Articles Posted in Sexual Assault

Bob Oliva, a former high school boy’s basketball coach has pleaded not guilty to two counts of child rape and one count of disseminating pornography to a minor. Oliva, 65, is charged with raping sexually assaulting a 14-year-old boy, who was a family friend, at the Boston Sheraton in 1976.

The alleged victim, Jimmy Carlino, is now 48-years-old. He reported the alleged sex crime to Boston police last year. Massachusetts prosecutors can prosecute Oliva for the 34-year-old sex assault case because the statute of limitations stayed frozen as long as the former coach lived outside the state.

Oliva, considered one of the top high school coaches in New York for almost 30 years, won more than 540 games and five city championships while coaching basketball at a high school in Queens.

Boston Sexual Assault Lawsuits
In addition to reporting a sex crime to the authorities, you may be able to file a Boston sexual assault lawsuit against your assailant or the entity that employed your perpetrator. Sexual assault can consist of rape, inappropriate fondling, molestation, unwelcome kissing, or other sexual acts.

Just last week, a jury awarded Kerry Lewis $1.4 million for the sex abuse he experienced at the hands of Timur Dykes during the 80’s. The 38-year-old former Boy Scout sued the Boy Scouts of America for his personal injuries. The jury will determine next week whether to order the defendant to pay up to $25 million in punitive damages. Dykes admitted to molesting 16 other boy scouts in addition to Lewis.

Sexual assault can be painful, traumatic, and may lead to lasting scars that can impede the victim’s ability to lead a normal, healthy, and happy life. The victim may end up with medical and therapy expenses because of physical, emotional, and psychological injuries brought about by the sex crime. Many instances involving Boston sexual abuse involve attackers that the victim knows or trusts, such as a family friend, a relative, a teacher, a priest, a coach, a doctor, a group leader.

Ex-high school coach pleads not guilty, ESPN, April 13, 2010
Former Christ the King coach Bob Oliva indicted on two counts of child rape by Mass. grand jury, NY Daily News, March 25, 2010 Former Boy Scout Kerry Lewis Wins Sex Abuse Case Against Boy Scouts, Gets $1.4 Million, CBS News, April 14, 2010
Related Web Resources:
U.S. courts allow sex abuse cases against Vatican to proceed in rare legal move, Washington Post, March 27, 2010
Child Sexual Abuse, American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry Continue reading

Experts are watching to determine the outcome of a clergy sex abuse case involving defrocked priest Paul Shanley. Shanley was convicted of child rape and indecent assault and battery for abusing a 27-year-old man when he was just a young boy.

The victim would go on to receive a $500,000 Boston child sex abuse settlement for his personal injuries. He accused Shanley of repeatedly abusing him when he was a Sunday school student in Newton. He said that the abuse incidents, which began when he was 6, took place in the rectory, the pews, the confessional, and the boys’ room. He said it wasn’t until the clergy sex abuse scandal occurred that he remember what happened to him.

Three other men that Shanley was initially accused of sexually abusing were later dropped from the criminal case. All four men said that they didn’t remember the abuse until years later when they recovered memories they had repressed.

Now, Shanley is questioning his conviction and the validity of repressed-recovered memories. While some experts believe that it is indeed possible to recover memories of child sex abuse, others are questioning whether such memories are reliable.

Yet there are many cases involving victims who were unable to remember the molestation incidents until years after they happened. Some child sex abuse victims were too scared to report the abuse at the time or may have been too young to even understand what was happening to them. As a result, they waited until they were older to come forward.

The Catholic Church in the US has spent over $2.5 billion in clergy sex abuse settlements. Over 550 sex abuse victims were in the Boston archdiocese.

Sexual Abuse
Regardless of how old you were when the sexual abuse happen, sex abuse is traumatic, violating, and can cause serious damage to a victim. Some people may have to spend years in therapy undoing the harm that was done to them. They may turn to drug addition, alcoholism, or suffer from eating disorders to cope. There may be grounds for filing a child sexual abuse lawsuit against the perpetrator.

Convicted ex-priest challenges repressed memories, AP, September 9, 2009
‘Repressed memory’ at issue in defrocked priest’s appealhttps://www.altmanllp.com/lawyer-attorney-1353569.html, Boston Globe, September 9, 2009

Related Web Resources:
Archdiocese of Boston

Differences In Recovered Memories Of Childhood Sexual Abuse, Science Daily, February 4, 2009 Continue reading

A former Buckingham Browne & Nichols student is suing the Cambridge, Massachusetts private school for the sexual abuse he says he suffered during the 80’s at the hands of an ex-English teacher. The man that Daniel Weinreib is accusing of abusing him, Edward Washburn, is now a convicted pedophile. He taught at the school for over two decades.

In his Massachusetts sexual abuse lawsuit, Weinreib, who graduated from the school in 1989, claims that Washburn sexually abused him from 1983 to 1985. He is seeking $1 million from the Cambridge school for personal damages and stress related to the abuse incidents that he maintains could have been prevented.

Last October, Head of School Rebecca Upham issued a public apology for the school’s failure to respond appropriately to Washburn’s actions. Weinreib, however, says that BB & N has failed to do enough to put into place preventative measures that would prevent future sex abuse incidents from happening.