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Lawyers for megachurch pastor blame 12-year-old for ‘initiating’ sexual contact (www.independent.co.uk)

submitted 4 months ago by MicroWave@lemmy.world to c/news@lemmy.world

119 comments fedilink hide all child comments

Lawyers for Donald Trump’s former faith advisor Robert Morris accused a 12-year-old girl of initiating “inappropriate” sexual conduct with the ex-Dallas megachurch pastor, new documents have revealed.

Morris resigned in June after admitting to the incident. His accuser Cindy Clemishire previously claimed that the pastor had begun abusing her on Christmas Day in 1982.

Clemishire, now 52, said that Morris and his wife had been staying at her family home at the time when he asked her to come into his room, whereafter he told her to lay on his bed and then began touching her inappropriately.

She said the abuse had continued until 1987 when she told her parents.

However, 25 years after the incident, a lawyer for Morris – J Shelby Sharpe – claimed that it was the child who was actually to blame.

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[–] Corvidae@lemmy.world 35 points 4 months ago (1 children)

Can't buy alcohol. Can't buy cigarettes. Can't be employed in most jobs. Can't get a drivers license. But can initiate sex with an adult?

[–] feedum_sneedson@lemmy.world 4 points 4 months ago (1 children)

They can certainly attempt to, particularly if they've previously been abused by a caregiver. It's totally something you're trained to deal with if you work with vulnerable children, as it's a major indicator of this. Teenagers are a bit different as they are exploring their sexuality and may incorporate this into disruptive behaviour if they notice it gets a reaction. Neither of these situations would serve as a legal defence, however, were you to start joining in. A colleague had a fourteen-year-old girl in a hitched-up skirt come and sit on his lap and pout because he told her off in class. He just stared at the wall until she got off, then went and reported it.

[–] andros_rex@lemmy.world 5 points 4 months ago

Yeah - if you are a teacher you ALWAYS leave the door cracked open, never alone with a kid.

Those kinds of kids almost always have genuinely experienced sexual abuse elsewhere. I’m working with a child who does exhibit that kind of behavior - propositioning adults/other teens and then claiming assault when rejected. The thing with kids and false allegations is that they are usually wildly inconsistent - as long as organizational safeguards are in place, it’s usually easy to verify that the claimed event didn’t happen. It is a STRONG indicator for previous experiences of abuse though.

This case is not at all consistent with what false allegations look like.