sexual abuse

1. The forcing of unwanted sexual activity by one person on another, as by the use of threats or coercion.
2. Sexual activity that is deemed improper or harmful, as between an adult and a minor or with a person of diminished mental capacity.

Sexual acts performed with children or with nonconsenting adults in a criminal manner.

Illegal sex acts performed against a minor by a parent, guardian, relative, or acquaintance.

Sexual abuse is a general term for any type of sexual activity inflicted on a child by someone with whom the child is acquainted. It is considered an especially heinous crime because the abuser occupies a position of trust. Until the 1970s the prevalence of sexual abuse had been seriously underestimated. Growing awareness of the problem led legislatures to enact reporting requirements, which mandate that any professional person (doctor, nurse, teacher, social worker) who knows or has reason to believe that a child is being abused report this information to the local welfare agency or law enforcement department. Statistics vary widely about the level of sexual abuse, but most researchers agree that it occurs at a higher rate than previously believed. Experts on the subject estimate that more than 130,000 children a year are sexually abused in the United States.

Perpetrators of sexual abuse are prosecuted under state criminal law statutes that have been toughened for sexual assaults on minors. The prosecution of reported sexual abuse has required children to testify in court about the abuse. Children are often unwilling to testify against the abuser, who may be a family member and may exert control over the victim. To relieve these pressures, courts have allowed the use of closed-circuit television to protect the child witness from the trauma of testifying in court before the defendant, expanded the hearsay evidence exception to allow testimony about what the child said if the child lacks a motive to lie or if the child uses sexual terminology unexpected of a child, and made rules that suspended the statute of limitations until the abusive conduct is discovered.

During the 1980s a rash of sexual abuse cases involving day care centers drew national attention. The McMartin preschool case in Manhattan Beach, California, which began in 1984, accused a group of day care employees of sexual abuse and bizarre rituals of animal sacrifice. Though none of the defendants was ever convicted, similar allegations around the United States resulted in 113 convictions.

A difference of opinion exists within the legal and medical communities over the truthfulness of child witness testimony in sexual abuse cases. Prosecutors and some health professionals argue that children do not lie. Defense attorneys and social researchers contend that faulty interviewing by parents, psychologists, and law enforcement can lead children to make up stories. Leading questions and demands that a child reveal abuse can pressure the child into making false statements in order to please the questioner.

The debate over child witnesses has led many law enforcement agencies to develop standard investigatory protocols that seek to prevent contamination of the child's testimony. Interviews are routinely videotaped to document the interview process.

Apart from criminal remedies, in the 1980s child abuse victims gained the ability to sue their abusers for damages. Before that time, civil remedies were available only for child victims who filed claims soon after attaining the age of majority. State courts and legislatures accepted the concept of repressed memory, in which traumatic episodes are repressed by the victim for many years. In more than twenty-three states, adults who "recover" their memories of childhood sexual abuse, either spontaneously or through psychiatric and psychological counseling, may now bring a civil lawsuit against the perpetrator. These states have rewritten their laws to start the statute of limitations from the time the victim knows or has reason to know that sexual abuse occurred.

During the 1980s and 1990s, many lawsuits were filed using these new laws. Adults successfully sued a number of Roman Catholic priests for sexual abuse that the victims had endured many years before. Health professionals argued that the victims needed the lawsuits as much for therapeutic as legal reasons. Confronting the abuser and holding the abuser accountable for the actions is a significant step for the victim, who often feels shame, guilt, and responsibility for the abuse.

However, a controversy has arisen over the validity of recovered memories. The dispute centers on memories that are coaxed or brought forth through the efforts of therapists. Some experts in law and mental health question the veracity of these memories and challenge their use as the evidentiary basis for lawsuits over conduct that allegedly occurred years, and sometimes decades, in the past. They contend that these are "implanted memories," brought about by hypnosis, truth serums, and therapists' suggestive remarks. They are also troubled that therapists may be allowed to testify as expert witnesses, when there is no scientific evidence to support their theories regarding recovered memories.

A 1994 California lawsuit by Gary Ramona was the first case in the United States where an alleged abuser won a large damages award against the therapist who had treated his child. Ramona's daughter Holly had filed suit, accusing her father of sexually molesting her when she was a child. As a result of the lawsuit and the charges, Ramona's wife divorced him and he lost his high-paying job. He argued that Holly's recollections were the result of the psychiatrist's giving her the hypnotic drug sodium amytal and then eliciting from her confabulations, or false but coherent memories spliced together from true events, that convinced Holly that she had been abused by her father. The jury agreed with the father, awarding him $500,000. The jury concluded that the recovered memories were unreliable and that the methods used to elicit them were improper.

See: children's rights; infants.

Unwanted sexual activity forced on a person by another through coercion or threats.

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