High school buddy turned pedophile!

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
1

I wasn’t sure where to put this thread. It’s not a rant. But it isn’t mindless. So, you mods can move it if you think there’s a better place.

I got some rotten, disgusting news today.

In high school, I had a very close guy friend. He lived right across the street from me. We did everything together. The relationship was not at all romantic. After high school, we went our seperate ways, but we still kept in touch and visited each other occasionally. We have/had many mutual friends, so we saw each other at parties, holiday functions, etc.

As time wore on, we lost touch. When I DID see him, he was different. He didn’t seem like he was very happy. I still made a point of looking him up when I went home for Christmas and stuff. After a while, I gave up. He was just too different.

Because we know so many of the same people, I have been kept pretty much abreast of his general information. It seems like no one is really friends with him anymore, but most people still know what he’s been up to. But no one knew this:

Two days ago, he was arrested on child pornography/child sexual abuse charges. 46 counts. Apparently, his girlfriend found a bunch of naked kiddie pics at his apartment, along with some VHS, and turned him in. My mother called me this afternoon with the information. The call was followed by several e-mails from friends. I found quite a few newspaper articals about it online. So it is true.

I am not exactly shocked, since I barely know him anymore. But I AM horrified. Disgusted. Aghast. Sick.

I feel dirty by association, even though I have only spoken to him perhaps 5 times in as many years.

This is the same guy whose house I spent the night at. Walked to school with. Shoveled snow for extra money with. He was a big part of my high school years.

I am just so sad.

:frowning: :frowning: :frowning:

And angry.

:mad:

Mostly sad.

:frowning:

2

I met this guy only once, but I feel mostly as she does. With a good dose of icked out. :frowning:

3

I’ve always felt that many pedophiles were themselves sexually abused as children.

Since you knew this guy growing up, was there ever any indication that things weren’t right at home for him?

4

No, not really. His mom is awesome and his dad was a pretty nice guy. (He died a few months ago.) They got divorced a little while after we graduated high school. I think they just didn’t get along anymore. But everything was pretty run-of-the-mill in their house. I was there almost every day, and spent the night fairly often. His sister is well adjusted and seems perfectly sane and happy. I don’t think he was ever abused.

5

It’s more than “felt”, it’s more or less a proven fact. A vast majority of the people who sexually abuse children were themselves sexually abused.

6

I really doubt that that is the case this time. I guess I could be wrong. I mean, it’s POSSIBLE. But I’m nearly 99.5% positive that it wasn’t anyone in that household. We told each other pretty much everything as kids, but he could have hidden that. I suppose it could’ve been a neighbor or something. It’s the SHOCK of him doing something like this that’s really gotten me upset.

7

I agree, Priceguy. I guess I was trying to put it in a “nice” way, if that is possible with something this horrible.

hyperjes, I guess he could be the exception to the rule, although sometimes it is so hidden, no one ever knows.

When I was in highschool, I was a cheerleader. The girl who was our mascot on the squad was also President of the Honor Society and President of her Class. She was a beautiful girl and no one ever suspected anything was amiss with her home life.

I ran into her many years later, and thousands of miles away from where we grew up, and she told me of the sexual abuse she suffered from her father as a child. You just never know.

8

I know how you feel hyperjes. The husband of a woman that I’ve worked with for nearly 13 years was imprisoned 3 years ago for molesting his own neice (he had been molesting her for several years, since she was 9 years old). He admitted to doing it. I thought he was such a nice guy! He seemed so in love with his wife. Absolutely unbelievable.

The real kicker though . . . his wife is still completely devoted to him and can’t understand why he had to go to prison. It was “just one little mistake”. Yeah, one he made about 100 times. She works daily trying to get his sentence shortened. I don’t know what the h*ll is wrong with some people.

9

stellar7, you and Priceguy may be right. He wasn’t super popular or anything. He was kind of a mopey kid, in general. But his family always seemed really NORMAL to me. Of course, my family situation was really not normal, so I guess I couldn’t make much of a comparison. I really don’t know. I feel sick about it though. You just don’t expect that one of your friends could ever grow up to do something like this.

10

When I was in high school, my great-uncle went to prison for molesting some girls at his daughter’s birthday party.

Just a few months ago, his son was arrested for murder.

It’s very creepy when people you know do really sick shit.

11

Back when I was in High school there was this huge football player that used to try to kiss and hug all over me. Real creepy guy. I used to try my best to avoid even seeing him in the hall.

Just about a year ago a little 9 year old girl was missing and they found her body in his house. She’d been raped and murdered. What can you say? It really affected me that it hit so close to home.

I know your situation is different but maybe you should go talk with the guy? Hard to do, I know but as much as we would like to write such people off as unworthy scum, he is hurting or he wouldn’t have let himself stoop so low as to do something so cruel to kids. And he seems so alone it makes me want to cry. Even while I feel that they should fry the bastard.

12

A friend of mine married a guy I thought was great – just an all-around good guy. She had a daughter from her first marriage, and her new husband adopted her once they married, and everything seemed wonderful for them, until her daughter told my friend that Daddy had been molesting her. All of her friends and family felt completely blindsided. We still do, and wonder how we could have missed the signs. But I don’t think there were any. I can’t believe that we, or especially my friend, would have ignored any suspicion that he was a pedophile. Some people are just very, very good at hiding what they are.

13

While I am angry that this guy did these sick things to these kids, what also angers me (as a normal decent guy) is that sickos like the men mentioned in this thread often give men in general a bad rep.

With so much perversion out there, it often makes people think twice about leaving men alone with kids.

My girlfriend has a 4 year old daughter that I love spending time with, but out of caution, I make sure I spend as little time alone with her as possible. Not because I would ever do anything, but rather because I always want to be able to cover my ass, plain and simple. Plus I never want there to be any misplaced worry on the part of her family or friends. I mean nine times out of ten, it seems, in movies “Mommy’s boyfriend” is portrayed in some sort of negative light-- asshole, abuser, whatever. It drives me nuts. Same thing with roles of “Step father.”

It really bugs me because I love the kid, and would like to be able to babysit whenever my GF needs to run errands or something, but these “seemingly decent and normal” fucktards that abuse children have forced me think twice about ever being alone with her.

Or am I just being overly cautious? Or is it impossible to be overly cautious in such a situation?

Happy

14

I know how you, feel, hyperjes. My paternal grandfather was almost my hero when I was growing up.

Then, I guess two or so years after I died, I found out about the other part of him. The part that molested my father and his 9 siblings (the step-brother didn’t live with them and so didn’t get molested). The part that knew his sons and one daughter were doing the same things to their siblings. The part who lied through his teeth when asked about anything that could possibly be bad about him. And his wife was no better.

15

Not that this will comfort you ** Happy Lendervedder**
but even 'tho I’m female, I was very strict about allowing the neighbor kids into my house when we lived in the burbs.
My husband and I were already pegged as “different” because we were the only ones without children on the block.
The kids would want to come in and play with the cats or dog but I just didn’t feel comfortable letting them in the house.

I also had a very good friend who was investigated by Child Protective Serivces because his stepdaughter accused him of abuse.
His crime?
He denied her internet access because her grades were failing and she mouthed off to her mother.
He was cleared, of course, but he refused to ever be alone in the house with the little bitch again.

16

Slight hijack - This is one of those statistical statements that always bothers me. Not that it is incorrect - but. There’s another side that is often overlooked, and that is that most people who were sexually abused DO NOT grow up to be sexual abusers. Most people who beat their kids were beaten, but most people who were beaten DO NOT beat their kids.

I grew up in a very abusive household. I am not an abusive person. Being abused is not an excuse for being an abuser - it’s obviously a significant contributor, but it is not the sole cause of abuse.

17

Are you sure about that, LifeOnWry? It seems like the problem should have snuffed itself out by now if there are very few “new” abusers, and most abuse lines tend to burn themselves out.

I’m not trying to suggest that we should immediately suspect people with abused pasts (having a somewhat abusive one myself, I’d like to think we can overcome such things), but I don’t think the logic of your statement works out.

18

Yeah, I am pretty sure. If you mean “do you have a statistical factoid that says so?” then no, I don’t. But the logic is sound. While the majority of abusers were themselves abused, that means there is a minority of abusers who were never themselves abused.

There are plenty of molesters who were never molested, beaters who were never beaten, rapists who were never raped, and obviously murderers who were never murdered (or even exposed to people who did murder.)

It’s the other way 'round - no one is suggesting that we should suspect people because they have been abused in the past. What is being suggested is that those who abuse must themselves have been abused. And we have to accept that sometimes, criminals spring from nowhere.

19

I don’t see any flaw in LifeOnWry’s observation. Yes, most abusers were abused. The point Life was making is that the way the statistic is often used implies that “all survivors of abuse will abuse eventually” which isn’t true.

Example/ there was a study that found that for the most part, those that suffer from bipolar disorder have high IQs. This does not mean that those with high IQs are all bipolar.

20

There’s actually a name for the “equation” but I can’t think of it. I remember in a sociology class many years ago figuring out logic problems along those lines, and the point of the exercise was to teach that what looks like flawless logic is sometimes nothing more than careful phrasing.

Basically, it was true/false statements with background, like, “If all tribbles are doohips, and all wahoos are doohips, then all tribbles are wahoos.” (Something like that, anyway.) Sounds “true” but it’s missing information.