The LA Times investigation:
http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-boyscouts-20120805-m,0,5822319.story

I don't know about y'all, but it's too damn much to read (triggering) in one sitting. And the link to some of the actual documents is worse. Note that the Keith M. Gardner file is a "vampire" report.

And the kicker is that this is just the tip of the iceberg.

The full, complete "ineligible volunteer list" is currently being scanned and digitized to be put online and searchable by perp name -- should be online in the coming months.

I'm sure one of us will have a link, right? Laying bets on my perp's name.

No surprise perps would work to circumvent a system that had been set up to keep them out, or that they could often succede in the era before computers and telecommunications made counterring them more possible.

Though flawed, I am glad they made the effort.

The schools and the foster care system back when this started can barely be said to have acknowledged there to be a problem.

For reference, in the local troop where I grew up there was a group of larger boys perping the litler ones. They didn't go after me but some of my johns when I was doing sex work had been abused there.

I'm expecting my abuser to show up as a serial abuser.

Puffer

that was my story. us younger ones got "initiated" by the older, bigger, more experienced boys. at the time i saw them as huge men - but they were only a few years older than me. meanwhile the adult leaders were nowhere to be seen - off having a few beers or whatever. my parents said they sent me to scouts because it was supposed to "make a man of you" - i don't think it worked that way.

and i'm sure none of the boys' names will ever show up on a Scout list of perps. i doubt it ever got reported. we were too desperate for acceptance.

lee

This was similar to what went on in my troop. Sometimes there was no adult leadership. Then a perp became the leader. Abuse was rampant. The other scout troop in town was lead by an abuser.

I have noticed several months ago that two of the older boys in my troop were listed as offenders in the same general area.

Puffer

I hope the database goes back to 1959!

John

maybe i should check it out - maybe some of the older scouts went on to become leaders and perps themselves. can't help but wonder - if it might have been a tradition that was passed down and how far back it went?

Reuters reports today that the timeline on the full database going online is "three to four weeks." Mark your calendars.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/09/16/boy-scouts-face-release-o_n_1888838.html

Again, another conflicting report on how far back the files go. Some reports have said 1919, but this report says 1965.

*

More news on this:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/steve-sieb...;comm_ref=false

That is a "joke" . Even when I was in the Scouts, both troops in the community were rife with sexual activity. I was one of the younger scouts. The other troop was headed by a predatory pedophile.

I was in Virginia. Here is a quote from this article.


I don't know who that was but it could well describe the person who abused me: Lifelong pattern

How many lives have to be destroyed before it's taken seriously that there really is a problem?

Puffer

I want to know if the name of my perp is in these files. I was shocked to read that some of the perps names were removed when they reached 75 years of age. Grrrrrrr! My perp is roughly 80 now.

My perp would also be over 80. However he died of congestive heart failure last December. I still want to know what else he did and to whom, etc. I also want to verify that he's the one I've been thinking it was.

Puffer

Puffer,

I suppose all of us would like to know if there were other victims and how many. In my case, I never knew of any other victims of my perp, but as we always hear, there is never just one. My perp had 5 children (3 boys and 2 girls). I always wondered if he sexually abused them too. When I got too old for my perp's attraction, I suppose he must have moved on to another boy. I don't know, but maybe there were others at the same time as he was abusing me too.

Since Colorado's lousy statute of limitations has screwed me, and I can't get any help, I am really tempted to name my perp here on the forum. I suppose he or his family could sue me, but as they say, "You can't get blood out of a turnip."

Alan

There is often a convenient lack of records that might shed light on CSA episodes--convenient for those who were responsible at the time for preventing and punishing CSA. In my case, I conclude that, half a century ago, nobody gave a damn... much like now.

John

John,

True what you say about no one caring. That further opens the wound of feeling we have no self-worth. I am finding that the damage done from the abuse is most severe now that I am in my early 50's. I was able to suppress it more during my youth. I can't suppress it now, because the difficulty of being older and the poor economy affect my hire-ability now too, plus there is kind of a "build-up" factor, I'd call it.

Alan