We are NOT alone if we only...

 Perhaps because, here in NV, I’ve often felt so isolated, so siloed by prejudice against those labeled “sex-offenders” and so shamed as a person who has chosen to stick with “my” SO, I began to reach out to find other individuals, other organizations with people impacted by the same prejudice against me and mine. Unfortunately, I have become aware of how siloed in our own little groups, how prejudiced, many of us are.

For example, few seem to realize that if they live in one of 20 states + the Feds where involuntary civil commitment “treatment facilities” exist (to see if you live in one of the 20 states/ the Feds go to www.cure-sort.org or educate yourself about involuntary civil commitment request their brochure). Registrants in these 20 states + the Feds don’t seem to know that if revoked on the Registry (with or without a new sex related conviction) they can be held, forensically evaluated as “likely” to be dangerous to themselves or another person at some unspecified point in the future, forensically labeled SVP (sexually Violent Preditor) and based solely on a prediction they can be, not imprisoned for a set length of time but, instead, sent directly to  one of the state’s “treatment” facilities and indefinitely detained “likely” forever.    

SPV, you say? Well, they deserve what they get. “My” guy is better-than. “Those SVP’s” they ought to be indefinitely detained. Anyone who would choose to stick with an SVP is… Reminds me of standing in line at the prison and having to keep quiet about “your” loved one’s sex-related conviction for fear of blow-back from the better-than-crowd.

There is one NV group that seems to have over come their prejudice, their “my guy is better than” syndrome, The Friends and Family of Incarcerated Persons ( FFIP.NV@gmail.com ) is now Prison Families Alliance (PFA). https://PrisonFamiliesAlliance.org Message phone: (702) 763-1389. FFIP NV is attempting to get out of the silo and go national. They have a monthly Calendar with a Support for Families of “sex-offenders” zoom group with people from all over the US.  Family and friends are welcome whatever state you live in.

No, I’m not suggesting you stop what you are doing against the Registry restrictions. No, I’m not suggesting leave your local Fearless Group, or any group if you have one, not suggesting you leave NARSOL https://narsol.org or WAR https://ww1.womenagainstregistry.org or ACSOL https://all4consolaws.org or a group fighting against terrible prison conditions, https://perilouschronicle.com. Maybe Google and watch  videos at Cure National  cure@curenational.org) check out CAGE ladyjusticemyth@gmail.com an organization against phone stings or contact Sherri Harlow thoughtasweak@yahoo.com? 

I ’m just saying we all need to climb out of our silos. We all have skin in the game in more ways than we realize.  There are allies out there, people we can help and who can help us grow to critical mass and, together, we will be able to effect real change. But first we need to examine ourselves and recover from our own “better-than” prejudice, reach out and add our strength to theirs. So next time you hear that some sister-group in your state, maybe EndMSOP in MN ( www.the voicesofocean.net ) is going to hand out Brochures against involuntary civil commitment at the state fair, grab your own brochures and hand out in solidarity with them. It will lessen the pain of isolation and, together, we will all be better able to attack the injustice each of us faces every day.   

 

Never heard of Involuntary Civil Commitment? A rose by any other name is still a prison

 20 states, the District of Columbia and the Federal System place people accused of sex related crimes in Involuntary Civil Commitment.  (Arizona, California, Florida, Illinois, Iowa, Kansas, Massachusetts, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, North Dakota, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, Texas, Virginia, Washington, and Wisconsin) and the District of Columbia have enacted laws permitting the civil commitment of those forensically evaluated as "dangerous.")

These states get around having to respect peoples rights under the constitution by claiming Involuntary Civil Commitment "Facilities" are not prisons and therefore are not "punishment" for the sex offenders forensically "evaluated" and sent there sometimes before they have even been  actually convicted of any sex related crime. But adjudicated or unadjudicated the legislatures in these 20 states have statutes which allow "Forensic" Psychological evaluators to label inmates of these facilities as SVP (sexually violent predators) and other "diagnosis" which conform to the legislative construct rather than to any actual DSM psychiatric diagnosis (the American Psychiatric Association  has come out against these state sponsored forensic "diagnosis" as Unethical) 

Dennis Doren who, as they say "wrote the bible"  Evaluating Sex Offenders, A Manual for Civil Commitment and Beyond,  admits his made-up diagnostic labels are unethical (because they don't diagnose any real problem. They just claim someone may be "dangerous to themselves or others and may commit unidentified action in future. But, never the less Doren urges more "forensic evaluators" to get on board (it's a very lucrative field) These dangerous faux-evaluations keep/ send people with sex related convictions (or presumed future actions) inside non-prisons even after they've served their prison sentences. For those of us "on the registries" in one of the 20 states, it also means that should your loved one be deemed to have violated the rules and restrictions of the Registry, they might not be sent back to prison, but could be sent to one of these Involuntary Civil Commitment "facilities.  

But these "facilities do not require a conviction or term of incarceration. Simply put, anyone sent to Involuntary Civil Commitment is incarcerated only with a Forensic Label NO life , no life-with-out  sentence required: the forensic evaluations labels mean your loved one has an sentence of "Indefinite Detention. Put plainly, people are more likely to "be set free" in a pine box than to actually live to be set free from one of these involuntary civil commitment "facilities". 

Please download and READ the report : Treatment Industrial Complex: How for profit prison corporations are undermining efforts to treat and rehabilitate Prisoners for corporate gain. (ufsc.org/sites/default/files/documents/TIC-report-online.pdf ) Or for more information please contact American Friends Service Committee ( clsaacs@afc.org.org ) or (520) 623-9141 

I once thought just getting rid of  prejudice against us and our families / finally making it off  parole/ off state Registries was what family and friends on the "outside" needed to strive for but more states than "just" these 20 states have passed legislation enabling the spread of "Involuntary Civil Commitment" so perhaps to your state is next on the for-profit list using incarceration and faux therapy of human beings as a means not to make anyone "safe" but as an ever broadening income stream and a means of pleasing "stockholders" at our expense?  

Isolation kills even years and years later,

Even after you've been "on the registry" with your "significant other" for as long as I have been.
I guess I just forgot how many others are coming up, having to deal with the labeling and the shunning, the prejudice that ignites lynch mobs and makes even family members turn against each other. Today I got an email from a woman whose husband is just starting the (endless) legal process from arrest to conviction to the Registry. I tried to reach out and offer some comfort. I try to provide some help to frightened people just experiencing the "knock on the door." and frightened of what comes next. I try not to be too blunt about the "system." They need encouragement to face what comes next. To face the education they are about to receive about how the "system" really works.

I've (and my husband) have been "on the registry" for years now. My husband was convicted in 1976 just after her returned from Vietnam. When he got out of prison there wasn't even a "Registry." just the usual parole supervision which worked pretty well to protect children and help people change.

But, after all these years of "social isolation" it's still lonely. Oh, I have good friends, some of whom "know" but most I met at work  or in other situations where I was living a sort of  compartmentalized life. "On the registry" friends in  one segment of your life know only your public "self." I have other friends who only know my husband has been in prison (a shaming enough admission for some to decide they didn't want to know me/us)

People you like and trust in one setting may turn against you if they know about  the other "compartment" of your life (most have no idea what it means to "be on the registry." They rely on the prejudices they learned in the middle class society to "judge" people like us.) Even people whom I thought weren't prejudiced look at me differently when they learn my husband's on parole. Taking a chance on losing the few friends you have by "telling" your husband's not just a parolee but a Registrant is pretty scary and often a risk I don't want to take.

My husband is still on the Registry at 76. We still have monthly "visits" from Parole Officers and monthly visits to the Office of Parole and Probation. (He says he's tired of training newby parole officers) He's required to renew his drivers license every year.This year he had to get a "Real ID" / driver's license because the deadline to get a "Real ID "is Oct. 2020.  Luckily, we already had certified copies of most of the paperwork (birth certificates, etc.)  I dread to think what other registrants will go through if they are homeless/ just out of prison etc. or if they have to contact another state for their documents and must do that before some date set by P&P or risk being violated and sent back to prison ( in this state any violation is a felony carrying a 6 year sentence)

Because NV went from a risk based tier system to a system (the Adam Walsh Act) a system that assigns tiers based solely upon original conviction 2 years ago, my 76 year old husband suddenly went from tier 2 up to tier 3. This means he must go to the Sheriffs Dept and check in and give his fingerprints every 90 day (counting from his DOB)

Now that we're both "retired" we manage to get by but our financial situation would be a lot better if he had been allowed to work and earn without all the restrictions imposed  by the Registry.
We manage but we still must live in a parole and probation "approved" location and the rents here, as in most places around the country, are going up and up. If we can't live here, not only will we have to find a place we can afford, but a place they will allow us to live (and  HUD will not allow "offenders" or those with any felony conviction in any senior citizens housing. God help the homeless "registrant" )

You say, So What? He (and YOU) deserve what you get.
You say children's safety matters.
 I agree. No child's safety is expendable.

 But  there has got to be a better way than this endless piling on,  this endless punishing isolation.

The stigma attached to reporting abuse

I recently published my memoir but sometimes I feel like I felt when I went to school and showed teachers my bruises and was ignored

July 31, 2019

There is still a huge stigma attached to "telling" and it's  alive and well in spite of #MeToo"   Although the memoir Silenced Lives, the Sex Offender's Legacy received good recommendations and several people bought and tread the book, they report they found it hard to read "heavy" was the word they used because it was about 4 generations of abuse running through my family. 

I don't know if they are too soft hearted to read about child abuse, or if they find themselves triggered from their own experiences. Maybe, like me, they were told " just don't think about it."  But as you and people who search for "not the Life" because they are in need of support, just don't think about it solves nothing and, unfortunately, it helps the generational cycle of abuse to continue.  Several women who read the book, found it very valuable but spoiler alert, for some it triggered  rememberance of their own experience.  They told me they too were raped either as children or as young adults. One woman said she had only ever told 4 people including me.  

If you bought and read the book Silenced Lives maybe you would share some feedback? Or even leave a review on Amazon?  (please buy the book using Amazon Smile so your favorite non-profit charity also reaps some benefit.)

I think sexual abuse is so embedded in our society that most people do not want to see how wide spread and how crippling it can be for both boys and girls and how much sexual violence silences us all (unless of course you are rich and "above the law" then it is apparently a means of demonstrating you are one of the big boys at the top of the family or at the top of the social heap. I was really shocked at the recent hearings to confirm the Supreme Court vacancy. I thought we had come further toward justice...and no, I don't think revenge is justice. I don't agree with the US Olympic team's "performance" in court against their coach. But that's another topic.

For those of us who have heard the knock at the door and had all social connections stripped away (along with a family member we love) we know what it means to suddenly discover our family is "expendable."

I recently read a book called Lost Connections which describes how our social "selves" are stripped away and we are set adrift at the know upon the door (followed after prison) by the 900,000+ public Sex Offender Registry whose sole purpose doesn't seem to be to protect children but to keep everyone from ever regaining a productive place in work and society.

The problem with stripping us of all our connections especially when the "perpetrator" is a sex-curious minor is that the whole system is bent upon making the rest of their lives "a an example" in order to feed those employed by  "justice system."

I don't believe, "once a perpetrator, always a perpetrator." I think if we are willing to listen, if we intervene early, if our intervention is healing and not just purposely destructive we have a chance of breaking the transgenerational cycle of abuse that harmed 4 generations of my family.

Oh, yes and if we allow ourselves to be "trauma informed" and stop averting our eyes when a 4th grader shows up in short sleeves in order to display her bruises....  Take care, Janet Mackie 

Silenced Lives was hard for me to write but it taught me so much about myself and how it was that the cycle of child sexual abuse harmed so many in my family. Please read Silenced Lives and join me in speaking out in order to protect the next generation of children. join me in vowing No More Victims.

 Silenced Lives:

The Sex Offender’s Legacy

By Janet Mackie

Book Summary                                                                         

Silenced Liives is a  memoir that takes courage to write. Author Janet Mackie shares family stories exposing a pattern of child sexual abuse that surfaced over a hundred years ago on a Nebraska farm, when Mackie’s bullied and abused Great Uncle Andrew was “disappeared” by his brother Paw Paw. The incident is silenced but Andrew’s grieving mother banishes Paw Paw and his devout wife to Black Tower. Once there, Paw Paw bullies and abuses their children, Mackie’s 5-year-old father among them.  Mackie’s angry and resentful father survives to marry, then abuses Mackie and her brothers. 

Powerless to protect, Mackie’s grandmother advises, “Just don’t think about ‘it.’” Mackie, called her mother’s “most stubborn little girl,” blots out her experience and manages to survive childhood only to marry a man “strangely like her father.”

In turn, Mackie’s daughter survives her father’s sexual abuse but also marries a controlling man “strangely like her father.”

Finally freed by her father’s death, Mackie sets out to discover “Why me? Why my family?” Her deftly written, engaging stories illustrate how, over time, abuse can create abuse that cycles forth to harm generations as yet unborn unless we, too, gather courage and speak out. 

Praise for Silenced Lives 

“Janet Mackie has indeed crafted a most compelling read. Her book is, in essence, a family saga, replete with abuse, horror, love, secrecy and regret. She convincingly argues that child sexual abuse can pervade ongoing generations with its destruction unless it is brought out of secrecy, acknowledged and addressed. In a most unique way, she is able to weave the stories of those who have endured sexual abuse at the hands of a family member with those who perpetrated the abuse. In so doing she is able to impart to the reader both understanding and compassion for all involved. This is a profoundly personal and intimate look at a family who has been affected by the cycle of abuse. However, in telling these stories she has provided the reader with a clear picture of what is at stake and how we might move forward so that future generations will not continue to suffer.”

-- Kate Thomas, Ph.D., Director of Clinical Services, The Johns Hopkins Sex and Gender Clinic

More Praise for Silenced Lives 

“Reading like a novel, this book shines a bright light deep into the dark recesses of child sexual exploitation. It also starts to unravel the bewildering inter-generational aspects of this phenomenon.” 

-- Charles M. McGee, Sr. District Judge; Second Judicial District Court, State of Nevada, Washoe County

“Silenced Lives is a beautifully written, raw personal account of the transgenerational effects of sexual abuse. Thank you, Janet Mackie, for your courage in sharing your voice to make a difference for others.”

-- Dr. Nancy B. Irwin, PsyD, C.Ht.  

A book like Silenced Lives,...by veteran social worker Janet Mackie, is long overdue. Until now, the public has never had concrete proof that the silent-shame cycle of sexual abuse is responsible for churning out victims, offenders, and enablers generation after generation. Now there can be no doubt. Many “experts” on sexual abuse deny that abuse causes abuse. Perhaps they want to reassure survivors that we are not in danger of becoming “monsters.” And they are right that most survivors do not go on to abuse. Still, a disproportionate number of sex offenders were sexually abused as children. Mackie doesn’t let this seeming paradox distract her from writing about the actual dynamics and facts of inherited abuse. In Silenced Lives, Mackie puts a human face on sex offenders, survivors, and enablers by inviting us into her family’s legacy of “hand-me-down” pain. Mackie was intimately violated by people who were violated by people who were violated by ... and so on. Mackie proves that one generation’s abuse caused the next generation’s abuse when she depicts idiosyncratic similarities of the abuse rituals that were handed down from one perpetrator to the next. Silenced Lives shows sex offenders hiding away in shame—the very shame they act out during their crimes. If they dared seek help, no one would help them anyway since conventional wisdom is, “Once a sex offender, always a sex offender.” They are considered monsters beyond redemption. Meanwhile, the survivors in Silenced Lives get the message that if they were abused, something must be wrong with them. They are told, “We don’t talk about such things.” So, they don’t get the help they need either. Those who suspect or know of abuse don’t want to get tainted by the shame associated with it, so they remain silent. And the secret abuse continues. 

Like Mackie, I was sexually abused as a child. Unlike Mackie, however, I chose to act out the secret shame by perpetrating a sex crime of my own. I don’t blame what I did on what happened to me. I made a choice. However, if I had been able to read Silenced Lives before I let my life get totally out of control, I would have understood the cause of my rape fantasies. Both I and the person I harmed might have escaped the cycle. Better late than never. That’s not what you’ll be saying about the ending of “Silenced Lives,” though. Painful as the family legacy is, Mackie writes so well you’ll want to keep reading even after “the end.” And that’s as it should be, because, as Silenced Lives makes clear, we are a long way from “the end” of the cycle of abuse. 
– Paul Hanley, author of Roller Coaster to Hell and Back: A True Story of Sexual Abuse and New Hope.

Available now on Amazon.com.   


Until I inherited the dusty box of family letters, photos, and memories that form the basis of my memoir Silenced Lives: The Sex Offender’s Legacy, I too thought child molestation was a  personal family tragedy to be quarantined by silence  and shame. I didn't realize that the child sexual abuse that so grievously affected my own family, the abuse that made me angrily assert "This is not the Life I Chose" (and it wasn't) however abuse is not a historic just appearing out of nowhere but can be traced, at least in my family, down 4 generations. Only by speaking out can any of us break the pattern and ensure the safety of generations to come. 

Blame the Mother: And speaking of friendship: someone who needs friendship... What do you think? There but for the grace of.... Please comment

A Meridian Idaho woman who failed to report the sexual abuse of her daughter by her husband will spend 19 days in jail as a result, as well as two years on probation.

Melinda Maloney, 46, pleaded guilty Wednesday morning to one count of failure to report child abuse, a misdemeanor. As a result of that plea agreement, attorneys from the Ada County Prosecuting Attorney’s Office asked 4th District Court Judge Daniel Steckel to dismiss the other charge Maloney faced, which was destruction of evidence.

Maloney is married to Craig Maloney, 47, a former Meridian veterinarian who in October was sentenced to up to 40 years in prison for the decade-long sexual abuse of his stepdaughter — Melinda Maloney’s biological daughter — from the time the girl was 4 until she was 14.

In the spring of last year, the girl told her mother about the sexual abuse, but Melinda Maloney, despite being a social worker and a mandatory reporter, did not report the abuse, she admitted in court Tuesday. Eight months later the girl told her father, who called the police and initiated the investigation that ended with the arrest of both Craig and Melinda Maloney, who was arrested in September.

When asked why Melinda Maloney did not report the abuse, Katelyn Farley, one of the case’s prosecutors, in court Tuesday said the woman replied she “was going through a custody battle and did not want it to affect her business.”

“That person who was supposed to help (the victim), who was supposed to protect her, did not,” Farley said.

Dennis Benjamin, Melinda’s attorney, pointed out Melinda Maloney forced her husband to move out of the house when she became aware of the abuse.

“She did fail to report it, but she took steps to protect her children,” Benjamin said.

One of the reasons for the plea agreement, the prosecutor told Steckel, was the 14-year-old girl’s reluctance to testify in court against her mother. Instead, prosecutors asked Steckel to sentence Melinda Maloney to 19 days in jail, as well as to pay a $250 fine, with another $250 possible if she does not comply with her unsupervised two-year probation.

Melinda Maloney is also under investigation by the Idaho Board of Social Work Examiners because of her failure to report the abuse.

Tommy Simmons is the Ada County public safety reporter for the Idaho Press. Follow him on Twitter @tsimmonsipt

Jail, probation for Meridian social worker who didn't report daughter's ...

https://www.idahopress.com/...meridian-social-worker.../article_02fdaff9-a21b-52d7-b3...

Nov 7, 2018 - In the spring of last year, the girl told her mother about the sexual abuse, but Melinda Maloney, despite being a social worker and a mandatory ..

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For those of us who are still too afraid to build relationships after the knock on the door, 2019 is time to "unfreeze"? Time to find ways to get started again.? Search the internet, find a team you can play for that does not insist on judging you by the worst thing that happened in your life (and the decisions you have made since then)? Oh, I know, most o those around you (at work or maybe even at Church, perhaps in your neighborhood will continue to be acquaintances you will still hold at arms length because you knw how prejudiced they are however if you can count 3 friends who know the whole truth, who can be there for you even when you need to complain about how the parole officer wrecked your house the last time they came, or tell the truth to about how the real facts of your everyday life...well post here on Not the Life and tell me, tell us all how you went about/ what changes in your thinking made it possible to make friends with that friend.

Dear Mindful Readers, A new year provides a chance to reflect on the aspects of your life you want to strengthen—and for many of us, that includes checking in on the constellation of relationships we’ve cultivated over the years. Whether it be with your friends, family, coworkers, or partner, here are three ways to build stronger relationships in 2019: 1. Recognize your true friends. Making friends is tough—and a true friend should never be taken for granted. But sometimes, the people you hold close may not be treating you the way you deserve. Explore these six signs of a strong friendship to discover all the ways a friend can enrich your life. 2. Listen to what’s being said. We’ve all caught ourselves tuning out midway through a conversation, either to prepare our response, tackle our mental to-do list, or even *gasp* check a phone notification. But failing to listen to what’s being said deprives our relationships of value and impedes connection. Try these five key mindful listening techniques to give your full attention in the next conversation you have. 3. Know when to forgive. It’s nearly impossible to foster a relationship with someone if you harbor feelings of distrust or uncertainty toward them. While you may not have the ability to forget what’s happened, you always have the power to forgive those who have hurt you. Follow this guided meditation to make amends with both yourself and others. Here’s hoping you all find moments to enjoy being mindful this week. With warmest wishes, The Mindful Team