Former leader of the Minutemen border vigilante group sentenced to 19.5 years in prison for sexually abusing two young girls.

Courtesy of AZ Central:

Chris Simcox, the former leader of the Minuteman border vigilante group, was sentenced to 19.5 years in prison Monday, bringing an end to a sex-abuse case involving two girls under 10.

A Maricopa County Superior Court jury found Simcox, 55, guilty last month of two counts of child molestation and one count of furnishing obscene material to a minor after a three-week trial. The jury composed of three women and nine men, found him not guilty on three other counts of sexual conduct with a minor — a charge that carries a mandatory sentence of life in prison. 

Simcox was arrested in 2013 after two girls, ages 5 and 6, accused him of touching them inappropriately between 2012 and 2013. 

Simcox was sentenced to two concurrent sentences of 17 years for each of the molestation counts and an additional 2.5-year sentence for furnishing obscene materials to a minor.

Why am I not surprised this happened in Maricopa County?

Or that this Simcox guy was once a favorite guest on the Sean Hannity Show?

Or that he was once a Republican candidate for the Senate?

Look I'm not suggesting that one HAS to be a child molester to run for the Senate as a Republican in Arizona, or appear on Sean Hannity, or live in Maricopa County, I am just pointing out that this child molester did all three.

Kind of like you don't have to be a sexual deviant to run Fox News, and yet there's Roger Ailes now accused of multiple incidents of sexual harassment.

Just things that make you go, hmmm. 

Highest ranking Vatican official ever investigated for sex abuse found to have tens of thousands of child porn videos and pictures on his computer.

Courtesy of the International Business Times: 

A former Vatican archbishop accused of paedophilia stored tens of thousands of child porn videos and photos on a computer in his office at the Holy See diplomatic compound in the Dominican Republic, it has emerged. 

Details of Jozef Wesolowski's massive child porn stash have been revealed after the 66-year-old was arrested at the Vatican earlier this week. 

He is the highest-ranking Vatican official ever to be investigated for sex abuse, and the first top papal representative to receive a defrocking sentence. He has been charged with sexually abusing minors and child porn possession and might face up to seven years in the Vatican's tiny jail. 

Vatican detectives analysed the PC Wesolowski used in his office in Santo Domingo, where he served as Holy See envoy from 2008 to 2012 as part of an investigation into the alleged sexual abuse of underage boys. 

The probe reportedly revealed a collection of horrors. The Polish native held more than 100,000 sexually-explicit files, Il Corriere della Sera newspaper reported. 

Some 160 videos showing teenage boys forced to perform sexual acts on themselves and on adults and more than 86,000 pornographic photos were meticulously archived in several category-based folders, the paper said. 

Investigators said that at least another 45,000 pictures were deleted, while a second stash of material was found on a laptop Wesolowski used during his trips abroad.

You know I think we are WAY past the time when we can simply chalk all of these Catholic priest sex crimes to a mere coincidence that so many pedophiles decided on their own to enter the priesthood simply as a way to keep themselves away from temptation or to fight their "sinful" urges through prayer, and to entertain the possibility that some of them either entered the priesthood well aware that they could satisfy their urges behind the protection of the church, or that they were in fact recruited by other pedophile priests in order to develop a brotherhood who would watch each others backs.

There is a database of publicly accused priests in the United States alone. And if you visit it you are immediately overwhelmed by the vast number of priests who have been accused of sexually abusing minors in this country. And of course that does not take into account the even larger number of accused or convicted priests from all around the world.

At this point it just seems to me that this was an organization that not only accepted a certain deviant lifestyle, but may in fact have welcomed it or, dare I say, promoted it.

Just for a moment ask yourself whether or not if this same scandal had befallen a Fortune 500 company, famous sports team, or political party, would any of those have manged to survived intact?

In my opinion, no.

And the fact that the Catholic church still stands, and continues to reveal that it is infested with this type of individual, I think speaks to the fact that the church leaders have really done nothing to rid themselves of any potential predators and have instead simply closed ranks and hidden behind the cloak of religious authority which has protected them for centuries.

And if something does not change there are undoubtedly more children who will suffer at the hands of an unrepentant organization that cares more for its access to power and reputation as a religious juggernaut than it does for those it claims to want to protect and steer toward a sinless life.

Pope claims that about 2% of priests are pedophiles. Sadly 100% of their victims are innocent children.

"Oy vey, what did I say?"

Courtesy of Slate:  

Pope Francis touched on particularly thorny issues confronting the Catholic Church during an interview with Italy’s La Repubblica published on Sunday. The Pope—known for extemporaneous remarks that at times simultaneously delight and confound his followers—addressed the lingering questions of sexual abuse in the church, saying about “2 percent” of the church’s clergy are pedophiles and pledged to "confront it with the severity it demands." “Among the 2% who are paedophiles are priests, bishops and cardinals. Others, more numerous, know but keep quiet. They punish without giving the reason," the Pope was quoted saying by La Repubblica. "I find this state of affairs intolerable." 

“In the interview, Pope Francis was quoted as saying that the 2% estimate came from advisers. It would represent around 8,000 priests out of a global number of about 414,000,” the BBC reports. “While the incidence of paedophilia in the general population is not accurately known, some estimates have put it at less than five percent.” 

Of course there is already an attempt by the Vatican to walk back the 2% estimate, saying that the Pope was misquoted.

Personally though I think the idea of 8,000 pedophile priests on the loose to be extremely troubling, I would be willing to bet that the number is even higher than that.

Especially when you consider that only a small portion of victims are willing to report abuse in most instances, and that the number becomes even lower when the abuse happens at the hands of a priest.

After all how many Catholic kids want to face the shame of identifying themselves as a victim while also facing the anger of the congregants who almost always side with the priest?

That means that there are almost certainly a large percentage of unreported abuses that are not counted among those of which we are already aware.

No I'm guessing the number is much larger, much larger indeed.

And what's more important, no matter what percentage of priests are involved in molesting children, is that the church was 100% involved in keeping it secret and protecting them from prosecution.

My daughter wanted this here.

My daughter would be the first to tell you that there are no excuses allowed.

If you do something stupid that is on you. You cannot blame it on peer pressure, alcohol, or temporary insanity. Those are excuses, not reasons.

If you hurt somebody, who was not trying to hurt you first, then YOU are the problem.

And that means hurting them emotionally as well.

I taught my daughter to be responsible for her actions, and then I taught her to help others be responsible as well. She is the designated driver EVERY TIME her friends go out, she is the voice of reason when others are not thinking clearly, and she is the one that will drop a guy like a wet sack of shit if he inappropriately touches one her friends.

I've seen her do it. In fact I taught her to do it.

And when I taught boys, I taught them to respect women, that no means "hell no," and that a child is a shared responsibility, not just a responsibility for the one with the ovaries.

It is not hard to teach boys to be men, but it helps if you understand that being a man means protecting those who cannot protect themselves, putting the needs of others before your own, and controlling the worst parts of your nature.

If more men approached their job as parent with this in mind there would be far fewer rapists in the world.

According to Billy Graham's grandson when it comes to sexual abuse the Catholics have got NOTHING on the Evangelicals.

Courtesy of Religion News:  

The Christian mission field is a “magnet” for sexual abusers, Boz Tchividjian, a Liberty University law professor who investigates abuse said Thursday (Sept. 26) to a room of journalists. 

While comparing evangelicals to Catholics on abuse response, ”I think we are worse,” he said at the Religion Newswriters Association conference, saying too many evangelicals had “sacrificed the souls” of young victims. 

“Protestants can be very arrogant when pointing to Catholics,” said Tchividjian, a grandson of evangelist Billy Graham and executive director of Godly Response to Abuse in the Christian Environment (GRACE), which has investigated sex abuse allegations.

 “The Protestant culture is defined by independence,” Tchividjian said. Evangelicals often frown upon transparency and accountability, he said, as many Protestants rely on Scripture more than religious leaders, compared to Catholics. 

Abusers discourage whistle-blowing by condemning gossip to try to keep people from reporting abuse, he said. Victims are also told to protect the reputation of Jesus. 

You know you would think that if church groups were so invested in protecting the "reputation of Jesus" they might prosecute the shit out of somebody who raped one of their own and protect the vulnerable from any further abuse.

After all isn't that what Jesus would do?

I have long thought that all of the attention on Catholic sexual abuse was somewhat hypocritical within the religious community. I have not had a great deal of exposure to Catholics up here (With the exception of my beautiful and talented ex-girlfriend.) however I have had substantially more exposure to religious types of other denominations raping children, sometimes even their own, as well as their wives.

It also needs to be pointed out that the sex abuse that has been visited upon the indigenous people of Alaska has NOT all come from Catholic priests, but has also been linked to other missionaries working in rural communities, though there is barely a whisper about it in the media.

Sadly there are features within certain very religious communities which allow this abuse to continue unabated, especially when the victims are kept away from secular education facilities, or others who might not be so willing to overlook abuse to protect a prominent church member or a minister.

You know the ironic thing is that if these people were REALLY living their lives according to the teachings of their idol, they would never think to harm anybody in this fashion. But the mantle of Christianity can often camouflage a black heart, and for some it is a license to do despicable things with no fear of retribution.

Neither in this world, or the next.

Must see! 11 year old Yemeni girl eloquently speaks out against marrying off children to older men as she flees from her family.

I often get dinged for not going after other beliefs as vehemently as I do Christian ones. But that is not because I find them any more acceptable, in fact most of the time I find them even more toxic, especially within the Islamic community.

However because they tend to impact us less here in the US I do not make them the focus of my rants nearly as often.

However make no mistake, I find the idea of honor killings, oppression of women, and the marrying off children to be the indefensible acts of a primitive culture that has no place in the 21st century.

This child is terrified for her very life, and the fact that her own family has put her in this situation is sickening.

However I must point out that less than two hundred years ago this very same horrific tradition was widely practiced right here in the United States. Christianity is no less complicit in this type of abuse than is the Islam. The difference is that in America we moved beyond our superstitious view of women and sexuality, and now tend to respect both genders equally.

Except in Texas of course. 

"Give me a blowjob and I'll get your Grandad into heaven." Catholic priest to grieving 7 year old boy.

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Lawyer working for anti-gay Christian Right organization found guilty of videotaping her own underage daughter having sex.

Courtesy of Salon:  

A New Hampshire lawyer who works with a virulently anti-gay Christian-right organization has been found guilty of child pornography charges after videotaping her own daughter having sex with two men on multiple occasions. 

Lisa Biron, 43, of Manchester faces a minimum sentence of 25 years in prison after a jury convicted her yesterday. The jury deliberated for less than an hour. 

Biron, arrested by the FBI last November, was accused of eight felony counts involving the videotaping of men having sex with a 14-year-old girl who was identified by the Associated Press as her daughter. She also allegedly made a cellphone video of herself having sex with her daughter. 

Biron, who claimed on her Facebook page (which was taken down, according to the Concord Monitor) that the Bible was her favorite book, had worked with Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF), formerly the Alliance Defense Fund, in defending a Pentecostal church in Concord in a tax fight against the city. 

The Arizona-based ADF calls itself a “servant ministry” that seeks to transform the legal system and advocate “for religious liberty, the sanctity of life, and marriage and family.” The group issues dire warnings about “the homosexual agenda” and offers a book (available for a donation of $35) by its president, Alan Sears, and senior director Craig Osten, with that title. In the book, the authors claim that “the homosexual agenda” will destroy religious liberty and free speech. In one chapter, they claim that homosexuality on college campuses leads to pedophilia, and that homosexuality and pedophilia “are intrinsically linked,” a falsehood long perpetuated by the anti-gay right to demonize LGBT people.

ADF, the Alliance Defending Freedom, has stated emphatically that this Lisa Biron is NOT an employee of theirs and have worked diligently to scrub any mention of her off of their website.

However the great folks over at Americablog did some searching and discovered that ADF had at least once identified Ms. Biron as a member of their "Honor Corps:" 

ADF Allied Attorney Success Stories: March 2011 By ADF Alliance Alert 

Congratulations to allied attorneys Geoffrey Westmoreland, Kevin Snider, Mike Tierney, Rick Macias, Steve Sanders, Stephen Casey, Greg Terra, Steve Whiting, Steve Amjad, Steve Fitschen, Tim Swickard, as well as new Honor Corps members, Albertos Polizogopoulos and Lisa Biron, for their recent accomplishments and successes listed below. Please take time to congratulate them!

Well gee she may not be an employee but they still felt that her contribution to their organization warranted a special title and honor.

And just what IS an "Honor Corp member?"

Alliance Defending Freedom has created the Honor Corps to recognize those allied attorneys who have completed 450 hours of pro bono service, and offers special awards in recognition of significant milestones in reported service.

So technically at least, this woman was NOT employed with a virulently anti-gay organization while she was filming men illegally having sex with her underage daughter and sexually molesting her as well, She was only volunteering her time as an attorney on their behalf, while she was filming men illegally having sex with her underage daughter and sexually molesting her as well, because she was such a supporter of their cause.

So much better.

You know this certainly does not mean that EVERY raging homophobic hyper Christian out there is a terrible person who would rape their own children, but from my experience the louder that somebody condemns another person's sexuality or lifestyle, the more likely it is that they are desperate to hide deviant behaviors of their own.

If this woman were the only example of this kind of chronic hypocrisy it would be one thing, but sadly she most certainly is not.