Tag: child abuse

Ex-CIA agent convicted of largest leak in agency’s history faces NYC trial for child porn

A Manhattan jury is expected to hear opening arguments Tuesday at a former CIA engineer’s third New York City trial in as many years, this time including child pornography allegations.

Joshua Schulte – convicted in July 2022 of carrying out the most prolific leak in the CIA’s history — is accused of transporting and possessing thousands of images and videos showing the rape and sexual abuse of children.

The feds say Schulte brought the sick trove to New York in 2016 when he moved to the city from the suburbs of Washington, D.C., for a job at a financial services firm. It was allegedly stored on his home desktop computer, buried under layers of encryption, and categorized by victims’ identities and characteristics.

Prosecutors say the FBI found the disturbing libraries on Schulte’s computer, which included images of very young children, after decrypting files using a password on one of his cellphones during the probe into his leaks at the CIA.

Schulte has previously argued without evidence that the FBI framed him because of what he did at the CIA. He won’t be permitted to make that argument at trial.

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Boy Scout whistleblower: Mormon church swayed abuse policy

A Boy Scouts of America whistleblower says administrators blocked proposed child protection measures because they feared objections from the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

Driving the news: The whistleblower, Michael Johnson, was the BSA’s former director of child protection. He said in the film that he wanted to implement “what I felt were very medium-level policies and content training upgrades for youth protection.”

  • “I kept getting told that the Mormons may not like that, the Mormons don’t like that,” Johnson said.
  • A BSA executive told him: “You need to understand something … The Mormons are sacrosanct,” Johnson said.

The church did not immediately respond to Axios’ request for comment and did not participate in the film.

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North Texas Educator Charged with Sex Crimes Against Multiple Students

A North Texas educator has been accused of sex crimes involving multiple students.

The Arlington Police Department arrested Anthony Rashad Hawkins, 25, on Tuesday in Grand Prairie.

Police say Hawkins is a former employee of Sam Houston High School in Arlington Independent School District.

Hawkins was charged with three counts of improper relationship between educator and student—forcible rape and two counts of indecency with a child by sexual contact. All are second-degree felonies punishable by two to 20 years in prison.

According to Arlington police, detectives with APD’s Crimes Against Children Unit initiated an investigation on August 23, after school administrators were made aware of the allegations and immediately reported them to authorities.

Through the course of their investigation, detectives identified three victims.

Hawkins was booked into the Arlington City Jail on September 5 and released on a $100,000 bond ($20,000 for each offense).

State records show that Hawkins does not hold a Texas teaching certificate.

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U.K. Government Finally Admits It Can’t Scan for Child Porn Without Violating Everybody’s Privacy

The U.K. government finally acknowledges that a component of the Online Safety Bill that would force tech companies to scan data and messages for child porn images can’t be implemented without violating the privacy rights of all internet users and undermining the data encryption tools that keep our information safe.

And so the government is backing down—for now—on what’s been called the “spy clause.” Using the justification of fighting the spread of child sexual abuse material (CSAM), part of the Online Safety Bill would have required online platforms to create “backdoors” that the British government could use to scan messages between social media users. The law also would’ve allowed the government to punish platforms or sites that implement end-to-end encryption and prevent the government from accessing messages and data.

While British officials have insisted that this intrusive surveillance power would be used only to track down CSAM, tech and privacy experts have warned repeatedly that there’s no way to implement a surveillance system that could be used only for this particular purpose. Encryption backdoors allow criminals and oppressive governments to snoop on people for dangerous and predatory purposes. Firms like Signal and WhatsApp threatened to pull their services from the U.K. entirely if this bill component moved forward.

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My editor trashed my inquiry into child sexual abuse. Now I know why

One morning, a fortnight ago, I checked the BBC headlines to find my old editor, Peter Wilby, peering out. He’d been exposed as a paedophile and convicted of possessing child sexual abuse images. I still feel sick at the discovery.

It would be disturbing enough to discover anyone you knew had done something so terrible – he was convicted of possessing images of children being raped since the 1990s. But Wilby wasn’t anyone. He was a pillar of the media establishment, an editor of the Independent on Sunday and the New Statesman, and a Guardian columnist.

Journalists who had worked with Wilby were appalled at his crimes, while others raged at his “hypocrisy”, but what shocked me was the creeping realisation that he had used his position as an editor and columnist to create what the writer Beatrix Campbell has called a “hostile environment” for victims of abuse.

It dawned on me that he had applied that “hostile environment” to me at the outset of my career when I was a freelance reporter at the Independent on Sunday, and he was its news editor.

In April 1991, I learned of mental and physical abuse at Ty Mawr children’s home in Gwent, south Wales, where some residents had attempted suicide. The claims emerged in the wake of abuse claims at other children’s homes – the “Pindown” scandal in Staffordshire where staff used violent restraint on children, and sexual abuse by social worker Frank Beck at homes in Leicestershire. I thought Wilby would be excited at the prospect of a scoop, but he couldn’t have been less interested. I took it to the daily Independent, which put it on the front page and made a campaign of it.

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TikTok star and English language teacher Luke Rockwell, 29, with 2m followers is arrested for ‘having sex with a minor he infected with STDs’ while working at private Christian schools in Bangkok

TikTok star and teacher Luke Rockwell has been arrested for allegedly having sex with a minor her mother says he infected with STDs while teaching English at private Christians schools in Bangkok.

The 29-year-old, from Florida, reportedly contacted a 16-year-old schoolgirl on social media before having sex with her ‘on multiple occasions’ while recording it and telling her to ‘keep it a secret’.

Last month the young girl fell ill with abdominal pains caused by chlamydia and gonorrhea passed onto her by Rockwell, who uses the name Teacher Luke for his TikToks, according to the girl’s mother.

Her worried mother rushed her to hospital before uncovering the alleged sex. 

The horrified mother filed a police report on August 29 and Rockwell was arrested yesterday at his luxury apartment for ‘sex with a minor’ and ‘recording the acts’. 

Speaking today, the shaken mother said: ‘My daughter had been messaging Teacher Luke for months using my phone. She deleted the messages after they chatted.

‘They met and had sex without me knowing, then my daughter caught gonorrhea and chlamydia from him.

‘I knew something was wrong when my daughter looked very sick. She looked pale and she was clutching her tummy complaining about the pain in that area. I kept on asking her questions until she told me about this man called Teacher Luke.

‘My daughter said the first time they had sex, Teacher Luke used protection but after he did not use any. She trusted him.

‘Teacher Luke told her to keep everything a secret until she turned 18. He told my daughter that he loved her and would let her come live with him when she’s no longer a minor.

‘My daughter messaged him the STD test result where she had tested positive for gonorrhea. He promised that he would take responsibility for the costs.

‘I’m not complaining to the police because I want money or compensation. I don’t care about the money.

‘I want every woman and child to know how evil Teacher Luke is. It’s embarrassing for me to tell people about what’s happening to my family but I hope it prevents Teacher Luke from ever taking advantage of any girl in the future.’

Rockwell is from Melbourne, Florida. He graduated from the University of Central Florida. He previously worked at the prestigious Wall Street English college in Bangkok, where he taught locals.

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Ex-Chris Christie aide arrested on suspicion of sex crimes

A former Chris Christie aide has been charged in connection with a child sex investigation, New Jersey Globe reports.

Kevin Tomafsky, 41, was arrested Aug. 15 after a grand jury indicted him in July, the report said. He was charged with engaging in sexual conduct with a child, conspiracy to endanger the welfare of a child, permitting a child to engage in pornography, and the possession of child pornography, the report said.

Tomafsky’s arrest culminated a probe that began in October 2022 when the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children alerted the Gloucester County Prosecutor’s office it received a report from Snapchat of an alleged incident depicting child sex was uploaded to the platform.

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Leading Academic Journal Publishes Paper Claiming “Sexual Relations Between Youths and Adults” Are Not Harmful

A leading academic journal has published an article questioning the need for age of consent laws and claiming that discussions of “youth sexuality” are unjustly hindered by “cancel culture.” The author, Marshall Burns, is a physicist and technology entrepreneur who was involved in the development of the early computer industry and operates a website titled “Consenting Juveniles.”

In his article, which was published in the Archives of Sexual Behavior in June and titled “The Elephant in the Room: Youth Sexuality,” Burns argues that “sexual relations between youths and adults” is wrongfully seen as a contentious issue in society.

“The Archives of Sexual Behavior special section on cancel culture is an important reference on a dangerous phenomenon taking place in front of us. Yet the section omits discussion of the primary cancellation issue that arguably helped set the stage for what we face today and that remains the most lightning-rod subject of all,” Burns writes.

“It ignores the elephant in the room: youth sexuality, and in particular, discussions of sexual relations between youths and adults without an a priori assumption of abuse and harm.”

In the article, Burns presents a selection of previous academic publications alongside reactions in order to highlight what he portrays as examples of cancel culture in action. The first incident he provides describes criticism leveled against Dutch-American, Columbia-affiliated academic and LGBT activist Theo Sandfort, who, Burns says, found that sexual relationships between adults and minors are “mostly harmless.”

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‘Teacher of the month’ who likes to ‘build relationships’ with pupils charged in student sex assault case

A Tennessee high school teacher who’d been awarded “teacher of the month” has been charged with statutory rape after allegedly having sex with one of her students. 

Casey McGrath, a 28-year-old geometry teacher at Chattanooga Central High School, was suspended without pay in March after a months-long investigation into alleged “inappropriate physical contact with a student” WTVC reported.

She was indicted on Aug. 14 and charged with “unlawfully and knowingly engag[ing] in sexual penetration with a person of at least 13 years of age, but less than 18,” according to court documents obtained by Fox News.

The indictment noted that she is “at least 10 years older than the victim.”

McGrath was arrested on Aug. 18 and is out on release after posting a $10,000 bond. She is scheduled to be arraigned in Hamilton County Criminal Court on Sept. 6.

McGrath — who had also taught at nearby East Ridge Middle School, according to school records. She had recently been nominated by Central High School students as “teacher of the month,” according to an online article in the school’s newspaper that has since been taken down.

The teacher told a student reporter that her favorite part of the  day was “getting to interact with students and build relationships with them” — despite challenges during the COVID-19 pandemic.

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Feds Demand Action on School Sexual Misconduct. Will California Heed the Call?

Across the nation, schools have repeatedly hidden instances of teacher misconduct that, in some cases, allow educators to inflict the same behaviors on more students. 

San Francisco’s public school district has entered into resignation agreements with 19 employees accused of sexual misconduct since 2017, The Standard previously revealed. One of those teachers had left another Bay Area school under separate sexual misconduct allegations 20 years prior, unbeknown to administrators. 

To prevent schools from unwittingly hiring teachers credibly accused of sexual misconduct, federal education officials want states to tighten regulations. Though criminal background checks are required for most school staff across the nation, the U.S. Education Department warned it creates a false sense of security. In a July 2022 report, the department called on states to enact more protections. 

California is one of many states that does not explicitly prohibit the suppression of information about employee misconduct. And, nearly one year after the federal report, state leaders have made little progress in assessing what needs to be done. Gaps also remain when it comes to tracking non-credentialed school staff accused of misconduct, and in tracking records of staff from out of state.

In response to questions regarding potential new practices, the California Department of Education said, it “has, by statute and regulations, a limited role in local matters with public schools. Any change to this oversight would require legislative action.”

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