The Bull Speaks!

Sitting today all alone in the house, I reflected on the many types of jobs I have had in my life. When I thought of my days as a Councilor at a Group Home for teenage sex offenders, my mind settled on one fact that had never bothered me much… Until now. I’ll tell you of that job now, if you don’t mind. I’ll tell you about what I learned and what I can never forget. I will give damned few details of crimes and no names at all. Sorry.
At the end I’ll tell you of true betrayal and why this story is titled so…

The Group Home is in South Carolina. The boys housed there have been serving time in the Juvenile Justice system for their crimes. Some are chosen for a chance at the Group Home where they earn their high school diploma, are taught how to socialize and take care of themselves, and most importantly - they learn how to recognize their cycle of abuse and how to avoid getting into it and offending again. The graduates of that Group Home have historically had only 1% commit a sex crime again, and less than 4% ever went back to jail for any reason. Compare that to the over 60% re-offending rate of adult sex offenders and teens who did not go through the program. It made me feel like I was accomplishing something good for society.

The Home is owned and operated by a small woman with a huge heart. I had applied because I was desperate for work and really didn’t care where I got it. I had just had one interview at another company that had went very well so felt rather cocky as I walked in to her office. Right away she told me the ugly truth of what I would be dealing with, the horrors of the crimes that these seemingly normal kids had committed. We walked through the school, kitchen, and dorms. I was stunned at the fact that there were no guards, no weapons anywhere, and no fences at all. Not one law enforcement officer was anywhere on the property, even though some of the residents were technically still serving their sentences. Yet, there was order and quiet. I was also surprised to see that most of the councilors were women, some quite young, and a couple were damned well beautiful! (I dated a couple of them while I worked there…) Yes, pretty young women left alone, (actually in pairs), with convicted sex-offenders. Even at night in darkened dorms containing as many as a dozen boys ages 14 to 18. Seemed to me it was rape and murder waiting to happen. All the while we were on this tour she told me examples of the crimes these kids had done. And my blood ran cold.

When we arrived back in the owners office after our tour, she asked me - looking me square in the eyes - what I thought the proper punishment for sex-offenders should be, and she told me to answer truthfully. So I did! I told her that, in my not-so-humble opinion, “they should all be taken to a landfill and have one round fired into their brains at the edge of the pit. Further, the only problem I can see in that plan was that society would still be spending too much money on them by using a gun. Ammo, after all, cost money.” All the while she looked me in the eye. And never blinked. When I was done there was a moment of silence, and then she said: “You’re hired. When can you start?”

Shocked as I was by her statement, I did manage to shake her hand. Then we got on with the paperwork that included fingerprinting and a SLED background check. Then there was a drug test and a TB test on the forearm. While I awaited SLED to make sure I was a good boy after all I studied the manuals, studied the layout of the campus, and read about each of the boys then in the system. The owner came by once as I was reading these files and she told me something I’ll never forget: “A couple of things you must try to remember… None of these boys were born as sex offenders, and none of them learned it all alone.” Yeah… Those words didn’t mean much right then, but within a couple of weeks they were burned into my mind never to be forgotten.

The next part of my training was rather physical and showed me how they managed with so damned few men there and no armed guards. It turned out that all employees were required to pass a course in physical restraints using no equipment. No handcuffs nor manacles. No ropes or zip-ties. I was taught a system of take downs, escapes, and holds that made even the smallest girl working their capable of taking even me down. This was before my back surgeries. Though I was in pain, (and didn’t know why), I was big, strong, and relatively quick. Some of these boys however nearly matched my 6ft. 1in. frame, and a couple were approaching my mass as well. Those were big ol’ boys, and were taught to fight in prison where it was either win or be someone’s bitch. That makes for a handful when it comes to restraint. Even with the training it was a tough go on the rare occasion the big guys put up a fight.

Here I need to clarify something. The Home had two campuses. One was for boys coming from Juvenile Justice prison, the other was for kids - mostly younger, (8 to 13 yrs old) - that had been sentenced to the Home instead of prison. The older boys usually would not fight physically because they knew they would be back at the prison within hours of hitting someone. The other, younger, boys had no such sword over their heads, so restraints were a daily occurrence. LZIL: file not found:
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While I ended up as Team Leader on my campus, oft times I was called to the other campus in order to calm matters or to restrain a kid. Like I said, at the time I was straight of spine, and big. I also shaved my skull, chewed tobacco, and habitually wore heavy boots and a safari vest. Somehow the total picture made me look somewhat “mean“. It helped, I used it. (Come to think of it, that might be why I was hired so fast…)

Now the background checks, TB test, piss-test, and all the other stuff was complete and I was a full-time employee at last. My first days with the boys were uneventful. My campus was divided into two houses. the Lower house was for new arrivals. As they learned learned their offense cycle and took complete responsibility for the crime that got them in trouble in the first place, they could be “graduated” to the Upper house. From there they could eventually be sent home after much rehabilitation and re-socialization and getting their high school diploma. (Not a GED, the real thing.) At the time we had eight boys in the Lower and six in the Upper. I learned their names, began to get a grasp on the personalities of each, and made it clear as crystal that none of their jail-house games worked on me. I showed the boys that if they followed the rules, gave me no grief, I’d do whatever I could to give them their free time doing things they enjoyed, like basketball or softball. Why not? I figured that if they are busy playing ball they are too busy to plan mischief.

Then came the day I was on schedule for one of the group sessions with the Home’s Pshrinks… It turns out that the Home had a rule that when a new Staff member was involved in one of the groups sessions each of the boys was required to give name, age, age at time of offense, offense convicted of with time served, and finally, the details of the crime. All staff members were told to develop a darned good poker face before sitting in on any of these groups because we could not, rather - should not, show any emotion as the horrible details were laid out. That is more difficult than you can imagine when the details go far beyond the worst rapes and other attacks you’ve ever read of in the paper. And when you’re a father of three kids yourself?? Dear Gods! I wanted to puke. Time and again. To make it worse - much worse than you can possibly dream - is to sit quietly while a boy perhaps 15 years of age tells you of his repeated rapes of wee babes still in diapers, and as he does you notice he is getting an erection just remembering something you wish to the Gods you had never heard!

I did it though. I made it through and was told later that I had less emotion on my face than anyone else that had heard the confessions. Perhaps. But there was murder in my heart. I sat there as this vile beast had raised a tent in his sweatpants while telling me of his raping a baby, but in my mind I was fast at work on him with my scalping knife. Could you blame me? This was on a Friday. It was one of the last weekends I had off. So I went out to the range on Saturday and put a bunch of lead down range. On Sunday I went trout fishing. (Come to think of it, it was the last time in my Life I went fishing. It’s been five years now…) All the time I was trying to decide whether or not to quit this new job. Sometime on the river that Sunday afternoon I decided that I could not let these little bastards run me off. Damned if I wasn’t right when I told the owner that they should all be shot. At the time I recall thinking I’d gladly volunteer for the duty. Yes, gladly.

As I recall the next day was quiet at work. Later I figured out that it was me being quiet and the boys knew that it wasn’t a good idea to provoke me. The kid with the erection had been moved back down to the Lower house for his “clear relapse”. Strangest name ever for an old fashioned woody… Tuesday brought yet another of the group sessions. Again I was strained to keep my emotions in check. Again I was pushed to a need to lift someone’s hair. But this time it was not one our boys. This was the day I was to learn what the owner had meant when she had said “None of these boys were born as sex offenders, and none of them learned it all alone.”

It was during this group session that I heard one of the boys tell of his earliest memories. He spoke of the sexual abuse by many men and women as his parents had rented him and his sister out as sex toys for others. (Yes, they rented out their children!) Then he continued by showing his feet, kicking off his shoes to show the scars that matched the ones on his hands. He related the story of having broken a small statue of Christ while playing and for punishment having been crucified by his own parents! Yes, the same parents that rented their kids out as sex slaves to other adults! Some Christians. Some parents! And in the end the child ended up spending more time in jail than either of the parents who abused and assaulted him. (If that doesn’t keep you up nights you aren’t much of a human and for damned sure you are not a parent!) Is it any wonder that a child living such a life would commit some offense? Does it surprise you that monsters would rear up monsters?

As things turn out, the boy mentioned above completed the program and was released into the home of his adopted parents and is doing well. (BTW: His baby sister was also adopted, (by another family), and after much - and continuing - therapy is doing pretty well though she will never have children of her own.) No, this boy was not born a sex offender, he was made that way. No, he did not learn it alone. Sad to say, many people had part in that crime. As you can see, the owner of this Group Home was right, wasn’t she? Aye, she was. His crime was indeed heinous. (He performed oral sex on two neighborhood children younger even than himself, as I recall…) But he served his time, was treated for his mental issues and will continue to be for life. A sad story all around. And here is where I began to rethink my thoughts of shooting them all…

Finally we come to another lesson I learned on that job. It concerned a boy who was committed to Juvenile Justice at the age of eleven. He had committed his offense of sexually assaulting his younger brother and sister at the age of nine and the next two years were spent in legal wrangling and pshrink visits. He was released from Juvenile Justice at the age of 17. When he arrived at the group home he was highly institutionalized as you might expect having grown up behind bars. He was surprisingly polite, though. And eager to learn. He had a voracious appetite for the free world and wanted most of all to see the mountains and a real waterfall. That struck me as so strange for his hometown was near mine and both were surrounded with both mountains and waterfalls. But there are neither in prison. This boy did well in school and worked diligently on understanding his offense cycle. He participated in every group session and eventually ran many himself. But there was a problem…

This boy’s case had made a huge uproar in his hometown and the churches and politicians were not happy that he might be coming home, even after all of these years and all of his treatment both in prison and out. So, on his 18^th birthday the State Police showed up at the Group Home and transported this kid back to Columbia for a hearing. Several of us went to that hearing. The owner of the Home gave testimony in the boy’s favor. But in the end the State used a Civil Commitment statute concerning sex offenders to commit this boy to the state mental hospital for the remainder of his natural life. Happy Birthday!

That’s right. Years after his offense, and after he had served the sentence imposed on him when he was eleven years old for his crime, this boy was given what amounts to a second sentence - a life sentence. And it was totally and completely legal. No, it isn’t double jeopardy because it was not a criminal case, it was a civil one. His community decided that he was too much of a risk to society. So even though he had paid his debt to that society, to that community, they were allowed to further prosecute and punish him for the same crime once again by doing an end-run on the Constitution.

If you are like most people, you will not see anything wrong with what happened to this boy. You will say that he was a sex offender - the lowest form of life - and therefore in no need of our pity or even our concern at all.
Perhaps.
But let me ask you this: If the State can so easily bypass one persons Constitutional rights, how long until they do it to another. And then another. How long until it is someone other than sex offenders? How long until it is someone you know? How long until it is you?

If you think on it a while I bet you shiver a little despite yourself.
Omar the Bull, out.  

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