All this is incredibly sad

[Scazza]

Not entirely rhetorical. This is the first time I've seen anyone connected to the school acknowledge that any mistakes were made. The school just said it was all very sad that it happened to occur there.

From Rob's last meeting nd those to come I think it is clear that at, least, the school is not denying them. I wonder if they even know the full extent - there seem to be more known cases to come to court.

perhaps they could make a firm commitment to explaining the lessons learned, once proceedings are complete. I don't think that is the reason behind the silence, though, and understanding the lack of checks and controls at CH would be useful context for any jury.

HarryH has given us access to the latest set of procedures intended to prevent any furure such failures. I have seen one typo pointed out and I have slight reservations about a few more but I think it is clear that the school has learned lessons from the past and is determined to avoid them in the future.

Ref rigour. Perhaps the school could provide more information about the doing, not just the written policies. eg: examples of recent welfare issues and how they were resolved. That is far stronger evidence than just pointing to a stack of dusty policies.

I very much doubt if thatr is possible. In any case the written details include the names of the "victim", the "assailant" (if that is the correct word) and everyone involved in the investigation.. In court the name and any identifiers of the rape victim is hidden from all except the prosecution, the defendant and the judge - should this not be the case for close to similar cases in the school?

Victims and other old blues deserve an explanation of what went wrong, don't they?

Victims on a case by case basis - yes. There are many victims whose names are hidden form the general population - they should be dealt with privately between them and the school - not in public.

Neither do I buy the other often quoted argument that 'things were different then'. Staff going back to the 50's presumably understood the rape of a woman was illegal. Why would the rape of a child be different?

In those days rape of a woman was technically a crime but virtually never prosecuted because to be namd in court was the end of any reasonable life for the victim - she would be thrown out of her family, probably her town and branded a harlot even if it ws not her fault.

Jesus wept.

- not denying something - silence - is very different to being open, frank and honest about mistakes.

- it is difficult to know if the school has learned lessons from the past without them explaining what those mistakes were!

- "the school is a very different place now" argument, yet again. It is great news but doesn't resolve or excuse historic issues. Fwiw, Howard didn't give us access to anything, he posted a link to CHs policies, which are, in any case, statutory requirements.

- I mentioned welfare issues. eg: Bullying, self harm, mental health, exam stress. The school could very easily and tactfully explain what is being done to resolve any such problems that arise. Evidence that they are getting the 'little' things right would provide assurance that there is a route for pupils voices to be heard if more traumatic issues arose.

- we'll have to disagree that only victims deserve an explanation. I think we were all put at risk. There but by the grace of God....

- your last para left me incredulous. A woman who was raped.... even if it was not her fault. Really? In any event, the point I was making was about morality as early as the 1950's, not justice at that time. There would have been significant stigma for any perpetrator as well as their victim and I couldn't imagine staff accepting someone who was violent, or sexually violent, against women. Yet when those crimes were against children, it seems to have been a tacitly accepted part of the public school system. In other situations adults would have battered abusers and ran them out of town. Public schools were either full of weaklings incapable of taking that on, or it was ignored as simply par for the course.


As for Jurys, I have no personal experience. As ever, criticism is not much help without suggestions on how to improve on trial by your peers, flawed as it can be.

[michael scuffil]

Yet when those crimes were against children, it seems to have been a tacitly accepted part of the public school system. In other situations adults would have battered abusers and ran them out of town. Public schools were either full of weaklings incapable of taking that on, or it was ignored as simply par for the course.

I've said it before, and I'll say it again. I don't think 'sexual abuse' as widely understood, perpetrated by teachers against pupils, was widespread in public schools. Of course it occurred, we all know it did. And it was usually covered up. On the other hand, paedophilia, while exceedingly common, was either of the 'soft' kind (voyeurism)* or sadistic. The latter, in the form of corporal punishment, was quite legal, and one can argue whether the first kind was harmful.

* Lord Baden-Powell, author of the aptly named 'Scouting for Boys', is known to have possessed a collection of photos of naked boys (though not involved in sexual acts). But it is very unlikely he ever committed acts of abuse.

[J.R.]

Lord Baden-Powell ??

OH, PLEASE......

"Come on boys !! I've got a lovely big woggle you can play with in my tent !!

[Foureyes]

The problem facing juries in most rape cases is that just two people were involved and their decision rests upon which of the two they believe. It is similar to the cases which used to occur in railway trains. In former times - in fact, up to the 1980s in some areas - many suburban railway carriages had no corridors so that there was a series of self-contained compartments with no exit from any of them unless the train was stationary at a platform. Every now and then a man and a woman, strangers, would find themselves in such a compartment and the woman would allege that the male passenger had molested her in some way. Such cases almost always boiled down to the jury having to decide which of the two they believed, because there were no other witnesses.

Curiously, the last such case involved an Old Blue. I met him once or twice over professional matters, and he always struck me as an honourable and decent man. At the time, he was in his early 60s and the charge and the subsequent appearance in court had a terrible effect on him and even though he was found 'not guilty' the stigma remained with him for the rest of his life.

David

[Scazza]

Yet when those crimes were against children, it seems to have been a tacitly accepted part of the public school system. In other situations adults would have battered abusers and ran them out of town. Public schools were either full of weaklings incapable of taking that on, or it was ignored as simply par for the course.

I've said it before, and I'll say it again. I don't think 'sexual abuse' as widely understood, perpetrated by teachers against pupils, was widespread in public schools. Of course it occurred, we all know it did. And it was usually covered up. On the other hand, paedophilia, while exceedingly common, was either of the 'soft' kind (voyeurism)* or sadistic. The latter, in the form of corporal punishment, was quite legal, and one can argue whether the first kind was harmful.

* Lord Baden-Powell, author of the aptly named 'Scouting for Boys', is known to have possessed a collection of photos of naked boys (though not involved in sexual acts). But it is very unlikely he ever committed acts of abuse.

There is strong evidence of serious abuse in 130+ residential schools according to the Times (4yrs ago!) Like care homes or hospitals, I guess they will attract people interested in vulnerable kids:

https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/130- ... m6sz3d6lcc

The long timeframe of offending at CH suggests it was pervasive there. All those offences are for indecency offences against the person, not 'soft' crimes.

I believe some of the sexually-motivated corporal punishment has been deemed illegal and I'm not sure the boundaries between offences and motivations are as clearly defined as you suggest:

https://www.theguardian.com/society/201 ... tian-camps

Fwiw, Ian Rowley was convicted of indecent assault after leaving CH. Was he 'just' ogling us during his time as my house tutor?! Is that OK? Does it eventually lead to other offences? (or did he offend at CH and it was covered up?!)

Scouts? Lots of convictions for very serious offences across the country. Very pervasive. Scoutmasters at CH may to have a case to answer too with Dobbie, Burr and Webb all welcome - so not sure you've used a great example there!

[postwarblue]

I think schools still haven't got the message. The perpetrators of what (as reported) were clearly criminal assaults at Millfield appear to have been merely 'suspended' and there has been no report that Millfield has involved the police. Who I would wish would take the hint and intervene, but I doubt they will.

[michael scuffil]

I am coming to the conclusion that it was the less formal relations between pupils and staff from about 1970 that led to an increase in overt cases of sexual abuse (see also my remarks elsewhere about the Odenwaldschule in Germany).

Also the increased privacy which pupils now enjoy removes one (more or less legal) opportunity for sexual gratification and the abolition of corporal punishment removes another

I stand by my assertion that overt genital abuse (i.e. sexual abuse as generally understood) perpetrated by masters against pupils was not common before that. Paedophiles had no reason to put their jobs at risk when they had other ways of getting their kicks which posed no risk to them.

[jhopgood]

I have wondered whether the conversion from houses run by senior pupils to Senior and Junior houses run by staff, did not in some way, make it easier for abuse to take place.
Barnes B had an incident in 1959/60, but to the best of my knowledge, it was between pupils.
After that I can recall no incidents but I was always suspicious of some of the housemasters we had.
Could it be possible that the senior pupils in a house formed an invisible barrier which made it more difficult for abuse to take place?
That is not to say that some of them did not abuse their seniority but not in a physical nor sexual way.

[graham]

The problem facing juries in most rape cases is that just two people were involved and their decision rests upon which of the two they believe. It is similar to the cases which used to occur in railway trains. In former times - in fact, up to the 1980s in some areas - many suburban railway carriages had no corridors so that there was a series of self-contained compartments with no exit from any of them unless the train was stationary at a platform. Every now and then a man and a woman, strangers, would find themselves in such a compartment and the woman would allege that the male passenger had molested her in some way. Such cases almost always boiled down to the jury having to decide which of the two they believed, because there were no other witnesses.

Curiously, the last such case involved an Old Blue. I met him once or twice over professional matters, and he always struck me as an honourable and decent man. At the time, he was in his early 60s and the charge and the subsequent appearance in court had a terrible effect on him and even though he was found 'not guilty' the stigma remained with him for the rest of his life.

David

David, please forgive my apparent targeting of you in what follows. I make no implications about your character but simply wish to point out an example of how implicit bias can affect even decent people.

The way you phrased your comment is interesting.

Every now and then a man and a woman, strangers, would find themselves in such a compartment and the woman would allege that the male passenger had molested her in some way.

because you could have said...

Every now and then a man and a woman, strangers, would find themselves in such a compartment and the male passenger would molest the woman in some way.

The difference here is that the first statement remarks implies that the molestation did not occur and that woman were making stuff up, while the second remarks that the situation (closed compartments) facilitated male assaults of women. The first wording therefore conveys a bias, intended or not, that weakens the claims of a victim of assault and, in turn, conveys a message that victims should not bother to come forward because no one will believe them.

I don't believe you intended convey this message but that's the thing with implicit biases. Even though we might firmly believe we are not sexist, racist, classist or whatever, we may still make decisions that reflect unconscious biases that we are not aware of. Studies show a particularly strong effect of race (so strong, in fact, that even black individuals may show unconscious bias that disfavors other black individuals), but recent examples, particularly over here (e.g. the current Supreme court nominee) show strong sex-based biases in perception too. These are tough things to overcome because they are inherent to us and the only way to deal with them is to be aware of their effects and to try to understand how they affect our decision making.

In the case of victims of sexual assault, be they women on a train or pupils at a public school, the first thing we can do is to believe them when they make a claim, regardless of who it is made against. Importantly, believing the victim does not mean believing the accused is guilty. It means treating the claim as you would any other claim, investigating it and presenting a case for trial if sufficient evidence exists.

[bakunin]

And even these days the appalling jury system means that only 1/3 of rape cases end up with a conviction - which is only a small percentage of the rape accusations that are made, which in turn are a small percentage of the rapes that take place.

The jury system is the only remotely positive, democratic aspect of any legal system. Judges are psychologically corrupted by the power they have over other people's lives, and lack perspective due to their extremely lofty position. Yes, juries are affected by the popular prejudices and beliefs of the time, but this is outweighed by the benefits. In any case the attitudes to sexual assault are becoming better gradually.

[sejintenej]

Yes, juries are affected by the popular prejudices and beliefs of the time, but this is outweighed by the benefits. In any case the attitudes to sexual assault are becoming better gradually.

From my limited exposure Judges and Magistrates are actively trrying to ensure that both sides have a level playing field and that neither benefits from the errors of the other. An example was when the CPS relied upon the victim to bring all the evidence and the victim didn't bother to turn up - no reason available. Instead of penalising the victim in his or her absence for an unknown reason he postoned the hearing.
My opinion at the time was to castigate the CPS for themselves not holding the evidence they needed and that opinion hasn't changed.

[Foureyes]

graham writes:
"The way you phrased your comment is interesting.
Every now and then a man and a woman, strangers, would find themselves in such a compartment and the woman would allege that the male passenger had molested her in some way."

You are misinterpreting what I wrote. I was merely describing the facts 1. There was a man in the compartment. 2. There was a woman in the same compartment. 3. The woman alleged (presumably when the train stopped at the next station) that the man had molested her.
I made absolutely no value judgement, nor did I exhibit any bias; those are simple, unadorned, facts. Nor did I suggest, or even imply, that either version of events was correct.

and further
"...because you could have said...
Every now and then a man and a woman, strangers, would find themselves in such a compartment and the male passenger would molest the woman in some way."

I suggest that you read what you wrote (above) very carefully because you seem to imply that in every compartment containing one man and one woman, the man would inevitably molest her. That is simply not true.

As I wrote above, not every such allegation necessarily may be justified. That is where the jury comes in - two people telling different version of events - someone has to decide which of the two is more likely to be correct.

I suggest you read https://www.theguardian.com/law/2018/ja ... fore-trial to see what can go wrong. The now notorious case of 'nick' is also relevant; how many lives have his allegations ruined?

David

[sejintenej]

graham writes:
"The way you phrased your comment is interesting.
Every now and then a man and a woman, strangers, would find themselves in such a compartment and the woman would allege that the male passenger had molested her in some way."

You are misinterpreting what I wrote. I was merely describing the facts 1. There was a man in the compartment. 2. There was a woman in the same compartment. 3. The woman alleged (presumably when the train stopped at the next station) that the man had molested her.
I made absolutely no value judgement, nor did I exhibit any bias; those are simple, unadorned, facts. Nor did I suggest, or even imply, that either version of events was correct.

and further
"...because you could have said...
Every now and then a man and a woman, strangers, would find themselves in such a compartment and the male passenger would molest the woman in some way."

I suggest that you read what you wrote (above) very carefully because you seem to imply that in every compartment containing one man and one woman, the man would inevitably molest her. That is simply not true.

Graham wrote:

The difference here is that the first statement remarks implies that in the rare cases referred to the molestation did not occur and that woman were making stuff up, while the second remarks that the situation (closed compartments) facilitated male assaults of women. The first wording therefore conveys a bias, intended or not, that weakens the claims of a victim of assault and, in turn, conveys a message that victims should not bother to come forward because no one will believe them.

IMHO Rubbish. There is no such implication as set out in the first line of this quote. There is no bias - it is simply a cases of a versus b.

In the case of victims of sexual assault, be they women on a train or pupils at a public school, the first thing we can do is to believe them when they make a claim, regardless of who it is made against. Importantly, believing the victim does not mean believing the accused is guilty. It means treating the claim as you would any other claim, investigating it and presenting a case for trial if sufficient evidence exists.

Your last sentence destroys your demand that we believe that the attack did place simply because the alledged victim says so. Your second sentance also is in and out of belief - just because someone says something does not prove that it is true - you agree that it should be investigated therefore you should not outright believe the claim.

[graham]

Your last sentence destroys your demand that we believe that the attack did place simply because the alledged victim says so. Your second sentance also is in and out of belief - just because someone says something does not prove that it is true - you agree that it should be investigated therefore you should not outright believe the claim.

Nonsense. If I report to the police that someone broke into my house and stole my TV, they will typically believe me and proceed with an investigation (ideally). The problem with sexual violence against women is that the he-said, she-said mentality is in place from the start - the women is not automatically believed in many cases and no investigation proceeds. An investigation is a search for corroborating evidence to build a case with. Beginning an investigation does not negate ones belief in the veracity of statement of the accuser.

I suggest you read https://www.theguardian.com/law/2018/ja ... fore-trial to see what can go wrong. The now notorious case of 'nick' is also relevant; how many lives have his allegations ruined?

False accusations against men count for between 2 and 10% of reported cases of sexual violence. In contrast, over 60% of sexual assault cases are not reported. Of the 40% that are, less than half will proceed to trial and less that half of those will result in jail time for the perpetrator. If we are concerning ourselves with the plight of falsely accused men, we're focused on the wrong problem.

[Foureyes]

Graham,
I am not trying to be difficult, but how does anyone know that "over 60 percent of sexual assault cases are never reported?" If they are not reported how does anyone know that they have taken place? Also, 60 percent of how many - 100, 1,000, 10,000? This is a very emotive area - and rightly so - but throwing quasi-statistics around does not help the discussion.
Also, I note that you live in Chicago, so are you talking about US figures or UK figures, or even, England figures?
David