BishopAccountability.org

Longtime area dentist accused of sexual abuse under Child Victims Act

By Stephen T. Watson
Buffalo News
July 12, 2020

https://buffalonews.com/news/local/longtime-area-dentist-accused-of-sexual-abuse-under-child-victims-act/article_518ede56-c205-11ea-bbac-63a86a779527.html

Nancy Shirley Peters, who has filed a lawsuit against Dr. Robert J. Herzog accusing him of sexually abusing her as a teenager when she was babysitting for his family in the 1970s, pictured on Wednesday, July 8, 2020.

Nancy Shirley Peters met Dr. Robert J. Herzog, a family friend, back in the early 1970s when she was hired to babysit his children.

After about a year, during moments when they were alone, Herzog began telling her how much he cared for her, kissing and groping her and suggesting he could teach her how to enjoy sex, according to Peters. She said she was 15 years old when this started.

Then over a period of two or three years, while she was still underage, Peters claims Herzog had sex with her on several occasions at his home and in a room at his office. Peters said she never told anyone at the time and it was years before she could grapple with the emotional pain of what she says Herzog did.

Now, Peters has filed a Child Victims Act lawsuit against Herzog. She agreed to an interview and to let The Buffalo News identify her.

"When you’re abused you carry tons of shame, like it’s your fault. And I don’t have that (anymore). I’m the person I am because of what happened to me, but I’m not ashamed because it wasn’t my fault," Peters said. "And I want other people out there to realize it’s not their fault."

Peters said she fears that there may be other victims of Herzog, a longtime soccer coach at Nardin and Mount St. Mary academies whose dental license is still active.

Peters' complaint is the only Child Victims Act lawsuit that names Herzog and there's no indication Herzog has ever been criminally charged with, let alone convicted of, sexual abuse.

His wife said Herzog is aware of the lawsuit, said she would pass a request for comment along to his attorney and asked a reporter not to call their home again. The News did not receive a response from Herzog's attorney for this article.

Peters, known then as Nancy Shirley, said she was about 14 when she started babysitting for Herzog's family, who she met through her brother. Herzog and his first wife had three children in all.

She said initially there was nothing amiss about their interactions, but this changed after about a year.

It began, she said, when the family brought her along on a vacation to Florida. At one point, she said, she was in the rented condominium with Herzog while the rest of the family was out at the pool.

He told her how much he cared for her and began kissing her, Peters said. "It was awful," she said. After he finished, she recalled, "He said, 'You can't tell anybody. This is our secret.' "

Back in Buffalo, she said, he started pulling over the car sometimes as he drove her home at the end of a babysitting shift to kiss her and tell her he could help her learn about love and relationships. She said the sessions made her uncomfortable but she didn't, or felt she couldn't, put a stop to them.

One happened at Herzog's dental office, Peters said, when a hygienist walked in on Herzog kissing the teenage Peters. Herzog said everything was OK and the hygienist quickly left, said Peters, who remembered feeling mortified.

By the time she was 16, Peters said, "He said, 'You should be having sex by now.'"

The first time he had sex with her was, Peters claims, while one of his daughters was having surgery at Women and Children's Hospital and no one else was at his home.

"I think he told me I had to come over," she said. "I didn't feel I ever had a choice."

She said he manipulated her and wore her down.

He told her, according to Peters, "It's important to be a good lover, and I'm going to teach you how."

She said she remembers staring at the wall while Herzog had sex with her and feeling like, as she put it in the interview, "You're not allowed to say no."

He also warned her not to tell anyone what had happened, Peters said, saying she'd be blamed: "If you tell, people will think you're a slut."

Peters said she can remember at least three other times when Herzog had sex with her, including one time when, she said, he pulled out a gun from a drawer and pointed it at her.

She said she's afraid even today that people won't understand why she didn't try to stop him or stop babysitting for his family. She said Herzog probably targeted her for abuse because he knew she had a challenging home life. Her parents were both alcoholics who dealt with health issues.

"People think you should be able to walk away and you just can’t,” Peters said, her voice breaking. "It’s a really screwed-up circumstance. It’s not normal."

She said she never told her family, friends or police at the time.

"I remember being so confused," Peters said.

Eventually, she said, the abuse ended.

"He just stopped. I have no idea why," Peters said, noting she was around 18 at the time. She stopped babysitting for the family when she was about 19.

Peters said she moved on with her life at that point. Herzog was her dentist when she was young, and many in her family and her now-husband's family also saw him.

In fact, Herzog and his then-wife attended Peters' 1983 wedding to her husband, Michael. By that point, both of Peters' parents had died and the Herzogs filled a void in her life.

"They were like second parents to me for some time," she said.

The Peters moved out of town, to Hawaii and San Diego, before returning in 1988. One day, Peters said, her husband told her he'd seen Herzog.

This brought rushing to the surface what Peters said were repressed memories of her teenage years.

"I said, 'We can't be friends with him,' " she recalled. " 'He abused me.' "

Peters said she gave a deposition in 1989 during Herzog's divorce from his first wife accusing him of having sex with her. At first, she said, she only remembered one time when Herzog had sex with her but, she said, she later recalled others.

"More of this came out," she said, noting she also started therapy around this time. "It was hard."

On Dec. 8, 1992, Peters sent a typed letter to Nardin Academy warning that Herzog, then an assistant girls' soccer coach at the school, "is a known molester of adolescent girls" whose victims included the letter writer.

"This man cannot be trusted," she wrote, signing the letter "a concerned parent," according to a copy she shared with The News.

Nardin, in response to a detailed set of questions from The Buffalo News, would say only this: "Nardin Academy can confirm that Dr. Robert Herzog served as a soccer coach more than 25 years ago."

Then, in October 1993, after seeing Herzog at a funeral, Peters sent him a signed, handwritten letter calling him "perverted" and "a pedophile."

"I am going to continue to talk about the disgusting things you did to me," she wrote. "Your secret is no longer safe with me. You are a sick, sick man."

Herzog then turned the tables on Peters, she said, and in response to her letter had her brought up on a charge of aggravated harassment in Buffalo City Court.

Peters said the charge was dismissed in January 1994 on condition she stop writing letters to or about Herzog.

She said she reached out to Nardin because she wondered if there were any other victims like her and feared Herzog was coaching soccer as a way to find girls to abuse.

There's no evidence of that. Aside from Nardin, Herzog coached varsity soccer and varsity cross-country and track and field at Mount St. Mary Academy in the Town of Tonawanda for various years between 1996 and 2005.

The school said in a statement that it had no record of any complaints against Herzog and he amicably stepped down as a coach.

However, even as Peters grew more comfortable sharing her story, she couldn't take legal action against Herzog because too much time had passed.

This changed in 2019 with the passage of the Child Victims Act, a state law that allows New Yorkers to sue someone they accuse of abuse no matter how long ago the acts occurred.

Peters, now 61 and a North Buffalo resident, sued Herzog on May 28. After identifying Herzog once by name as the defendant, he is referred to throughout the rest of the lawsuit as "the child molester."

The suit claims Peters suffered from emotional distress, disgrace and humiliation and requires continuing therapy and other counseling because of the alleged abuse. She is represented by Richard P. Weisbeck Jr. and Christina M. Croglio.

Herzog was served with the complaint but has not responded to the filing. On Friday, Michael F. Perley and Anastasia M. McCarthy filed a notice that they represent Herzog in the case.

"I know people aren’t going to believe me. People never believe this happens to somebody else. I mean the people who love him and think he’s wonderful aren’t going to believe he did this," Peters said. "But he did it."

 

Contact: SWatson@buffnews.com




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