[lettie]

This is such a contentious issue but the fact remains that most child sex abusers are somebody that the child knows and trusts. They are either family members, friends of the family, somebody who works at their school, nursery or youth club etc or neighbours. This is not a new problem but a problem that seems to be spiralling out of control due to media hype and the fact that this form of abuse is more likely to be reported these days when the actual figures are probably no higher now than they were 50 years ago.

Naming and shaming would probably not achieve very much. I do know someone who had allegations made against him in a local paper several years ago. He endured over 12 months of verbal and physical abuse from neighbours and members of the public before being found innocent. It was also found that the child in question had lied. I met this man during the course of my work, he has since moved out of the area because he said that even though the paper printed the full story and apology after his 12 month ordeal, he was still on the receiving end of threats, name-calling and general distrust, the child in question got off scott free. Now I know that this is not a one off case because it is currently happening to a colleagues brother, who has also just been found to be innocent of any wrong doing and the 14 year old girl making the allegations has finally admitted to fabricating her story based on a teenage crush. These 2 cases that I know of have ruined innocent peoples lives and have shown that you really are guilty until proven innocent in the eyes of the media. Neither of these cases ever went to court but because these people were named by the media their lives have been made hell when neither of them had done anything wrong.
I like to think that I have the good sense not to believe anything that the newspapers print and try to keep in the back of my mind that they are there to sensationalise mundane stories in order to sell papers. As for Maxine Carr, the only thing she did wrong was to fall in love with an evil man. He not only got her to give him an alibi but managed to slip through the net of the police and education authorities. Even the sharpest tool in the box can be taken in by aimiable persuasive people with hidden agendas.