Abuse cases 'slip under the rug'
'STATE OF DENIAL' | Many educators who molest kids are allowed to quit, move on: experts
Chicago Sun Times
March 30, 2008
BY MIKE THOMAS Staff Reporter/mthomas@suntimes.com
It's an increasingly familiar scenario: An educator or coach, someone in a position of great trust, is accused of sexual misconduct with one or more students.
In Chicago, former Walter Payton College Prep basketball coach George Turner, 45, was charged recently with the criminal sexual assault and aggravated criminal sexual abuse of two 15-year-old female students.
If the allegations stick, the married father of two could end up in prison until he's 60.
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| George Turner (inset) had worked at Walter Payton College Prep for two years before he was fired Feb. 29. (Chris Sweda/Sun-Times/Courtesy) |
4.5 million abused, study says
But according to experts, many such cases never come to the surface.
"These cases tend to slip under the rug," said Terri Miller, president of the national organization Stop Educator Sexual Abuse, Misconduct and Exploitation. "They let teachers quietly resign and move on."
That's possible in part, she said, because state boards aren't required to report incidents to the U.S. Department of Education.
"One of the big problems is that you're in a situation where the acts by themselves are very private," said Chicago personal injury attorney Joe Klest, who has represented victims of sexual abuse by teachers and coaches.
"And even though they're involving minors, and minors can't legally consent, they are often groomed into consenting. So you've got two people -- one saying it happened, one saying it didn't -- and there's very rarely any extrinsic physical evidence."
In 2004, Congress released the results of a report it had commissioned on teacher sexual misconduct. Compiled by Hofstra University Professor Charol Shakeshaft, it concluded that an estimated 4.5 million of 50 million students in American public schools "are subject to sexual misconduct by an employee of a school sometime between kindergarten and 12th grade."
Frequency in Illinois unclear
In 2007, the Associated Press published the results of a seven-month-long investigation into educator-student sex abuse. Among other things, it found that few abusers are caught and that, overall, there is "a deeply entrenched resistance to recognizing and fighting abuse."
"It's a state of denial," Klest said. "I don't think administrators or whoever's in authority over hiring and firing want to believe the allegations against someone that they worked with -- or hired, for that matter."
The frequency of abuse in Illinois schools is unclear, and the Illinois State Board of Education could provide no figures Friday about how many teachers have lost their license because of sexual misconduct. The board also couldn't provide data on how often it happens. Chicago Police and the Illinois State Police have no statistics, either, as they don't keep track of sexual predators by job.
'Silent suffering' takes toll
Ultimately, Miller said, many victims are left with a lifetime of coping that involves drugs or alcohol. They're also at risk of becoming oversexualized, she added.
Klest is more hopeful.
"My experience has been that when the perpetrator is caught early on and society rallies around the victim, the victims do a whole lot better emotionally and psychologically," he said. "When the perpetrator is not caught or outed or in some way exposed, victims suffer in silence. And I think that silent suffering is what causes most of the damage."
Contributing: Annie Sweeney
