Child predators

UNITED STATES
The Marietta Times

June 30, 2012

By Kevin Pierson – The Marietta Times (kpierson@mariettatimes.com) , The Marietta Times

When she was a little girl, “Sarah” found herself receiving some unwanted attention from her father.

Anytime the young girl needed a bath, her father wanted to join her and have her wash him in ways the little girl never understood.

Years later, Sarah, 27, of Parkersburg, began to understand that she was one of the thousands of victims of child sexual abuse, and it came from within the home and the people trusted to raise her. …

Most abusers are men.

According to a U.S. Department of Health and Human Services report made to Congress in 2010, 97 percent of the non-biological parent or partners responsible for sexual abuse of a child were men. Eighty percent of biological parents who sexually abused a child were male and 86 percent of non-relatives were also male, the report says.

There were 55,313 substantiated reports of sexual abuse against children in 2010, the most recent statistics available from the Department of Justice.

State numbers weren’t available for cases, but a review earlier this year in Ohio found there were 7,426 people incarcerated in Ohio for sex-related offenses – the second highest total for any demographic.

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