A Dallas-area child psychiatrist had to register as a sex offender after pleading no contest to charges of taking indecent liberties with a 10-year-old girl. But Dr. William Olmsted can still keep his medical license. The Texas Medical Board will allow Olmsted to practice as long as he does it in a group setting and stays away from kids. (It’s not clear how he’s going to practice child psychiatry if he can’t have contact with kids. Maybe teleconferencing?)
But now, a second family has come forward to say that Olmsted behaved inappropriately when he treated their 10-year-old daughter, the Dallas Morning News reports. In 2005, the family says, Olmsted dropped his pants in front of the girl. Her parents pulled the girl out of treatment and reported the incident to the medical board, but say there was no follow-up.
“To find that the state board knew of not one but two complaints of impropriety with young girls and yet allowed this doctor to continue his practice with children is unconscionable,” the father wrote in a statement. “I am severely disappointed with the state of Texas right now and doubtful of its ability to stand watch.”
At least one state legislator is looking into whether laws need to be changed so doctors don’t get to keep their licenses so easily. The Texas Medical Board says that currently, licenses are revoked only if a doctor is convicted. Although Olsted pleaded no-contest to the charges, he received a sentence of six years’ deferred adjudication in January, which means that judgment will not be decided until then. The victim was a neighbor of Olmsted’s who was visiting his kids when he touched her inappropriately and sucked her toes.
One Kentucky church is extremely forgiving. On Sunday, the City of Refuge Worship Center ordained a sex offender as a pastor. Mark Hourigan, 41, was convicted in 1998 of two felony counts of sexual abuse of an 11-year-old boy. He served more than four years in prison and has to register as a sex offender for life (see his registry mug shot above).
Randy Meadows, one of the church’s pastors, told WAVE TV News that Hourigan, who joined the City of Refuge two years ago, has paid his debt to society. But others aren’t so sure. Protesters marched in front of the church in Germantown, Ky., on Sunday, and some of them compared Hourigan’s ordination to the Catholic Church’s cover-up of pedophile priests. “I’m scared for the children of Germantown,” one resident said.
While many states have laws barring sex offenders from trolling Web sites such as MySpace or even driving ice cream trucks, Kentucky apparently has no statute forbidding them from becoming ministers. City of Refuge did make one restriction on Hourigan — he can’t have any contact with kids.
Teens have been doing it, now it’s teachers’ turn.
A Detroit-area middle school teacher allegedly sent 10 sexually explicit text messages and a partially nude photo of herself to one of her 14-year-old students. Michelle Simsonson, 28, has been charged with enticing a minor for immoral purposes and distributing sexually explicit material to a minor.
Simsonson had been the boy’s teacher during the past school year, but has since resigned from Sashabaw Middle School, the Detroit Free Press reported. She was arraigned in court last week.
The boy told investigators that he and his teacher began texting each other in the fall, but then the content became more sexually explicit. He said he told her to stop and that there was never physical contact between the two.
If convicted, Simsonson faces up to four years in prison.
A New York social studies teacher pleaded guilty on Tuesday to having sex with a male student seven times in an empty second floor classroom after school.
Melissa Weber, 28, who taught at a public school in Queens, NY, has given up her teaching license and will enter sex-offender treatment, the New York Daily News reported. For the second-degree rape plea, she was sentenced to 10 years probation and is barred from all social networking sites frequented by minors.
The boy’s mom found out about the sex incidents when she looked at her son’s cell phone and saw messages and calls from Weber. The teacher’s lawyer says that Weber is remorseful and that her behavior was the result of a dysfunctional childhood.
When Weber was initially charged, she denied the allegations. She told police that the teen had been the aggressor and grabbed her butt.
Photo from Facebook
Jennifer Rice had a sexual relationship with a 10-year-old boy for several months while she was teaching at an elementary school in Tacoma, Wash., prosecutors said. She also had sex with the boy’s older brother, who was 15 at the time.
Last week, Rice was sentenced to 25 years to life in prison — she won’t be eligible for release until she serves at least 25 years, the Olympian reported. “I am desperately sorry for what I have done,” Rice said in court.
The 33-year-old mother of three kids was caught in August 2007, after she sneaked the boy out of his home and drove him to another town, where they had sex at a rest stop. Rice received a mandatory tough prison sentence thanks to laws passed after another Washington teacher — Mary Kay Letourneau – was convicted of having sex with a student. Certain child molestation charges are deemed as predatory offenses when a teacher is accused of crimes involving a student.
Rice’s husband, Jason, says he still loves and supports her. “We would give anything to change what’s happened,” he told the court.
A federal judge has sentenced Aaron Bruns, a former Fox News producer, to 10 years in prison for possessing child porn, according to the Associated Press.
As Minor Troubles readers will recall, Bruns, 29, had previously been convicted for child porn. In February, federal agents found photos and videos on Bruns computer depicting “children under the age of 10 being sexually abused by adult men and women.” In May, Bruns plead guilty to possession of child porn.
When Bruns was just a 19-year-old college student, he also pleaded guilty to distributing child pornography online, a crime for which he received three years probation. When police raided his University of Michigan dorm room, they found approximately 6,000 pornographic images of children.
A former NPR editor who pleaded guilty to watching videos of children being raped will not have to spend any time in prison for the crime.
David Malakoff will have to register as a sex offender for 25 years, pay a fine of $500 and do 600 hours of community service. But he will not be required to do the six to eight years of prison time recommended by federal sentencing guidelines, according to the Washington Examiner.
In deciding against a prison sentence, the judge cited Malakoff’s abuse as a child. He’d been raped as a 9-year-old boy, and had looked at videos of child rape and sexual abuse for a period of five hours as a way to relive his own rape.
Before the judge’s decision, Malakoff, 46, apologized to the court: “I am ashamed. I am horrified. Most of all because I know their story. I have made their lives worse. I am so sorry,” Malakoff said. He said he will be haunted forever by the images of the children being raped, “their distant eyes, their blank faces.”
As Minor Troubles readers will recall, Malakoff worked as an editor and on-air correspondant for National Public Radio until June of 2008.
A Chicago-area man accused of child porn has so far avoided jail, but a federal judge has ordered that he must pull down the shades in his home from dawn to dusk and turn over all of his cameras.
Mario Meschino, a former public school bus driver, has been charged with possessing, receiving and transporting child porn over the Internet. He’s admitted to having sexual images of minors on his computer as well as taking pics of clothed kids who rode his school bus, according to a criminal affadavit.
He hasn’t been convicted of any crime yet and is currently out on bond. But dozens of his neighbors in Plainfield, Ill., went to court this week, complaining that he has been taking photos of area kids from inside his home, the Chicago Sun-Times reported. Authorities said they found photos of neighborhood kids — all clothed — when they searched Meschino’s home and computer. It appeared that the kids did not know they were being photographed.
On Wednesday, a judge declined to revoke Meschino’s bond but instead made the unusual order for the suspect to shut his window shades. However, Judge Martin Ashman admitted that the photos were “somewhat creepy,” although “you don’t revoke a bond because of creepiness.”
Meschino’s lawyer said that the neighbors were too paranoid and were unfairly convicting Meschino before trial. But neighbors said they feel their kids are being stalked. “We’re not going to feel comfortable until he’s in prison,” said one neighbor who owns a pool adjacent to Meschino’s backyard.
Photo by Dana Graves
The mother of a 15-year-old girl repeatedly allowed her daughter to have sex with a 25-year-old parolee, authorities allege.
In San Bernardino County, cops caught 25-year-old parolee Anthony Vaux and the Victorville girl in the act on Sunday at the Travelodge hotel, according to the Associated Press. The fuzz had gotten a tip that the couple would be found there and that her mother knew all about it.
Vaux had his parolee revoked and was booked on charges of felony unlawful sex with a minor. A complaint about the mother has been sent to prosecutors, but so far no charges have been filed against her.
Hernandez
A Florida mom not only endorsed her son’s sexual relations with a teacher, but allowed them to go to Disney World for a weekend getaway. That’s according to accusations from Miami police.
Her 15-year-old son allegedly had an affair with a sixth grade teacher at his religious school, the Miami Herald reported. Shortly after the couple got back from Disney World on Saturday, Maria Guzman Hernandez, 32, was arrested. She was charged with sexual battery on a child over whom she had custodial authority. The boy has been suspended from Our Lady of Charity school.
The boy’s mother, 44, is disputing just exactly what she knew about the affair. On Wednesday, a judge ordered that mother and son undergo psychological testing and counseling. He also warned that the relationship between the boy and his teacher had to end and the mom mustn’t encourage it.