Bucks County leaders joined the Network of Victim Assistance in urging all county residents to participate in a comprehensive, three-year program to eradicate the sexual victimization of children
The Times
Bucks County leaders joined the Network of Victim Assistance in urging all county residents to participate in a comprehensive, three-year program to eradicate the sexual victimization of children.
Bucks County is one of five Pennsylvania counties chosen to participate in a pilot program known as the Safe and Healthy Communities Initiative.
The initiative — funded through penalties levied against Penn State after the Jerry Sandusky case — combines parental training, school workshops for young children and free sexual abuse prevention sessions aimed at reaching at least 5 percent of Bucks County’s adult population, or about 25,000 people.
“Child sexual abuse is an epidemic,” said Penelope R. Ettinger, executive director of NOVA.
According to the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, one in 10 children will be sexually abused by age 18.
Vital to prevention, and the impetus behind the ambitious reach of the adult training program, known as “Darkness to Light: Stewards of Children,” is helping adults to recognize signs of sexual abuse in children, and to educate them in how and when to report suspected abuse to authorities.
The Darkness to Light component is a two-hour session run by a trained facilitator. Participants are educated in facts related to child sexual abuse; ways of minimizing opportunities for potential predators to have access to children; strategies for talking to children about safe and unsafe touches and how to tell adults about potential abuse; recognizing symptoms of child sexual abuse, such as emotional and behavioral changes; and knowing how to report suspected abuse.
“We can have all the knowledge and tools in the world, but if we do not react responsibly to abuse, it does us no good, it does the children no good,” said Grace Wheeler, NOVA’s coordinator for the Safe and Healthy Communities Initiative.
A reminder of what can happen to children when adults fail to acknowledge signs of child sexual abuse came from Lyndlee Dull, who was victimized as a child by William Thomas of Falls Township. Thomas, 61, was sentenced in 2017 to serve 60 to 120 years in state prison for sexually assaulting at least six girls over a span of two decades.
Dull stressed the importance of prevention, saying the suffering of child victims endures long after the abuse ends. Guilt, depression, suicidal thoughts, low self-esteem and the inability to maintain intimate, trusting relationships can haunt survivors throughout their lives, she said.
“I am nearly 35 years old, and only through the help of NOVA have I found who I can truly be, without being robbed by the monsters of my past of all that life has to offer,” Dull said at the news conference.
County Commissioners Chairman Robert G. Loughery, Commissioner Diane M. Ellis-Marseglia and District Attorney Matthew D. Weintraub pledged to strongly encourage county employees to take the Darkness to Light training.
“Protecting our children is a priority for county government, but it needs to be a priority for each and every one of us,” Loughery said.
Marseglia, whose professional background is in social work, said child sexual abuse had evolved from a topic that was only whispered about in the 1970s to a priority for law enforcement, schools, social services and other public and private entities.
“We are going to turn to our entire community to become the eyes and ears for our children, to speak up for our children,” she said.
Weintraub, whose office successfully prosecuted William Thomas, said police and prosecutors still encounter denial among some adults that child sexual abuse is as widespread as it is.
“We have to educate people and make sure that they know and understand that these things do happen in the real world, whether we like it or not, whether we keep our eyes open or closed,” he said.
For more information, a schedule of upcoming trainings and information on how to sign up for Darkness to Light training, click on novabucks.org/free-training-on-child-sexual-abuse-prevention/ or contact Grace Wheeler at grace@novabucks.org or 215–343–6543, Ext. 166.
Anyone seeking to report child sexual abuse may call Bucks County Children and Youth at 215–348–6900 or Childline at 800–932–0313. ••
