Child Sexual Predators Target the Poor, Illegal Immigrants
Article sheds additional light on the Miramonte child sex abuse allegations.
In my interview with child sexual abuse expert Cordelia Anderson last month, she told me that child sexual predators often look for children who are particularly needy for male attention, such as children with single mothers and absent fathers. They may also target kids with special needs.
In Abusers Used School In Impoverished Area as Stalking Grounds, however, USA Today points out that poverty and a family's immigration status is another factor that puts children at risk for sexual abuse.
"At Miramonte, the victims could hardly have been more disadvantaged: The 1,400 students are virtually all from poor Latino homes, a majority from immigrant families where English isn't spoken at home, and some with parents lacking legal immigrant status. It's a voiceless community where fear is ingrained - fear of authority, fear of the police, fear of immigration enforcement, fear of retribution.
"The hard-pressed barrio school is just the kind of place where an adult with bad intentions could take advantage of a child, knowing there was little chance a victimized family would report the acts. Or if they did, little chance they would be believed."
This sounds a lot like the Jerry Sandusky case in which the former Penn State assistant football coach allegedly used his charity for poor and at-risk youth to target and then groom his victims.
Read the full story.
Related Articles
Author Bios
With more than 30 years in public safety, David served as a 9-1-1 dispatcher and paramedic operations manager in Oakland, Calif., for 10 years, working six days at the Cypress "880" freeway collapse during the Loma Prieta earthquake in October 1989. David brings over 20 years executive/administration experience serving nine years in EMS administration as a regional disaster planner; seven years as a full-time emergency manager for a municipal fire depart
Jim Grayson is a senior security consultant. His career spans more than 35 years in law enforcement and security consulting. He worked for UCLA on a workplace violence study involving hospitals, schools and small retail environments and consulted with NIOSH on a retail violence prevention study.
Michael Dorn serves as the Executive Director of Safe Havens International, a global non profit campus safety center. During his 30 year campus safety career, Michael has served as a university police officer, corporal, sergeant and lieutenant. The author of 25 books on school safety, his work has taken him to Central America, Mexico, Canada, Europe, Asia, South Africa and the Middle East.
Robin has been covering the security and campus public safety industries since 1998 and is a specialist in emerging technologies and systems integration. She joined CS in 2005 and has authored award-winning editorials on important campus safety issues, including gang prevention, grants and funding, network integration, IP video, emergency notification, emergency management and communications, crime trends and risk management.