Don’t Be an Enabler —  When a Child Is Abused,  Here’s What to Do
By Michael Reagan
Published November 10, 2011
| FoxNews.com

Michael Reagan: “The reason I tell you all this? Because, I was once that boy.”

Allegations of child sexual abuse by a former assistant football coach at Penn State University have dominated the news this week. On Wednesday legendary football coach Joe Paterno released a statement in which he said, “With the benefit of hindsight, I wish I had done more.” How lame is that, coach? Would you have accepted that excuse from one of your players? “With the benefit of hindsight, coach, I wish I had run the route we rehearsed a thousand times in practice.” See how stupid that sounds? It doesn’t take “hindsight” to know that when some monster is raping children in your locker room, you call the police.  READ MORE HERE

A child abuse survivor who experienced how silence perpetuated the crime and the pain is using the biggest message board he has to raise awareness and to encourage victims to seek help. Rodney Timms, president of Western Flyer Xpress, had the illustration of the Oklahoma Institute for Child Advocacy‘s “Protect Kids” child abuse poster wrapped on one of his tractor-trailers and parked it in western Oklahoma City alongside Interstate 40, one of the busiest highways in the country. READ MORE HERE

At first it seemed a miracle to the parents of a 14-year-old autistic child in Michigan whose search for a means of communication for their daughter appeared finally answered. Despite Julian and Tali Wendrow’s daughter said to have never developed mentally past the age of two, facing difficulty matching pictures without help and rarely speaking a word, with the help of an aid holding her hands above a keyboard, Aislinn was typing.  READ MORE HERE

Ten years ago today, the FBI searched the townhouse of Scott Tyree in suburban Washington D.C. and found 13-year-old Alicia Kozakiewicz bound to a bed. She had been missing for 4 days. Now, a decade later, Alicia speaks with us about her experience of being deceived and groomed online by this predator over a period of 8 months, only to be abducted by him and taken to his home on New Year’s Day, where she was raped, beaten, and tortured.  READ MORE HERE

Judge said teenager within his rights to use deadly force to defend himself—Court ruled on ‘stand your ground’ law

A teenager has become the youngest person in the U.S. to escape a murder charge under a controversial ‘stand your ground’ law. A judge ruled that Jorge Saavedra, 15, was in danger from the older boy and acted in self-defence when he stabbed Dylan Nuno to death. Saavedra, who was 14 at the time, stabbed his attacker 12 times with a pocket knife he had been carrying in Naples, Florida. READ MORE HERE

‘Walked free after court heard she was ‘too big to kill’

A woman charged with murdering her sister’s son has told how she was freed after her defence team claimed she was too fat to have committed the crime. In a new interview, Mayra Rosales, 31, of Texas, says she could not have hit the boy on the head because her arm was so big that she would not have been able to lift it to strike him. When two-year-old Eliseo Jr died in March 2008, 74-stone Ms Rosales, who had been babysitting at the time he was taken into hospital, originally claimed she caused his death by falling onto him.  READ MORE HERE

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‘I spent 32 years afraid to breathe’

Tricia McKnight is no stranger to domestic abuse and her mission is to share her story in the hopes it will encourage and help other women get out of violent, abusive situations.”A lot of them are like me,” said McKnight, 48, of Breese. “They were ‘trained’ to behave in a certain way and accept certain things and not think anything about it. It becomes a pattern of abuse. I spent 32 years afraid to breathe, literally afraid to breathe.”

READ MORE HERE

Tricia is a BlogTalk Radio Host for child abuse survivors. Please tune-in and listen to her shows here:

 http://www.blogtalkradio.com/dreamcatchers/2011/12/24/survivors-speak-out