Page 2 Computers are providing pedophiles with a virtually untraceable means of exchanging information, including the names of potential victims. There is a clear need for additional safeguards in this area. The Child Protection Act of 1984, which made illegal all distribution of sexually explicit material involving children, has been highly successful. 164 convictions have been won since its passage, compared with only 64 in the entire six and half previous years. What commercial child pornography does exist is a small portion of the overall pornography "market" and is deeply underground. CHILD PORNOGRAPHY AND PEDOPHILIA INVESTIGATION REPORT Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations INTRODUCTION A decade ago, the sexual abuse of children was a subject that came to the attention of most Americans infrequently, if at all. Assault cases often were quietly kept out of the courts, and many police departments viewed such cases as little more than time-consuming social work. Child molesters were more often the target of jokes than investigations. For millions of Americans, child sexual abuse was a problem that was out of sight and out of mind. During the late 1970s, however, reports of child sexual abuse slowly began to increase, and so did public awareness of the problem. The American Association for Protecting Children, a subsidiary of the American Humane Association, noted a ten-fold increase in the number of children reported to be sexual abuse "crisis." 1 victims from 1976 to 1983, but it was not until the following year that the problem was presented to the general public as a Beginning in 1984 and throughout 1985, child sexual abuse was almost constantly in the national focus. Networks and local TV stations devoted scores of prime-time hours to its exposure; hundreds of newspapers and magazines ran lengthy accounts of child sexual assaults and pornography rings; grocery bags and milk cartons began to carry the faces of missing children; citizen awareness groups sprang up around the country; police agencies that once paid scant attention to the problem began establishing special training programs for their officers and setting up child sex crime units; the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children was established in Washington, D. C.; and in Congress, from 1983 to mid-1986 a total of 194 bills and 13 hearings focused specifically on some aspect of child abuse or child sexual exploitation. 2 2 With this unprecedented attention came an exponential increase in the reporting of child sexual abuse, believed by some to be the most underreported major crime in America. Reports increased dramatically throughout the United States in Farm Belt states and in the nation's largest cities, in West Coast beach towns and East Coast industrial centers, in the neighborhoods of the affluent, the middle class and the poor. A 1985 report by the New York-based Child Welfare League of America said child sexual abuse reports rose 59 percent from 1983 to 3 1984. In Delaware and Idaho reports nearly doubled from 1983 to 1984; in Oregon they rose 129 percent; and in Wisconsin, they went up by 132 percent." In Houston, police received 1.600 reports of child sexual assaults in 1985, more than double the total in 1983.5 In virtually all cases the extraordinary rise in sexual abuse statistics reflected a state's or city's increased efforts to discover and investigate such crimes, rather than a sudden increase in molested children over years past. And yet there is wide agreement that even these are conservative figures.6 The following are just a few of the many cases that attracted national attention during 1984 and 1985: In Manhattan Beach, California, in the Spring of 1984. seven employees of a day care center were charged with 207 counts of rape, sodomy and other abuses, involving at least 41 children over a six-year period. Doctors confirmed that 37 of the children showed physical signs of molestation. After a grueling pre-trial hearing lasting several months, many parents withdrew their children as witnesses after watching other children undergo lengthy cross-examination by defense attorneys. Later the Los Angeles County District Attorney dropped all charges against five of the seven defendants, citing a lack of evidence.7 *In 1985 a Roman Catholic priest was convicted of molesting over a period of years at least 37 boys, among them altar boys and members of the parish Boy Scout troop in Henry, Louisiana. Depositions in the case disclosed that the priest's supervisors had confronted him with such allegations as far back as 1974 and had received similar complaints from parents in 1977. Yet the supervisors did not alert police and still allowed the priest to work with children. More than a dozen civil suits were filed against the diocese by the families and $4.2 million in damages 8 already has been awarded. *In Tampa, Florida. Eric Cross, who had been convicted of molesting young girls in four countries, was indicted for allegedly distributing child pornography while in prison on a molestation charge. He was convicted on 19 counts of As a large number of cases illustrate, child molesters come from virtually every type of background in society. In the past two years those convicted on such charges have included police officers, politicians, judges, physicians, lawyers, journalists, grandmothers, teachers and military officers, among others. To their neighbors and co-workers they were often respected. responsible members of the community, remembered by some acquaintances as being "great with kids." Many were active in church, school and sports organizations. The stereotype of the child molester as a menacing deviate lurking in public places obviously does not apply to many of them. the abnormal With these events as a backdrop, the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations in early 1984 began an investigation of child pornography and pedophilia sexual desire of an adult for pre-pubescent children. Subcommittee investigators interviewed more than 200 people in more than 30 states, including convicted child molesters. pornographers, pro-pedophilia activists, molestation victims, investigators, judges, prosecutors, psychiatrists and child protection workers. The Subcommittee also reviewed thousands of documents, including arrest reports, victim statements, pedophile correspondence, newsletters, child pornography catalogs, films, videotapes and magazines. Finally, the Subcommittee held three days of public hearings on Nov. 29 and 30, 1984 and Feb. 21, 1985 - - for further exploration of the issues and questions raised during the investigation. The investigation's primary focus was on child pornography and pedophile activities in the United States. but because of the Importance of the Netherlands, Denmark and Sweden in the international distribution of child pornography, the Subcommittee also examined efforts to combat child pornography in those 11 countries. The Subcommittee found that while the growth in the number of reports of abuse and sexual exploitation of children is cause for continuing concern, recent Federal laws - notably the Child Protection Act of 1984 -- are beginning to show significant results in the battle against these evils. The public perception of an "epidemic" of child abuse and child pornography reports and arrests, which has led to demands for even tougher laws, may actually be testimony to the effectiveness of the existing laws in providing authorities with the tools to arrest and convict child abusers and pornographers. In addition, the economic |