By Kathryn Snodgrass
WHIZ-TV
January 7, 2008
http://www.whiznews.com/tv/article.php?articleId=20219
An area woman who says she was molested as a child by a priest spoke publicly for the first time today.
Twenty-eight year-old Beth Rocker says she was abused by a recently suspended priest at a church in Lore City, Ohio.
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Rocker filed a formal complaint today with the Guernsey County Sheriff's Department about the sexual abuse she endured over a three-year period from 1989 to 1991 that started when she was just 10 years old.
Rocker says her main reason for coming forward today is to put a stop to the abuse and help prevent another child from becoming a victim.
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"It's a horrible thing and kids have a difficult enough time just dealing with everyday school pressures, drugs, violence, sex, everything that's out there in the world, they don't need people of ministry coming and doing things to them, so it needs to be stopped," said Beth Rocker, abuse victim.
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Member of the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests urge those who have been abused to come forward and report the crime no matter how many years ago it happened.
"A lot of times survivors don't even think of it as being a crime, a lot of times it happened when they were young, they didn't even know what was going on to them and they are so isolated so many times that they don't dare tell anybody a lot of times they don't tell anyone in their family, they don't have to, they don't even have to report it to the diocese," said Judy Jones, Southeastern Ohio SNAP Director.
After Rocker reported the case of abuse to Steubenville Catholic Officials, the priest accused of abuse in the case was suspended from his assignment in November.
The Guernsey County Sheriff's Department is investigating the case.
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