Prominent community members not often caught for abuse

By Ben Meiklejohn
Courier
March 21, 2015

http://courier.mainelymediallc.com/news/2015-03-19/Front_Page/Prominent_community_members_not_often_caught_for_a.html

SOUTHERN MAINE – For victims of sexual abuse, the process of healing can take years, even decades. And some survivors may live the remainder of their lives without reaching closure.

Children who are molested are taught by abusers to keep secrets. Or they are told they will be in trouble if they reveal what happened.

These are just some of the challenges faced by sexually abused children, said Julia Davidson, a sexual assault response team program manager for Sexual Assault Response Services of Southern Maine. Davidson said she and her co-workers help survivors at all stages – by being in the hospital immediately after an incident or guiding a person through the trial process. The organization works to help survivors reach their goals, including providing access to mental health services and helping law enforcement officials prosecute abusers.

Davidson said many people call the SARSSM hotline and disclose their abuse for the first time. The most important for any person to whom abuse is being disclosed by a victim, said Davidson, is to believe them.

“The first thing we do is we tell them that we believe them and that what happened is not their fault,” Davidson said. “What we know from our work is that a primary indicator of long term public health is that a youngster is believed and supported when they try to disclose for the first time. When they're told to get over it and move on … keeping it secret can cause longstanding trauma.”

“We shouldn't make assumptions that someone is not a survivor,” she added. “We should always be questioning those folks who are questioning survivors. That's the way we talk about changing culture.”

Statistically, Davidson said the rate of false reporting sex abuse is very low.

“Sharing that fact with people is very important,” Davidson said. “These processes are horrible. People don't do it for fun or revenge.”

Matt Lauzon, a 30-year-old Biddeford native, recently disclosed publicly, and on Facebook, that he was molested as a boy. Lauzon alleged that a former Biddeford police officer, Stephen Dodd, drove him into the woods and abused him. When Lauzon asked Biddeford Police Chief Roger Beaupre and Mayor Alan Casavant for an assessment on whether police did enough to protect underage males from abuse, prominent members of the Biddeford community criticized him.

Davidson said the best way to engage a survivor who discloses abuse is to be his or her ally, direct them to resources and not be judgmental.

“Not to ask 'why' questions – 'Why did they respond in the way they did? Why didn't they fight back?'” Davidson said. “Online conversations can evolve into this.”

Davidson said men often don't disclose their abuse as boys until many years later because there is a social stigma of male sexuality that creates a barrier to disclosure.

“People think their sexual orientation will change, which is not true,” Davidson said. “They think there is something wrong with their masculinity, or wrong with their sexuality. We often see boys disclose as men, and they often become addicted to drugs and alcohol.”

Lauzon said it is harder to trust the justice process when the abuser was a police officer.

"I personally have experienced feeling too intimidated to speak up and I think it's hard for non-victims to understand what it feels like be sexually abused, especially by a police officer,” Lauzon said. "Rationally, I understand and appreciate that the vast majority of police officers are amazing people that put their lives on the line every day for us. I feel very fortunate to live in a country overwhelmingly policed by great men and women. However, imagine how it feels to live your life if you have been abused by someone whom you had been taught is the absolute safest kind of person you can trust. Do you think you would have the confidence to come forward and trust the system and process if you felt like you might be re-abused in the process?"

Davidson said people in positions of power are less likely to get prosecuted and held accountable because they have more social protections around them.

“A perpetrator can be any person … but people of low-income or of color are more likely to get prosecuted because they have less social protections around them,” Davidson said. “The thing about social power – look at (retired Penn State football coach) Jerry Sandusky – it took so many years for anyone to disclose and be listened to. It took a snowballing effect where multiple (victims disclose abuse). It almost has to get to that point before it will be taken seriously.”

Davidson said taking on an abuser who holds a position of power is a daunting undertaking for a victim.

“I've heard it a million times – they want to know the process to take on a corrections officer or former mayor or professor who is well-loved,” she said, “and their whole community supports (the abuser). When people turn on law and order, they get an incorrect message about what will happen. It's baffling. It's as if they're not really in trouble.”

And children who are abused by respected community members have difficulty trusting people in those positions, she added.

“We see these folks grow up not trusting police officers, teachers, social workers,” said Davidson. “With religion, if they were assaulted by clergy members, it's not only a violation of their body and rights and consent, but their spirituality, too. If it's an army-level assault, it's an attack on their patriotism.”

Davidson said people who abuse children have access to consensual sex, but thrive on having power and control over their victims. Child molesters participate in a form of “grooming behavior,” she said, where they will initiate a relationship by making the child feel special.

“They give them candy or let them smoke cigarettes,” Davidson said. “They look for children they have more access to.”

In time though, Davidson said the perpetrator will “work very, very hard to make the victim scared of them, scared of reporting.”

Davidson said before she started working for SARSSM, she thought the only sexual abuse that happens is what she read about in the newspapers.

“Sex abuse and sex violence are really common. It happens much more than people think,” Davidson said. “What is rare is prosecution and perpetrators being held accountable.”

Davidson said when people like Lauzon come forward to speak about abuse, they may be saving other children from being abused, because most perpetrators will continue to abuse if they never get caught.

“It's important to remember that they might be stopping future victimizations, of people who don't have a voice of their own.”