Category Archives: volunteer background checks

Grooming: One Misstep at a Time

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Child molesters have specific ways of targeting children and using technology as a tool is one of the preferred methods.  It’s ironic that a child predator, who is devious and cunning, would utilize text messaging and social networking to make friends with children when most of this is traceable and can be shown to a parent at any time.  A child predators strategy to grooming their victims, which is the process a child predator uses to develop a friendship with the child, is used again and again until the child responds the way they want.   An off comment or a friendly text message that is slightly out of bounds of normal conversation is used to “soften” the victim up and “push the boundaries” for future communication.  By the time a child molester puts something in text that is clearly out of bounds, the child has engaged in enough communication to give the predator the confidence he or she needs to take the risk of stepping way out of bounds. 

As parents we should keep a close eye on all the social networking and texting our children are doing, so we are able to perceive a threat that our children might not see as a threat.  Children are more open to all forms of communication and explicit content.  Children are now “sexting” to each other, which is the process of sending nude pictures between their phones.  A joint study by The National Campaign to Prevent Teen and Unplanned Pregnancy and CosmoGirl suggests that 20% of teens (ages 13-19) and 33% of young adults (ages 20-26) have shared nude or semi-nude pictures of themselves either via text or by posting online. Teen girls are slightly more likely to do this than boys and 11% of the young teen girls (ages 13-16) admitted to sending suggestive photos of themselves.

Consider the recent arrest of a Former Boys and Girls Club Coach arrested for soliciting a girl.  A 27 year old man faces attempted child solicitation and improper communication with a child for asking the girl if she ever “touches” herself.  This question is clearly inappropriate, but some children might not realize that this is the behavior of a child predator and that questions like these are build up to what’s coming. 

In the case of Clifford Moran, he began grooming his victim by communicating with her through texts about friends, family and the 4th grade.  Then, it allegedly escalated to Moran wanting to see pictures of the young girl “maybe some naughty full body ones?”

According to Indiana Code of Law a person who solicits and improperly communicates with a child, as outlined in IC 35-42-4-6, is committing a felony:

Child solicitation    

Sec. 6. (a) As used in this section, “solicit” means to command, authorize, urge, incite, request, or advise an individual:
        (1) in person;
        (2) by telephone;
        (3) in writing;
        (4) by using a computer network (as defined in IC 35-43-2-3(a));
        (5) by advertisement of any kind; or
        (6) by any other means; to perform an act described in subsection (b) or (c).
   
Keep an eye on all your children’s correspondence with leaders in church, sports, school or any other activities.  A good rule of thumb is that no one over the age of 18 should be contacting your child directly, unless they come through you.  This might sound too conservative, but this policy can also help you prevent other issues like “sexting” and overall it can help you build a hedge of protection around your most precious gift, your children.

Get information on how to train your leaders to spot potential child abusers through Protect Youth Sports and get background checks and child safety training resources.

Penn State Scandal

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“All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing.” – Edmund Burke

Penn State Scandal

As I am sure you have heard by now, Penn State university has been rocked by the scandal of a former assistant coach, Jerry Sandusky, who is accused of sexually assaulting young boys beginning as early as the mid 90’s and continuing throughout and after his tenure at Penn State.

Where Did Coach Paterno Go Wrong?

According to the attorney general report there are several accusations of assault happening both on and off campus property with one in particular being witnessed by a graduate assistant who reported what he witnessed to head football coach Joe Paterno. Paterno then reported the incident to his immediate supervisor who escalated the incident to senior staff, but never University Police or local officials.

The Grand Jury concluded that the sexual assault of a minor male in 2002 should have been reported to the Pennsylvania Department of Public Welfare and/or a law enforcement agency such as University Police or the Pennsylvania State Police in accordance with Pennsylvania’s mandatory reporting statute for suspected child abuse.

Most people don’t’ disagree with Joe Paterno first reporting to his direct supervisor what he heard from his graduate assistant about Jerry Sandusky assaulting a boy in a Penn State athletics facility shower room. You shouldn’t have to go over your supervisor’s head and report an incident to the police. What we can’t accept is why he waited a day to tell Penn State athletic director Tim Curley and why he didn’t make sure that Curley went immediately to the police with the report. We now know that Curley did not go to the police at all – and Paterno left the matter alone.

What Can We Learn?

In the light of this horrific tragedy, being angry and shocked is simply not enough. What happened at Penn State needs to go beyond anger, surprise, sensationalism, and lengthy news coverage. Every organization that works with children needs to look at what happened and do some self- evaluation of their current sexual abuse prevention strategies.  Don’t be afraid to make changes.

Policies Protect Children

Start with a clear policy and guidelines on what is acceptable and not acceptable.  The consequences of not having a child protection policy in place far outweigh the cost of implementing them.  As fathers, mothers and caretakers we don’t care what the cost is to protect our own children.  Youth sport and recreation should have the same level of protection in place that you would choose for your own children. 

It’s not too difficult to establish a policy with clear, enforceable child protection guidelines.  The basic tenants of your policy should include background checks for staff and volunteers, including coaches and officials that work with minors.  Background checks of criminal and sex offender history that meet national standards typically cost around $10 to $20.  And because only 1 in 10 sexual abusers has a criminal history it is also imperative to have mandatory child safety training on the topic of sexual abuse prevention and awareness.  Be sure to get signed agreements from volunteers stating they have read and understand the policy and agree to adhere to the requirements of the policy. Enforcing the policy is essential to demonstrating that your organization has performed the necessary due diligence, in case someone still manages to slip through the cracks.

Children Won’t Always Tell

Next it is paramount that we figure out how to get kids to understand when something wrong has been done to them – and then report it to the right people. It is terrifying how pedophiles are able to keep their victims silent. Children remain silent because their abuser scares them into silence; there can also be shame and embarrassment, and sometimes even a feeling of affection for the person molesting them. Silence is terrible because it protects and enables the molester to keep on molesting, and it deprives the victims of the help they need. Studies have shown the average sexual predator victimizes 120 before being caught.

Predators Are On The Prowl

It is not enough to say “we know everyone” or “that will never happen here.” Our communities and youth sports program are a target for predators.  Predators are eager to volunteer to coach children and they especially like that they can get immediate access to children by coaching or officiating.  Predators don’t like to wait long before gaining access.  If access is not permitted they will move to another target.  The two-person rule is a great way to weed out any potential predators.  This requires 2 adults to be present with children at all times.

About Protect Youth Sports

Coach & Volunteer Background Checks through Protect Youth Sports are designed to help league officials implement and maintain a thorough background screening program for employees, staff and volunteers, while using simple paperless technology to streamline the process.

Protect Youth Sports can help you avoid many of the problems that occur with low quality, instant databases and state-level-only police checks, which lead to lead to missed records, incomplete records, out-of-date records and inadequate protection from sexual predators. Don’t put your children and organization at risk!

 Visit us www.protectyouthsports.com

False Identification and Background Check

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If you think a person should be able to submit their own background check to your organization, you might want to think again.

There are several issues with allowing a coach, volunteer or employee to retreive their own background check. They could submit for a background check and falsify the report before submitting it to your oganization. This has been the case at Johnston School Department when an applicant submitted false papers to the school department. According to the police report the applicant tried to get a job with the Johnston School Department as a volleyball coach. The applicant was arraigned on a charge of filing false documents and sent to the Adult Correctional Institutions on a previous warrant.

To verify a persons identification we recommend a Social Security Number (SSN) verification, including a name and date of birth check. By conducting a simple check like this we can verify a person’s identity and you can be sure the information they are providing is first of all true and accurate, then you can use this information to search court records and national database records for felony, misdemeanor and sex offender history. Every organization should take the responsibility to collect an applicant’s agreeement for a background check and perform the proper due dilligence, themselves, by conducting an SSN verification and criminal records search. This should be repeated annually as long as the volunteer or employee is in contact with youth or other vulnerable persons.

Published at www.protectyouthsports.com

Coach Background Checks

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The value of youth sports on a child’s development will vary depending on their experiences. Some kids will learn to enjoy competition in a healthy atmosphere that builds the emotional, physical and social skills necessary for their adult life and future development. They may learn to compete effectively with others, hone their skills and challenge themselves to achieve greater things. Their self confidence, poise under pressure and mental attitude could be affected for a lifetime and impact their future successes on and off the field.

But what happens to a kid that has a negative experience in youth sports? This can have as dramatic an affect as a positive experience. Instead of feeling more confident, they feel less confident. Instead of managing the pressures of life with poise, they avoid and distance themselves from others. Instead of developing a can do attitude, they are filled with thoughts that tell them they don’t’ measure up or will never be good enough. These are common and most kids will grow up and be just fine, eventually outgrowing or learning to deal with their insecurities.

A kids’ youth sports experience will certainly affect the rest of their lives one way or another, positive or negative. What about a kid that experiences sexual abuse? The emotional impact will last a lifetime and could even cause the abused child to perpetuate the cycle, by becoming the abuser. These are harsh realities of the world we live in and we need to limit these occurrences as best we can. Our kids have enough insecurities and negative thoughts to deal with, without the devastating impact of sexual abuse weighing them down.

The thought of a kid being sexually abused by a leader, mentor or coach is without a doubt terrifying. It causes us to feel a sense of disgust that leaves us unable to comprehend how someone could do that to a kid. That might be why we tend to avoid thinking about it, talking about it or preparing for it.

We spend a lot of time teaching kids what they need to learn to get better and be more successful, but are we teaching our volunteers and staff what they need to learn in order to protect our kids? The purpose of this article is to not only inform you about the reality of sexual abuse, but to also help you prevent this from happening in your league and organization.

First and foremost, you need to implement a Child Protection program and Policy. Your policy should require Training for all your volunteers, staff and employees to be educated on the realities of abuse and the signs to look for. Your policy should also require all volunteer, coaches and staff to pass a background check.

First, let’s start by telling our volunteers and staff the facts about sexual abuse and sexual abusers.

Facts about Sexual Abuse and Sexual Abusers:

  • Sexual Molesters will seek access to children where protective barriers are low.
    • Only 10% of sexual predators will EVER encounter the criminal justice system.
    o As a result, your criminal background check – even if it works perfectly – will only identify a fraction of those who want to abuse children in your programs.
    o Sexual abusers KNOW when there is nothing for you to find – even if you run a check.
    o Background checks are important, but have limitations: NOT A SILVER BULLET!
    o If a background check is ALL we do, our security blanket is the size of a place mat.
  •  1 of 3 girls and 1 of 6 boys will be sexually molested before reaching age 18.
    o THIS IS AN ISSUE OF EPIDEMIC PROPORTION … AND IS GROWING.
    • 66% of molestation victims will not tell until adulthood (if ever).
    • Male molesters preferring boys will have an average of 150 victims before prosecution.
    • Male molesters preferring girls will have an average of 52 victims before prosecution.
    • 85% of convicted molesters are men; 15% of convicted molesters are women.
    • 90% of sexual abuse victims are abused by someone they know and trust.
    o Amber alerts and the ‘snatch and grab’ are a fraction of sexual abuse occurrences.
    o the greater risk is from those we allow coach our teams or parents
  •  Sexual molesters will groom children AND gatekeepers prior to sexual behavior.
    o staff members and volunteer leaders are gatekeepers
    o staff members and volunteer leaders MUST understand and recognize grooming process
  •  There is NO visual profile for a molester.
    o most molesters appear helpful, trustworthy, kind and safe
    o to recognize a molester, gatekeepers MUST understand and recognize grooming process

If education were as simple as providing a handout to our volunteers, coaches and staff that would be great; unfortunately that is not enough if we expect them to help us prevent abuse. Against this backdrop Protect Youth Sport has create online Child Safety Training that you can now use to conduct training with your volunteers. The training includes an interactive online video training, testing and certification, for awareness of sexual abuse and abusers and how to prevent and report abuse.

Background Checks are a must.

Background checks have become a standard practice in youth sports, as coach violence and sexual abuse and harassment have become more frequent occurrences.

First and foremost, background checks are necessary as a matter of safety:
• Discover previous arrest and convictions for sexual and/or violent offenses
• Protect your organization from legal liability and lawsuits
• Prevent allegations of negligent selection and hiring

A proper background check should be part of your risk management strategy, including documented protection policies, procedures and child abuse prevention training.

We are often asked by youth sports organizations, “What type of criminal background check should I do for my staff, employees and volunteers?” Protect Youth Sports has consulted with thousands of youth sports organizations to help them understand the types of criminal records sources. Protect Youth Sport has even developed an online consultation system, so you can view recommendations for criminal background checks in each state. When searching the “national” criminal database it′s important to understand what jurisdictions are included in the database, how often the records are updated, what identifiers are/are not given, what search parameters are used, and what compliance issues are associated with a database “hit” as it relates to the FCRA §613.

Protect Youth Sport’s recommendations include a criminal background check, as well as a “true” 50 states sex offender registries search with several states that must be searched by “name-only”, because some states do not provide date of birth on the offenders. A social security number verification is included to verify the correct name and date of birth of the applicant and to alert you to possible mis-matches between the name provided by the applicant and the name registered to the social security number. A mis-match could indicate that the applicant is attempting to hide their true identity.

Protect Youth Sports is one of very few companies serving the coach background check marketplace that offers an FCRA §613 compliant “national” criminal database search for youth sports. Protect Youth Sports sends “instant” results for “no-hit” records. For “hit” records there is a 24-48 hour process of re-verification, in which the county courthouse records are updated to the “national” criminal database records, prior to sending results back.

Protect Youth Sports makes recommendations for your state and also does a complete re-check of all background check hits, so you get the right information the first time, before you qualify or disqualify coaches from volunteering.

A background check can also have a pre-screening affect whereby repelling any would be offenders from even applying to work with the kids. Of course this will only repel those who have prior criminal records.

Summary:
Youth sports decision makers must make sure to cover all the bases when it comes to protecting youngsters in their programs. When recruiting and evaluating volunteers, no youth sports administrator wants to strike out by appointing someone who may not be qualified for the job, or who puts children in danger. To help decision makers with these crucial responsibilities Protect Youth Sports, one of the nations’ premier background check providers, introduces an all new system for leagues and associations to totally manage their volunteer youth sports coaches background checks and training.

About Protect Youth Sports:
Coach Background Checks through industry expert Protect Youth Sports are designed to help leagues and youth sports officials implement and maintain a thorough background screening process and child abuse prevention program for volunteers, staff and employees. Preventing sexual predators and violent offenders from working with children and youth is our primary concern.

Many of the problems that youth sports leagues encounter with background checks are caused by low quality, instant checks and state-level-only background checks. Instant checks and state-level-only checks lead to missed records, incomplete records, out-of-date records and inadequate protection from sexual predators.

Protect Youth Sports has established a firm and reputable standing within the youth sports market for background screening. Benefitting from this very much proven history could not be any simpler, as over 5,000 organizations have found.

Visit www.protectyouthsports.com
Call (877) 319-5587

15 Arrested in Undercover Child Sex Sting

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Fifteen men allegedly looking to have sex with underage girls were arrested last weekend in an undercover sting in Florida, law enforcement authorities said.

The suspects were arrested between Thursday and Sunday and charged with traveling to meet a minor for sex or related crimes, during an extensive undercover operation conducted by the Polk County Sheriff’s Office, along with state and federal officials.

“These men expressed specific desires to prey upon who they believed were innocent children,” Polk County Sheriff Grady Judd said Monday at a news conference. 

Police said 12 of the 15 suspects responded to ads posted on Craigslist by authorities that had a similar theme “mom or dad seeking guidance for my daughter” for girls between 10 and 14 years old.  A chat room was used in the other three cases.

“Some of the men even sent pornographic images of themselves to the detectives and made very specific requests about what they wanted these children to do to them,”  Judd said.

When the suspects arrived at the undercover location, they were met, not by the children wearing lingerie as they had hoped, but by undercover agents in vests who placed the men under arrest.

Judd said one of the agents was shocked to discover that a suspect, 33-year-old Tommy Dupre, had been his son’s former baseball coach. ”This gentleman coached youth sports baseball in Lakeland. Our undercover sergeant recognized him because he coached his son 8-10 years of age,” Judd said.

The wife of Kevin Scott, 35, was shocked to hear the news of her husband’s arrest, telling police, “I never want to see him again, I don’t want my children see him again, I hope he rots in jail for life.”

For information on  screening your coaches, click here