MICHIGAN
Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests
He admitted molesting two teenaged girls
His former employer was forced to pay $1.6 million
But he works now at a MI college & no one was warned
Group wants Methodists, who meet there this week, to act
SNAP: “Church officials should at least alert others about him”
He is also accused of impregnating one girl & giving her an STD
WHAT
Holding signs and childhood photos at a sidewalk news conference, child sex abuse victims and advocates will disclose that they are;
–writing a federal official saying that a Michigan college may have broken federal law by quietly hiring a credibly accused child molesting professor but telling no one about him, and
–writing Michigan Methodist officials, who meet this week at the college, and urging them to warn their flocks about him.
They will also beg;
– college officials to at least alert staff and students about the professor’s past, and
– anyone who may have seen, suspected or suffered any crimes or misdeeds by the professor to “speak up, get help, expose wrongdoers, protect others and start healing.”
WHEN
Wednesday, May 14 at 4:00 p.m.
WHERE
On the sidewalk leading to the Bell Tower at Adrian College in Adrian, Michigan
WHO
Two-three members of a self help group called SNAP, the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (SNAPnetwork.org)
WHY
Leaders of SNAP are writing Michigan Methodist church officials and a federal bureaucrat about Dr. Thomas Hodgman, a music professor at Adrian College. The college hired Hodgman in 1999, despite the fact that Hodgman admitted molesting two girls and is accused of molesting at least one more.
Hodgman’s former employer, a Catholic high school, had to pay $1.6 million to a California woman who was repeatedly sexually violated by Hodgman when she was a youngster.
A federal law called the Clery Act requires colleges “to give timely warnings of crimes that represent a threat to the safety of students or employees.” In a new letter to a U.S. Education Department official, SNAP alleges that Adrian’s “continuing secrecy” surrounding Hodgman’s past “violates the spirit of the Clery Act and may well violate its letter too.”
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