ENGLISH
FOR
CONGRESS POSITION PAPER (Revised January 2012)
The
problem of child abuse is far more serious than most people
know. One-third of girls and one-fifth of boys will be
abused before they reach age twenty. Most of the
abuse is conducted by individual perpetrators not affiliated
with any group or organization. However, about 4,500
pedophile priests have been identified in the Catholic church,
which has deliberately ignored, denied, and attempted to
cover-up the problem until the magnitude of abuse in Boston was
exposed in 2002. The average pedophile has about 100
victims during his career: multiplying this number by 4,500
means that there could be as many as 450,000 victims of
pedophile priests alone over the past fifty years. Over
half of the bishops in this country have known and deliberately
transferred pedophiles from one assignment or parish to another,
thereby spreading the contagion of abuse. About $1 Billion
has already been paid out by the church to victims, with another
$2 Billion in future settlements estimated to be
paid. Over 50 suicides of victims of clerical sexual abuse
have been recorded.
State Attorney Generals have attempted to deal with this
criminal behavior, but the problem is national and a national
response such as the Lindbergh law that was passed to deal with
kidnapping is needed. The lack of attention from the
Congress and the U. S. Department of Justice about the issue is
inexplicable: if there had been child abuse of similar magnitude
in the boy scouts, there would have been a national uproar with
Congressional hearings resulting in the probable loss of the
organization's national charter and the abolition of many boy
scout troops. (In fact, the boy scout organization has a
very effective child protection program in place.) Instead, the
Department of Justice (DOJ) is going after suspected cases of
internet child pornography: those responsible for this behavior
need to be investigated, but what and whom else is DOJ's
internet surveillance also monitoring? Why isn't it
pursuing the known pedophiles in the country that are being
shielded by their employers? Is the DOJ's pedophile
internet surveillance program merely a cover for widespread
illegal snooping into private citizens lawful electronic
correspondence?
I propose that a joint Congressional commission be established
similar to the Keafauver Commission that was authorized fifty
years ago to investigate the extent and activities of organized
crime to investigate the problem of child abuse nationally and
propose legislation to deal with this problem. In cases
where perpetrators have been shielded by others, those who have
covered up or enabled perpetrators to continue with their
criminal activities also should become liable for prosecution
and punishment similar to drivers of getaway cars in bank
robberies. "Lindberg Law" companion legislation to
authorize the FBI to investigate child abusers' relocation
to other states to escape justice is needed. In situations
where tax exempt funds have been used to pay legal fees of
perpetrators, hush money or award settlements to victims, income
taxes should be levied on the organizations paying the fees or
awards. The costs of pedophilia are not a legitimate
charitable expense that should continue to be subsidized through
tax exemptions by the rest of society. The DOJ's internet
pornography surveillance program should come under the most
rigorous Congressional scrutiny to insure that illegal
monitoring of lawful private electronic communications also is
not being conducted.
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Designed by Imad-ad-Dean,
Inc.