Authorities in Schaumburg, Illinois have charged a teacher at a Christian school for repeatedly masturbating in class over a period of 10 years. Schaumburg Christian School fired math teacher Paul A. LaDuke, 75, on Friday after a student reported that she saw him masturbating, according to NBC Chicago.
After conducting an internal investigation, school officials contacted Schaumburg police Monday. On Tuesday, LaDuke was charged with sexual exploitation of a child. Several students reportedly told police that they were present in the classroom when LaDuke unzipped and lower his pants and then masturbated.
“Through the course of our investigation, our detectives have come to believe that this has happened several times per year for 10 years or more, possibly,” Schaumburg police Sgt. John Nebel told the CBS affiliate in Chicago.
I am always on the lookout for hypocrisy, so of course this story really caught my eye. The idea that parents sent their children to a Christian schooling order to protect them from what they see as the immorality of a secular school system, only to learn that one of the teachers has been pleasuring himself in front of students for possibly ten years, is the height of irony.
I am completely shocked that this type of behavior could have occurred for ten years without ANYBODY yanking this guy out of the classroom and getting him as far away from the children as possible.
I don't yet know all of the particulars, and I don't want to paint ALL religious school with the same broad brush, but I cannot imagine THIS type of behaivor taking place in a public school without officials being notified immediately!
I have only one problem with your response to this article, Gryph. It's your use of the term "yank". ;)
ReplyDeleteOMG. That is just so appalling. Ten years? Well, at least the guy probably wasn't teaching that masturbatin was wrong and that the kids would go blind and hairy if they did it lol.
ReplyDeleteSorry. Not a laughing matter.
Forgot to add that my mother was sexually abused by a nun in the early 1950's in a catholic grade school. She was repeatedly fingered in the cloakroom. When my mother told her mother (my gm) about it, my mother was beaten for making things up about a nun.
ReplyDeleteThe Republican push for vouchers is a move to support Christian schools at the expense of our declining public school system. It is critical that vouchers be fought tooth and nail or the nation's decline will only hasten with the right wing dogma taught in so called Christian schools.
ReplyDeleteYou're right. If a public school teacher had done this - even once - he would have been fried.
ReplyDeleteI suspect this is one of the aspects of the simplistic far-right that bothers me most: their naivete. As long as someone calls themselves a Christian, these far right folks will accept them almost without question, not questioning their behavior.
Goodness, look at Santorum, Palin, and Gingrich. They get away with so much all in the name of being Christian.
Two observations:
ReplyDelete1. Typical. My parents forced me to attend a Christian school. The hypocrisy I saw on a daily basis has a lot to do with the reason I am no longer a Christian.
2. Is it me, or does that man look like Chuck Heath?
"I cannot imagine THIS type of behaivor taking place in a public school without officials being notified immediately!"
ReplyDeleteWell, you would be wrong, Gryphen. It doesn't happen all the time, but it happens. They walk among us, and no school, church, business, or family is immune.
Thats the best part of not providing basic sex education to kids. Religious perverts can just tell them it's "horsing around" and get away with it for a decade or more.
ReplyDeleteIs this what religious institutions mean when they demand that "government keep its hands off our schools so we can keep our hands on"?
"without ANYBODY yanking this guy out"
ReplyDeleteIndeed.
I imagine that if one of the kids complained to their parents, the parents wouldn't pay attention because of course, it is a Christian school and the teachers are paragons of virtue. Or... the kids are all exposed to this kind of hypocritical perversion at home and had no idea it was abnormal. Or... they don't get any kind of sex education and had no idea what the guy was doing.
ReplyDeleteYou may think no one knew about his classroom behavior but I would find it easier to believe that no one wanted to know. Maybe he was also a coach on one of their athletic teams?
ReplyDeleteOr Indian school. Any institution of learning that purports to mold a child, and then excludes parent involvement and oversight in the classroom is a perv magnet.
ReplyDeleteAs with that raggedy fool Sandusky, child rape is not about lust or sex. It has to do with power.
ReplyDeleteHello BIA!
This looks to me more like mental illness than hypocrisy.
ReplyDeleteHorrible story, of course, but I assume you are being ironic with that last line?
ReplyDeleteDid you see Anderson Cooper last night? Did you hear how public school officials told the mother of Sandusky Victim #1 that the man had a "heart of gold" and that the woman should carefully consider the ramifications of pressing charges.
The same public school regularly allowed Sandusky to take children out of the classroom and the school during the school day, without parental consent, for no particular reason.
It can happen anywhere, tragically.
This took place in my neck of the woods and it thoroughly disgusted me when I heard of it. I'd like to know how they know it went on for 10 years? Just like what happened at Penn State these sexual perverts seem to be at places you would think your children should be safe and protected. Makes me sick to my stomach!
ReplyDeleteIn my case it was Mormon missionaries.
ReplyDelete"...but I cannot imagine THIS type of behaivor taking place in a public school without officials being notified immediately!"
ReplyDelete----------------------------
I'm sorry, but to suggest that these sorts of things are promptly and appropriately handled if they happen in a public school setting is just silly.
And even if public school officials were invariably and immediately notified of such wrongful activities, it is incredibly naive to suggest that there isn't just as much CYA and sweep-under-the-rug and sucking up to the powers that be in public schools as there is in private schools.
3:02Am, same reaction of many parents in the early 70's. Our eighth grade teacher nun took all the "developing" females into rooms and fondled our breasts saying she was checking our bra fittings. One girl told her mom and showed up the next day with a red face from being slapped silly.
ReplyDeleteNo one did anything until the nun snapped at the same girl and started to beat the girl with her fists in front of the whole class. Christie ran out of the room, we locked that door as she ran around to the other door (So Cal school had open corridors and the class rooms had two doors to the outside), we let her in, and locked the doors. They had intercoms in the classrooms and we were ordered to open the door. We piled desks in front and refused until Christie's mom was called.
The nun was GONE the same day to the nun nut house in Catalina. No one apologized, explained, or even mentioned that evil woman's name again. It was quietly swept under the ever growing catholic scandal rug.
I could tell you the rest of the horrors of catholic education from grade school through college. Visiting priests raping grade school aged altar boys to high school marriage teacher priests who give A's for blow jobs to the attempted rape of my college roommate by our resident priest. That's been my limited experience in the realm of catholic education from the late 60's to the early 80's.
Public school teachers must be credentialed and to qualify undergo background checks. They lose their credential if convicted of a crime.
ReplyDeleteAnyone can be a teacher in a private school. The rules are different and vary school by school.
Ten years? He's 75. So, they hired him when he was 65?
Did I mention private schools on average tend to pay a LOT less than public schools so the teachers they hire tend not to be the cream of the crop?
Yeah, Gryphen, i'm gonna take it that your last paragraph was tongue in cheek.
ReplyDelete... my molester/tormentor was a cousin, but it often happened at my very public school. There is no doubt in my mind, in public/xtian schools across the USA, it happens and goes unreported, today.
He'll probably be no the rethuglicon presidential agenda next week! PERFECT GUY.. Him and the Monkey Squad could take over the earth since the Monkey Queen seems to have a pitch fork stuck in her ass....
ReplyDelete...and as Christians, the last thing that will ever occur to them is to forgive the guy.
ReplyDeleteBeldar used the term "horsing around." That's just what Jerry Sandusky said he was doing with kids. Now he's charged with molesting 40 kids over a period of 15 years.
ReplyDeleteGryphen, perversion exists everywhere--religious schools, public schools, workplaces, bus stations, health care facilities, etc. It's a crime committed by people because they're sick and predatory, not because they claim some spurious religious faith.
omg, Gryphen, "yanking"????? I didn't want to laugh at this serious subject, but the use of that word had me in stitches.
ReplyDeleteReligion is clearly no substitute for morality.
ReplyDelete"Now he's charged with molesting 40 kids over a period of 15 years."
ReplyDeleteIt probably is as many as 40 kids really, but he has 40 counts of molesting 8 kids.
mlaiuppa, I worked in public schools.
ReplyDeleteThe only caveat to your statement is that sadly many pedophiles and perverts go undetected (and thus un-prosecuted), and are free to victimize children over decades - as we have seen with this Penn State nightmare.
Public school background checks are only effective if the person has already been accused and/or found guilty of a crime and has a record with law enforcement. Far too many of these sick people fly under the radar, in both public and private school settings.
As a survivor of Catholic Schools, It pains me to say this, but I believe it's the Church's ass backward puritanical bullshit that a priest or nun must stay celibate. I was brutalized physically and mentally by a nun in full view of the class. She closed both doors and got me good with rosaries, wooden yard sticks, and pointers, then admonished the class that "What goes on in these four walls, stays in these four walls, or there will be hell to pay". Wonderful woman, may she rot in hell!
ReplyDeleteAnd I witnessed sexual abuse on boys as well. Gropeing, frottage, and oral sex, again in closed classrooms with the same admonition.
Yes, it does happen everyhwere, but I doubt it happened as often in public schools during the same time period.
The archdiocese, during the initial scandle, maintained a database. The offenders were either shuffled to other schools or given "administrative duties", and twelve men who graduated high school with me, eventually committed suicide, a mortal sin which disallows burial in a Catholic Cemetary.
I can't speak for this particular christian school, but ten years doesn't shock me at all.
We need to eliminate the statute of limitations, keep a national database and change the laws to make advocacy more available to victims.
And Parents have to watch for signs, listen to and believe their kids when they are brave enough to expose their torment and tormentors.
I am so, so sorry about the molestations people have experienced. It's horrible, vastly underreported, and can happen anywhere, at any time. As a teenager, I was fondled by a doctor, with my mother in the room (apparently you can find a heartbeat by running your hands over a girl's nipples--who knew?). I was also groped by a coworker in front of customers on multiple occasions. I always tried to physically escape but was not strong enough. I did not make a verbal fuss because he was the longtime "model employee" and I was an expendable summer worker, so I knew management would side with him. And for some reason, customers adored him too, even though I often thought his behavior toward them was creepy.
ReplyDeleteAlthough I obviously can't speak to the dynamic at this Illinois school, I attended a so-called Christian school for my whole elementary and secondary education. I don't know of any instances of physical or sexual abuse, but it was a very emotionally and psychologically abusive atmosphere. In retrospect, we were in many ways being groomed to become perfect victims--powerless, taught that whatever happened was God's will, forbidden to question authority. There was also a very strong belief that if you were the victim of a sexual crime, it was your own fault--you were asking for it by dressing "inappropriately" or behaving in a "seductive" way. So when a classmate groped me, I didn't even think of reporting the incident; I just tried to laugh it off.
I wouldn't be surprised if some of those same dynamics were at play in this situation. The students may not have dared to question authority. They may not have thought any adults would believe or side with them. They may have blamed themselves for "causing" this teacher to masturbate.
A friend I knew growing up had two older brothers who claimed to have been raped repeatedly by a priest. I can't remember if it was just one priest or more than one. Their own family didn't believe them. They said it had sometimes happened in their own house. They tried reporting this in the church and outside the church. It didn't work. They were the problem not the raping priest.
ReplyDeleteIt was many years ago. When people refused to see that the Catholic church had put these demons in positions of authority. They were repeatedly beaten by their father for making this up. With belts and coathangers and boards. They were expected to confess that they had lied and made this up and admit that the rapes by the priest had never happened. They refused to do this. They kept telling their story.
I was 12 years old. I remember thinking that they wouldn't make something like this up. Many adults and children knew what was going on. Nothing was done. It had already destroyed this family.
It was also rumored that a teen pregnancy was also by a priest. I didn't know so much about that, but she was pregnant and I thought that could be true too.
Many of the other Catholic kids told stories of witnessing or themselves being beaten by nuns with rulers and belts and other things as elementary students. I knew there was something wrong with a church and its believers that treated their children worse than any animal should be treated.
This went on as long as I as I lived there. Nothing was ever done to help the victims or punish the guilty. Nothing was done to all the enablers and those whose faith made them too blind to see that their cherished priests and nuns were beating and molesting and raping their own children.
Thy rod and thy staff, they comfort him.
ReplyDeleteGiven his age, I'd look at neurological disease such as Pick's Disease. Pick's affects the part of the brain which governs behavior. Early signs are things like this: completely inappropriate behavior, things a 2 yo would do because they don't know better. One case involved a respected surgeon who carved his initials in a patient's abdomen.
ReplyDeleteIt takes place in public schools too. Didn't Joe McGinniss write about a molester in Alaska who was protected by the school board or staff, supposedly including Sarah Palin's father.
ReplyDeleteParochial schools, public schools, public parks, nursing homes. You name it, there are pervs there, along with people who look the other way. A few years ago, a doctor committed suicide when OR staff finally turned in him after years of him performing sex acts on patients while they were under anesthesia. So yeah, it can happen anywhere.
Doesn't this guy look an awful lot like Chuck Heath?
ReplyDeleteI have,for much of my adult life, though it a mistake for God to not have an eleventh commandment, "Thou shalt not be self righteous." Though not using the lord's name in vain, I personally believe, is the next best thing.
ReplyDeleteBecause when a person convinces themselves that everything they do is blessed, well then Everything they do is OK to do.
My brother was sexually molested, by a female,when he was in kindergarten.
ReplyDeleteAt around the age of 40 he sought counseling to deal with the fallout.
Yet when his own 18 year old daughter was given a date rape drink and sodomized by her step father, my super Christian brother had to be persuaded by me, and I am sure others to report this to the police.
That incident among others put the bastard in jail.
There is so much denial, so much destruction of the personhood [phrase used intentionally] of the victims and in society as a whole that it become extremely difficult for any one to accuse (They don't want to relive it. Can we blame them?)or for authorities to deal with something so unspeakable.
And of course without Rape Kit DNA proof and eye witnesses or lots of blood it is very difficult to prove.
We have two perfect(ly) horrible examples in Herb Cain and Sandusky and now this sicko (Wanta bet he does more than masturbate in front of his students?) as prime examples.