$94,000 bond.
'All shapes and sexes'
The investigation began after police received a tip from a concerned adult, Durkin
said. Their investigation is ongoing, and police say there may be more victims. Other
charges related to the current nine victims also may be filed, he said.
"The shocking thing to some people is that this is a woman," he said. "But
it's not
just adult males that are out there snatching kids. Abusers come in all shapes and
sexes."