Verdict In Maryland Deaf School Sex Abuse Case

Deaf News: Clarence Taylor III found guilty of sex abuse at Maryland School for the Deaf.

FREDERICK, Maryland -- A Howard County Circuit Court jury in the Maryland School for the Deaf sex abuse case handed down a mixed result Wedneday, finding the defendant guilty of two charges of child sexual abuse, not guilty of one count and declaring a mistrial in the four remaining counts.

Clarence Cepheus Taylor III, 38, was found guilty by the 12-member jury, who began deliberations Friday, of groping two girls while working as an aide at the school from 2008 to 2011.

Taylor, who is Deaf, had his bond revoked by Judge William Tucker and is scheduled to be sentenced on the two guilty verdicts on Jan. 31, 2014, with a retrial on the four non-decision counts scheduled for May 21, 2014.

A split verdict is reached by jurors and a mistrial is declared by the judge for some charges in the Howard County sexual abuse trial of a former aide for the Maryland School for the Deaf. Barry Simms files this report on 11 News at Noon.

Earlier in the trial, three counts of solicitation of child pornography were dropped by the State's Attorney's office after the prosecution could not prove the events happened in Howard County.

Those charges accused Taylor of text messaging three of the students and requesting pictures of their breasts, according to the prosecution.

Taylor faces a maximum of 50 years in prison 25 years for each guilty count. According to prosecutor and Assistant State's Attorney Lisa Broten, the state's recommendations for such convictions usually fall between seven and 13 years per count.

As Taylor was handcuffed after his bond was revoked, his wife, who is on leave from her employment at the school, left the courtroom fighthing tears.

A split verdict was reached in the sexual abuse trial of a former aide for the Maryland School for the Deaf, prompting the Howard County judge to call a mistrial for some charges.

Taylor's defense attorney, Brandon Mead, said he recommended Taylor file an appeal, citing Tucker's jury instructions... Read The Full Story.

Related:
Verdict In Maryland Deaf School Sex Abuse Case
Maryland School For The Deaf Abuse Sex Case
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Deaf Sex Predator Jailed For Probation Violation

Released sex predator straight back in jail for breaching his parole after he had posed online as a young woman.

CHRISTCHURCH, NZ -- An online sex predator has lasted just one week after his release from prison before ending up straight back in custody for contacting one of his victims by text message.

Cameron Stuart Hore, 30, was released on bail on October 22 but pleaded guilty to a charge of breaching his parole before Judge Murray Hunt in the Christchurch District Court today.

Judge Hunt remanded him to next Thursday for sentence on the breach charge, but in the meantime the Probation Service would be applying for his recall to prison anyway.

Craig Ruane appeared as defence counsel for today's appearance.

Hore was jailed for four years and one month on July 4, 2012, after being held for a long time in custody on remand on 12 charges which he eventually admitted.

He had posed online as a young woman named Sarah Ruddenklau - including posting a picture of a young woman - to carry out sexual exploitation of his young victims.

He was sentenced in the High Court on two charges of blackmail, two of obtaining credit by deception, and eight of sexual exploitation or attempted sexual exploitation.

Hore is Deaf and a sign language interpreters helped him in court today.

The victims were found after police seized Hore's computer after a complaint and analysed just one month of the the 9306 chat logs accumulated over 15 months from September 2009 to November 2010. Nine of the 14 victims traced from that month were willing to talk to the police.

Crown prosecutor Pip Currie said then it had been premeditated and planned offending using false identities to obtain personal details.

The offending occurred on the Internet, and by text, and there was sexual offending on occasions when face-to-face contact occurred... Read The Full Story.

Courtroom Sign Language Prohibited Raise Concerns

Maryland courtroom sign language restrictions raise concerns, only the official interpreters and trial participants are allowed to use ASL.

FREDERICK, MD -- A judge in the trial of a Deaf man is prohibiting signing among the audience, a move that has raised concerns among some in the Deaf community.

Clarence Taylor III, who is Deaf, is accused of inappropriately touching Maryland School for the Deaf students when he was a student life counselor and dormitory aide at the school's Columbia campus. MSD also has a campus in Frederick.

Judge William Tucker of Howard County Circuit Court prohibited signs and "facial gestures" among spectators at Taylor's trial, according to a report from Capital News Service.

Only the four official courtroom interpreters and trial participants communicating with them will be allowed to sign and gesture in the courtroom.

Some advocates for the Deaf took issue with the way the decision singled out American Sign Language.

Howard A. Rosenblum, CEO of the National Association of the Deaf, said in a statement that the NAD understands the need to preserve order in the courtroom, but any restriction on communication needs to be applied evenly in any language to all spectators.

"The judge's order in this case appears to impose restrictions solely on Deaf and Hard of Hearing spectators and is unacceptable," he said.

David Martin, an assistant professor who manages ASL studies at Frederick Community College, is an MSD alumnus and has been following the trial.

He said that it would be difficult for a Deaf person to avoid making gestures.

“From my perspective, you know, with a Deaf person, It's going to be a challenge for a Deaf person to have no expressions and no signing,” Martin said through an ASL interpreter.

Still, Martin said the judge's decision was fair as long as hearing people were subject to the same restrictions... Read The Full Story.

Related:
Verdict In Maryland Deaf School Sex Abuse Case
Maryland School For The Deaf Abuse Sex Case
Courtroom Sign Language Prohibited Raise Concerns
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Deaf Girl Brutal Gang Raped In India

Deaf News: The four then allegedly raped the girl and when the girl became unconscious in India.

KOLKATA, India -- A 16-year-old Deaf and mute girl was allegedly gangraped and left to die at an auto rickshaw stand at Arbelia in village Tildanga under jurisdiction of Baduria police station area in North 24-Parganas district.

The girl has been hospitalised and is undergoing treatment at Baduria hospital. She was found in an unconscious state at the auto stand.

The police arrested four accused on Wednesday and produced them in court which remanded them to 14 days police custody.

The teenager, who is a resident of Deganga, had come to Tildanga with her mother to attend her maternal uncle’s marriage. From there they went to Borogobra village, where the marriage was supposed to take place. While the marriage ceremony was on, four persons - Ujjal Mondal, Asif Hossain, Iilias Mortaza alias Ibrahim and Azharuddin, teased the girl.

At this the girl’s family intervened and warned the four youths not to disturb the girl anymore. The family then came back to Tildanga from Borogobra after the marriage ceremony was over.

Sources said on Tuesday, while the reception of the marriage was on at Tildanga, the girl’s maternal uncle’s place, the youths who had come to attend the reception somehow managed to take the girl away to some secluded area.

The four then allegedly raped the girl and when the girl became unconscious, they left her at an auto rickshaw stand at a place called Arbelia in Tildanga.

Locals rescued the girl after they spotted the girl and took her to Baduria hospital... Read The Full Story.

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Maryland School For The Deaf Sex Abuse Case

Deaf News: Jury selection starts for Maryland School for the Deaf case.

FREDERICK, Maryland -- Jury selection has begun in Ellicott City for the trial of a former Maryland School for the Deaf dormitory aide charged with sexually abusing seven female students in Columbia.

Thirty-eight-year-old Clarence Taylor III of Gwynn Oak pleaded not guilty to all charges Monday before the selection process began.

Howard County Circuit Judge William Tucker says 12 jurors and three alternates will be seated Tuesday before lawyers make opening statements.

Taylor is accused of molesting students from 2008 to 2011. The alleged victims were in the fourth through eighth grades. Taylor allegedly kissed, hugged and fondled the girls during their overnight stays at the school.

He faces seven counts of sex abuse of a minor and three counts of soliciting a subject for child pornography... Read The Full Story.

Related:
Verdict In Maryland Deaf School Sex Abuse Case
Maryland School For The Deaf Abuse Sex Case
Courtroom Sign Language Prohibited Raise Concerns
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Deaf Girl Brutal Raped By Trafficker

A couple who trafficked a 10-year-old girl to the UK who was repeatedly raped and kept as a domestic servant for nearly a decade.

MANCHESTER, United Kingdom -- Ilyas and Tallat Ashar brought the girl, who is Deaf, from Pakistan and kept her at their home in Eccles, Salford, where she slept in the cellar. Ilyas Ashar, 84, was also found guilty of 13 counts of raping the girl, now in her 20s, who was found in 2009. The couple will be sentenced at Manchester Crown Court on 23 October.

Tallat Ashar, 68, was found guilty of trafficking and benefit fraud at an earlier trial, as was her husband. This can now be reported after the lifting of reporting restrictions, following Ilyas Ashar's conviction for rape at a retrial.

The victim, who cannot be named for legal reasons, was only found after trading standards officials visited their Cromwell Road home investigating allegations of illegal activity.

Deaf girl was found in the cellar, which was described as "sparse, cold and damp". Police said the girl cleaned and cooked at the house, and was taken to other houses belonging to the family to carry out domestic chores.

Details of the victim's ordeal only emerged after she was taught sign language, enabling her to be interviewed by police. Thousands of pounds in benefits were claimed in the victim's name and a number of bank accounts were set up using her details, police said.

The couple's daughter, Faaiza Ashar, 46, was also found guilty of benefit fraud at an earlier trial. Judge Peter Lakin warned Ilyas Ashar to expect a "substantial prison sentence". Ch Supt May Doyle, from Greater Manchester Police, described Ilyas Ashar as "pure evil"... Read The Full Story.

Deaf Girl, Gang Rape Victim Gives Birth

WATCH: Minor Deaf girl, gang rape victim gives birth to child in India.

BANGALORE - Kalpana, India -- 15, Deaf and mute cannot convey her feelings through words to others. But her eyes reflect her trauma and agony.

A gang rape victim, Kalpana’s agony has compounded when she gave birth to a baby at a hospital in Allahabad.

She was gang raped last year at her village in Allahabad district allegedly by two youths of the same village. The culprits later convened a panchayat and forced her parents not to approach police but to settle the matter outside. The panchayat had held that the culprits should pay Rs 21,000 each to the family of the victim.

However, police got wind of the matter through the local media and registered a case and arrested the alleged culprits.

None bothered to think about the victim who became pregnant. Sources said the families of the culprits also tried to force an abortion but did not succeed.

The minor gave birth to a baby a few days back. The poor parents had to borrow money from a money lender to admit the girl to the hospital... Read The Full Story.

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Sexual Assaults in Deaf Catholic School

Pope resigns without apologizing to Deaf victims from St. John’s school.

MILWAUKEE, WI -- The spiritual leader of 1.2 billion Catholics, Pope Benedict XVI, surprised the world Monday, February 11th by saying he will resign at the end of the month “because of advanced age.” It’s the first time a pope has stepped down in nearly 600 years. Many on Monday, reacted to the news including SNAP, the Survivors Network for Those Abused by Priests.

In a statement, entitled “Pope resigns without ever apologizing to Milwaukee’s Deaf victims from St. John’s school,” John Pilmaier, SNAP Wisconsin Director said: “It is difficult today, with the announcement that Pope Benedict XVI is retiring this month, not to think of the many victim/survivors of sexual abuse from St. John’s School for the Deaf.”

According to SNAP, it was Benedict, as Cardinal Ratzinger in his previous post running the powerful Doctrine for the Congregation of the Faith CDF), who was in charge of the fate of the notorious Fr. Lawrence Murphy.

Murphy, Ratzinger knew, had sexually assaulted at least 200 children at the boarding school in Milwaukee. Ratzinger ordered that Murphy be left in ministry, unpunished and unprosecuted, undetected to the public, and remain a priest, with all the rights, honors, and power which the church grants only to ordained clerics, right up until his death.

In its statement, SNAP says: “Benedict never once contacted, spoke to, or apologized to the Deaf victims from St. John’s.”... Read The Full Story.

Related Milwaukee’s Deaf Victims:

MILWAUKEE, WI -- Movie about Catholic priest sex abuse scandal makes US premiere in Milwaukee. The controversy over the Catholic priest sex abuse scandal hits the big screen. Five Deaf men who led the first known public protest against clerical sex abuse in the United States.

Mea Maxima Culpa: Silence In The House Of God.

Not only that, but Friday night is the US premiere of the film. It's called Mea Maxima Culpa: Silence In The House Of God a documentary focused on the sexual assaults within the church right here in Milwaukee and with bright lights, ticket lines, even a red carpet, the event had all the trimmings of a blockbuster premiere... Read More at Mea Maxima Culpa: Silence In The House Of God.

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Deaf Aide Teacher Charged With Sexual Abuse

An aide teacher Clarence Taylor charged with sexual abuse at Maryland School for the Deaf.

FREDERICK, Maryland -- Charges allege he molested girls at school in Columbia, Maryland. An aide at the Maryland School for the Deaf was arrested and charged Thursday with multiple counts of sexual abuse after being accused of touching three students between 2008 and 2010.

Howard County Police say that Clarence Cepheus Taylor, a 37-year-old Windsor Mill, Md. resident, inappropriately touched three girls while working as an evening-shift dorm aide at the Columbia school for the Deaf and Hard of Hearing.

Students, who are now aged 15 and 16, have come forward with allegations of abuse, and investigators believe there may be more victims. Read The Full Story.

Related:
Verdict In Maryland Deaf School Sex Abuse Case
Maryland School For The Deaf Abuse Sex Case
Courtroom Sign Language Prohibited Raise Concerns
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Montreal Institute For The Deaf Ex-Students Allege Horrific Abuses

Montreal School for the Deaf's ex-students allege horrific abuses by Catholic's pedophilia priests.

MONTREAL, Quebec -- Former students at a church-run institute for the Deaf in Montreal have come forward with graphic tales of sexual abuse they allege they suffered during more than four decades.

Quebec's Superior Court authorized a class-action lawsuit last March against members of the Clerics of St-Viateur who worked at the school, formerly known as the Montreal Institute for the Deaf.

The former boarding school was run by the Clerics of Saint-Viateur, a religious congregation founded in 1831.

According to students who attended the all-boys institute between 1940 and 1982, violent sexual assaults were commonplace. Denis Chalifoux, who alleges he was eight years old when the abuse began in 1968, is one of 64 claimants taking part in the class action against 28 religious staff and six lay workers.

Only four or five of the alleged abusers would still be alive today. Most of the alleged victims' identities are protected in court documents, but Chalifoux came forward to tell his story to CBC's French-language service with the help of a sign language interpreter. He described horrific acts allegedly at the hands of a staff member. "He showed me his penis. It was in front of me, in my face. I didn't want to look," Chalifoux told Radio-Canada. "He touched my cheek with it. All the while, he was masturbating." ... Read The Full Story.

Watch the coverage video: HERE.

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Sexual Abuses Children At Montreal School For The Deaf

Sexual abuses children by Canadian pedopilia priests at Montreal School for the Deaf in Quebec.

MONTREAL, Quebec -- Lawsuit alleges dozens of clergy abused children at Montreal school for Deaf. Another chapter of Quebec’s dark history of the sexual abuse of children in church-run institutions was aired this week by Radio-Canada. But this was not just any chapter. It threatens to be one of the most horrifying in an already heartbreaking record.

It deals with the sexual abuse of young boys, already vulnerable because of their age but doubly or triply so because they were also Deaf and mute. Their alleged abusers were educated men who promised to set the boys free from their silent world.

Clerical and lay members of a much-admired Roman Catholic teaching order, the Clercs de Saint-Viateur, these men did not set the boys free. The boys who say they were abused ended up in a living hell, terrified of telling anyone what was happening to them. They remained trapped in that hell in adulthood, unable to erase the grotesque images in their heads of masturbating priests and anal rape.

This case may turn out to be the worst ever seen involving the abuse of Deaf children. Unlike the previous record, held by a single Roman Catholic priest, Lawrence Murphy of Wisconsin, in Quebec more than 30 clergy are alleged to have abused the Deaf children in their care, sometimes one after another. (Murphy, who may have sexually assaulted as many as 200 children at a school for the Deaf in Wisconsin, was denounced in 1996 to Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, now Pope Benedict XVI.

Radio-Canada’s investigative program Enquête called its program The Perfect Victims. The boys came as boarders to the only school for the Deaf in the province at the age of 7 or 8. Many were thrilled to be at the school, where for the first time they would be taught to communicate with other children and learn to read and write... Read The Full Story.

Watch the coverage video: HERE.

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Priest Admitted Deaf Child Abuse In Confession
Montreal Institute For The Deaf Ex-Students Allege Horrific Abuses
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Deaf Woman Assaulted In Virginia

Deaf woman victimized in Virginia sex assault.

ARLINGTON, Virginia -- We're learning about a disturbing sexual assault that took place in Arlington over the weekend.

The victim's disability created an unusual challenge for investigators.

Police say the victim in this case is a woman in her 20s who is Deaf and does not know American Sign Language. So investigators had to write down their questions for the traumatized woman and wait for her to write out her answers.

"She was dropped off by a cab at the Rosslyn Metro station, where she went underground to catch a Metro back to her residence in Alexandria," said Dustin Sternbeck, spokesman for the Arlington County Police.

In the early hours of last Saturday morning, the victim was returning to Virginia after a night out in District of Columbia.

"Upon learning that the Metro wasn't going to arrive in a short amount of time, she resurfaced to street level, attempted to find a cab again drive her back to her residence, and was grabbed and pulled into an alley by the suspect," said Sternbeck.

The Deaf victim was especially vulnerable at a time of day with few witnesses or people to come to her aid. But police say she put up quite a fight. SOURCE.

Mea Maxima Culpa: Silence In The House Of God

Documentary Film: Mea Maxima Culpa: Silence in the house of God.

MILWAUKEE, Wisconsin -- Movie about Catholic priest sex abuse scandal makes US premiere in Milwaukee. The controversy over the Catholic priest sex abuse scandal hits the big screen. Five Deaf men who led the first known public protest against clerical sex abuse in the United States.

Not only that, but Friday night is the US premiere of the film. It's called Mea Maxima Culpa: Silence In The House Of God a documentary focused on the sexual assaults within the church right here in Milwaukee. With bright lights, ticket lines, even a red carpet, the event had all the trimmings of a blockbuster premiere.

The film brought a message to the big screen. Telling the story of hundreds of young men abused by Father Lawrence Murphy, the headmaster at St. John's School for the Deaf in St. Francis. Showing the film to many of the victims themselves, filmmaker Alex Gibney uses the documentary to expose their pain and the cover-up by the Catholic Church... Read The Full Story.

Find more information at tiff: http://tiff.net/filmsandschedules/tiff/2012/meamaximaculpasilenc

Holloywood Reporter: http://hollywoodreporter.com/review/mea-maxima-culpa-silence-in-the-house-of-god-film-review

Abused in Wisconsin blog: http://abusedinwisconsin.com/st_johns_school_for_the_deaf

Related Deaf Catholic School:
Catholic Nun Helping Priests 'Rape' Deaf Kids
Deaf Children Sex Abuse By Argentine Priests
Priest Admitted Deaf Child Abuse In Confession
Montreal Institute For The Deaf Ex-Students Allege Horrific Abuses
Sexual Abuses Children At Montreal School For The Deaf
Sexual Assaults in Deaf Catholic School
Mea Maxima Culpa Silence In House Of God
Deaf Students Abused By Priests Win $30-Million

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New York Judge Accused of Molested Deaf Niece

Former Onondaga County family court judge Bryan R. Hedges is accused of sexually abusing his 5-year-old Deaf niece 40 years ago.

SYRACUSE, New York -- Ellen Cantwell Warner, the suspected victim in this case, spoke out at Vera House in Syracuse Thursday.

"An experience like this would be difficult for any child growing up, but it is especially difficult for a Deaf child, whose communication is limited. He preyed on my deafness," says Warner.

"40 years of trauma have finally come to an end. I am at peace. The truth has set me free. I feel like a butterfly that has finally emerged."... Read more: https://cnycentral.com/news/story.