Child Sexual Abuse

A Windsor Mill man pleaded guilty yesterday to distributing child pornography, said the Maryland U.S. attorney's office. Steven Kruger, 63, met an officer who was posing as a 13-year-old girl on the Internet. He sent pictures of himself and pornographic photos, and he wrote about meeting her, according to Rod J. Rosenstein's office. Search warrants were executed, and officers found an e-mail in which Kruger attached photos documenting child sexual abuse. Kruger admitted sending child pornography, authorities said.

The starvation death last summer of 9-year-old Rita Denise Fisher has prompted officials at two levels of government to revamp their policies in hopes of better identifying and preventing what they call premeditated, "evil" child abuse.Besides pledging to bolster the staff at Baltimore County's overburdened Department of Social Services, state and county officials yesterday said they would set policies to establish better communication between social workers and doctors, teachers, police officers and others in the community.

Victims of rape and child sexual abuse told their moving stories of survival yesterday in an effort to convince County Commissioners not to approve proposed budget cuts to counseling programs."

A former Naval Academy midshipman will spend 90 days in the Anne Arundel County jail for sexually abusing the 2-year-old granddaughter of an Annapolis couple with whom he spent weekends.Jeremy Michael Coale, 20, was sentenced yesterday by Anne Arundel Circuit Judge Raymond G. Thieme Jr. He pleaded guilty to child sexual abuse Aug. 12.Coale, from East Grand Rapids, Mich., could have been sentenced to 15 years.Assistant State's Attorney Laura Kiessling said that since Coale arrived at the academy in September 1995, he had spent weekends at the Eastport house of a couple volunteering in a program to give midshipmen a home away from home.

A 34-year-old Westminster woman pleaded guilty yesterday to child sexual abuse involving two Taylorsville girls last summer.In exchange for the guilty pleas, prosecutors dropped related charges against the woman, who had lived with the family of one of the victims. The woman's name is being withheld to protect the victims' privacy. The girls were 12 and 5 when the abuse occurred.Prosecutors said yesterday that the woman made advances to the older child first. Later, she included the younger child in the acts.

A 47-year-old Upperco man accused of sexually molesting his step-grandson corroborated key parts of the boy's story in a poem he wrote while being held at the Carroll County Detention Center, a trooper who investigated the case testified yesterday.For example, the poem -- which described the defendant performing sexual acts with the 8-year-old boy -- talked about being "all wrapped up in a nice pink quilt," said Tfc. Joseph M. Newcomer of the county child sexual abuse unit.The poem was given to jail officials by the defendant's cellmate, who said he was concerned about his safety after reading it, Trooper Newcomer told the jurors during the third day of testimony in Carroll County Circuit Court.

A 47-year-old Upperco man who has HIV, the virus that causes AIDS, was convicted yesterday of assault with intent to murder and reckless endangerment in the sexual assault of his 9-year-old step-grandson.This is the first Maryland case in which a jury has convicted someone who has the human immunodeficiency virus of child sexual abuse and assault with intent to commit murder.The Carroll County man -- who is not being named to protect the victim's privacy -- was convicted on all 10 child-abuse counts he faced in the 1994 assaults.

Carroll County jurors are expected to continue deliberations today in the case of a 47-year-old Upperco man accused of sexually abusing his wife's grandson about a year ago.County Circuit Judge Raymond E. Beck Sr. sent the jury of six men and six women home about 7:30 last night. The panel is expected to reconvene this morning at 9 a.m.The man -- who is not being named to protect the child's privacy -- was charged in November 1994 with rape and child sexual abuse. He was also charged with assault with intent to murder because he has HIV, the virus that causes AIDS.

A former Taneytown man, now living in Tennessee, has been charged with sexually abusing three girls here between 1960 and 1970.Ronnie Lane Robertson, 48, of Roan Mountain, Tenn., is accused in a three-count indictment of child sexual abuse. The children were between the ages of 1 and 13 at the time of the alleged abuse.Mr. Robertson is the brother of Roy Monroe Robertson, who also faces child sexual abuse charges.He is being held in the Carroll County Detention Center in lieu of $75,000 bond.

By receiving a 145-year prison sentence, a 29-year-old Carroll County man has the dubious honor of facing the longest sentence for child sexual abuse of anyone now in the Maryland prison system. We should take comfort from the fact that he will be behind bars for decades but also realize that this century-plus sentence won't deter others from committing the same crime.Adults who sexually exploit children are psychologically twisted people. They have problems maintaining normal adult relationships.

Appeal of sentence is denied A Columbia man who was sent to prison for 60 years after being convicted in 2004 of second-degree murder and physically abusing his then-2-year-old stepson was denied an appeal to have his sentence reduced. Marcus Owens, then 33, was found guilty in June 2004 of killing Kevonte Davis and received the maximum sentence - 30 years for murder and 30 for abuse leading to the child's death - from Howard County Circuit Judge Diane O. Leasure, who also presided over the reconsideration hearing.

The Archdiocese of Baltimore has removed the pastor of a Cumberland church as it investigates allegations that he sexually abused a minor in the 1970s, the archdiocese announced Sunday. Monsignor Thomas Bevan, pastor of St. Patrick Church since 1997, has denied the allegations, according to the archdiocese. Representatives of the archdiocese met with parishioners and staff at St. Patrick on Sunday to inform them of the allegations and to answer questions, according to the archdiocese.

A Windsor Mill man pleaded guilty yesterday to distributing child pornography, said the Maryland U.S. attorney's office. Steven Kruger, 63, met an officer who was posing as a 13-year-old girl on the Internet. He sent pictures of himself and pornographic photos, and he wrote about meeting her, according to Rod J. Rosenstein's office. Search warrants were executed, and officers found an e-mail in which Kruger attached photos documenting child sexual abuse. Kruger admitted sending child pornography, authorities said.

Statistics are more than just numbers to Kenneth Smith. Five years ago, he attended a dinner sponsored by an NFL group to raise money for a residential center for traumatized children. During the dinner, Smith said he learned that one in three girls, and one in seven boys, is sexually abused by age 18. "When I heard the statistics, I thought with those statistics, children aren't safe," said Smith, 51, of Bel Air, who has three grown children. "I felt that more needed to be done to bring the statistics out in the open."

A 42-year-old Western Maryland man convicted of child sexual abuse in 1986 has been sentenced to 25 years in prison for videotaping himself having sex with three boys between the ages of 10 and 14, according to the Maryland U.S. attorney's office. Larry Cordell of Frederick pleaded guilty to sexually exploiting minors for the purpose of producing child pornography. Prosecutors said they seized 10 videotapes showing the abuse and that Cordell enticed the victims with money. The victims identified themselves from the tapes, prosecutors said.

A registered sex offender who helped coach a recreation soccer team in Baltimore until last month has been charged with sexually abusing an 8-year-old boy in the man's Reisterstown home, police said yesterday. Richard David Morris Jr., 24, was charged with child sexual abuse and other offenses after investigators learned that he had planned to take the boy and two others on a trip to Florida, Baltimore County police said. The charges against Morris were filed last week, seven years after he registered as a sexually violent offender and child sex offender because he had been convicted of abusing a toddler boy. He had volunteered as an assistant soccer coach for about three months this year at the Roosevelt Park Recreation Center in Hampden, according to a spokeswoman for the city's Department of Recreation and Parks.

The arrest of two Howard County high school teachers last week on charges of sexually abusing students sent shock waves through the county, but to Ellen Mugmon, the alternative is far worse. When the Ellicott City mother and children's advocate began crusading to change Howard County school system policies for these kinds of incidents two decades ago, the reception was very different. "School systems in the past used to pass the trash," by firing teachers, who would then often go to another school or another state, she said.

Poor Irvin J. Harris. Only 11 years old when he was stabbed to death and left in a wooded area of Northeast Baltimore, the kid really didn't stand a chance. The list of people who failed Harris is either a very long one or a very short one, depending on where you think ultimate responsibility lies. Let's start with police, prosecutors and judges, who stand accused of allowing the man charged with killing Harris to be on the streets when he should have been in prison. That man is Melvin L. Jones Jr., who has a history of child sexual abuse convictions.

Courting the attention of no one in particular, the young girl dressed in knee-high boots, a miniskirt and heavy makeup saunters along the pathway that snakes alongside the basketball courts at a Westminster playground. Although her provocative attire suggests there is more to her story, this much is clear: the carefree days of a 10-year-old seem to have eluded the pretty fifth-grader. Fortunately, for Rachel Kotmair of Westminster, it's all an act. On a recent sunny day, the scene is captured on camera for It's Up To Us, an instructional video that will be used to train teachers, doctors, ministers and community organizations, such as local parent-teacher associations, about the importance of reporting suspected child sexual abuse.

For now, Michael Jackson is off the hook - but society may not be so fortunate. The entertainer, of course, beat the rap this month in his child molestation trial, yet its tawdriness was just the latest element undermining the once-wistful notion of childhood. No matter what the jury decided about Jackson, the damage was already done: Childhood has been sullied by suspicion and innuendo. From revelations about child sexual abuse by Catholic clergy to what feels like an increasing number of news accounts of teachers, coaches and parents accused of sexually abusing minors, the world seems awash in imperiled urchins and predatory grown-ups.