AK – Navy officer sentenced in abuse case

Article

JUNEAU, Alaska — The Navy’s former top ranking officer in Alaska stood at attention as a judge sentenced him to two years in prison for the attempted sexual abuse of a 12-year-old girl.

A military man such as Cmdr. Robert Schetky should know discipline and should have been able to control his impulses toward the girl, Juneau Superior Judge Larry Weeks said Thursday as he handed down the sentence, which includes two more years that were suspended.

“No one will ever know the damage done to her,” Weeks said.

Schetky, 54, briefly apologized.

“The damage I’ve caused to my family, I can’t change that,” he said. “I ask for forgiveness and hope to amend what I did.”

A Letter from SNAP (Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests)

Survivors and family members:
We need your help!

If there is anyone whose perpetrator lived or worked in Washington DC, Delaware or Alaska or if your abuse took place in any of these places, please contact us right away!

If your abuse or perpetrator have a connection to Delaware please send an email to snapblaine@gmail.com

If your abuse or perpetrator have a connection to Washington DC please contact snapadmin@gmail.com

If your abuse or perpetrator have a connection to Alaska please email gymsoul@hotmail.com

Stop and think again, even if it happened only 20 feet across the border and/or one time it still counts. Even if your perpetrator lived or worked in one of these jurisdictions for only one month it still counts!

Survivors frequently feel helpless because it doesn’t seem that there are ways to help others. This is a great opportunity to make a big difference. Please contact us right away if you think you have information that could help in these jurisdictions.

All the best,

Barbara Blaine

Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests | PO Box 6416 | Chicago | IL | 60680

NY – Child molester thrown in brig

Lieutenant at Fort Wadsworth admits snatching, abusing 2 boys
Wednesday, January 17, 2007
By JOHN ANNESE
STATEN ISLAND ADVANCE
For three years, a U.S. Coast Guard lieutenant who volunteered at Fort Wadsworth chapel events used his position to get close to several young children. And what might have seemed innocent play at the time was anything but that.

Now Lt. Junior Grade Jay Coker, 28, will spend 12 years in a Navy brig for possessing child pornography, kidnapping and taking “indecent liberties” with several children on Staten Island, Rhode Island and Alaska, Coast Guard officials confirmed yesterday.

A military judge sentenced Coker to 30 years in prison. Under an agreement with Coker, in exchange for his pleading guilty to the 12 charges, he is to serve no more than 12 years in prison provided he successfully completes a sex offender treatment program and fulfills other conditions. He is in custody at the Naval Consolidated Brig, Charleston, S.C., and awaiting transfer to the U.S. Disciplinary Barracks, Fort Leavenworth, Kansas.

Coker admitted he kidnapped and tried to molest two little boys on the grounds of the Fort Wadsworth base last year.

AK, CO – Federal Pen Next Site for Web Predator: MAXIMUM: A Colorado Man Met a Minor Online and Traveled to Alaska to Have Sex With Her in 2004.

Article

By Megan Holland, Anchorage Daily News, Alaska

Jan. 5–A Colorado music teacher was sentenced this week to more than five years in federal prison for traveling to Alaska to have sex with a child he met on the Internet.

Brock Purviance of Arvada, Colo., was convicted of flying to Alaska in August 2004 to have sex with a 15-year-old girl he met in an online chat room, federal prosecutors said.

According to a press release from the U.S. attorney’s office, U.S. District Judge John Sedwick gave Purviance the maximum sentence of 71 months in prison because of evidence that Purviance had committed other crimes before, even though he had no previous criminal convictions. Purviance admitted that in 2000 he met a 14-year-old Colorado girl on the Internet and met with her for sex, according to the U.S. attorney’s statement.

After Purviance, who is in his 30s, is released from prison, he will have 25 years of supervised release, prosecutors said. His use of the Internet will be limited and his contact with children will also be limited.

AK – Federal pen next site for Web predator

Article

MAXIMUM: A Colorado man met a minor online and traveled to Alaska to have sex with her in 2004.

By MEGAN HOLLAND
Anchorage Daily News

Published: January 5, 2007

 

A Colorado music teacher was sentenced this week to more than five years in federal prison for traveling to Alaska to have sex with a child he met on the Internet.

Brock Purviance of Arvada, Colo., was convicted of flying to Alaska in August 2004 to have sex with a 15-year-old girl he met in an online chat room, federal prosecutors said.

According to a press release from the U.S. attorney’s office, U.S. District Judge John Sedwick gave Purviance the maximum sentence of 71 months in prison because of evidence that Purviance had committed other crimes before, even though he had no previous criminal convictions. Purviance admitted that in 2000 he met a 14-year-old Colorado girl on the Internet and met with her for sex, according to the U.S. attorney’s statement.

After Purviance, who is in his 30s, is released from prison, he will have 25 years of supervised release, prosecutors said. His use of the Internet will be limited and his contact with children will also be limited.

Prosecutors say Purviance, a guitar teacher, met an Alaska girl who was 13 at the time in an Internet music chat room and carried on online chats and telephone conversations with her for more than a year. Purviance conversed with the girl in explicit and graphic language, then flew to Alaska while her parents were out of state at a funeral. The two had sex, prosecutors say.

Purviance was charged with the crime this past July and pleaded no contest in October. It was unclear Thursday how authorities found out about the relationship.

Local and federal authorities in Anchorage in recent years have cracked down on people who prey on youngsters over the Internet. Kids are often online unsupervised, where they reveal many details about their lives and become easy targets unbeknownst to their parents. The Anchorage Police Department has even set up a special unit, dedicated full-time to snagging the predators.

AK – Hale says he’ll plead no contest to incest; PAPA PILGRIM: Family’s patriarch, also charged with rape and assault, would get 14 years.

Article
By TOM KIZZIA
Anchorage Daily News
Published: December 22, 2006
Last Modified: December 22, 2006 at 07:44 AM

After more than a year in jail awaiting trial on charges of rape, assault and incest, the man known as Papa Pilgrim says he is ready to plead no contest and accept punishment.

Robert Hale, the reclusive patriarch of a large family from McCarthy, is scheduled to go on trial in Glennallen starting Jan. 16. The 30 felony charges involve one of his daughters as victim and reach back seven years.

But in a request filed in court Thursday, Hale’s public defender said Hale is willing to plead no contest to most of the charges in exchange for a 14-year prison sentence. Hale, 65 and in poor health, has been in jail since his arrest in October 2005.

AK – Man arrested for sexual abuse

Article

(Published: December 20, 2006)

ANCHORAGE — Police arrested Richard Schaerer, 39, Tuesday on charges that he sexually abused two young people repeatedly between 1997 and 2004, according to the Anchorage Police Department.

The investigation began earlier this month when one of the victims came forward. Schaerer was charged with 26 counts of sexually abusing a minor.

Schaerer will go before a judge for his first court appearance today at Anchorage Jail Court at 3 p.m.

Police are concerned that Schaerer may have abused more victims. They ask anyone who may know about incidents involving him or who has been a victim to call 786-8900.

AK – Fort Rich soldier removed from Iraq, charged with sexual abuse

Article
Published: November 22, 2006
Last Modified: November 22, 2006 at 06:29 AM

ANCHORAGE — A soldier serving in Iraq with an Alaska unit has been brought back to Anchorage to face charges of forcing children to have sex with him, Anchorage police said.

Fort Richardson Staff Sgt. Sean Rohde videotaped himself abusing the children, according to the charges filed in Anchorage District Court.

Rohde is a 39-year-old career military man from Houston, Texas, Anchorage police said.

In Iraq, a fellow soldier saw child pornography on Rohde’s computer in mid-October and immediately notified Army authorities, who began an investigation, said Anchorage police detective Kevin Vandegriff.

AK – School bus monitor charged with abuse

Article
By ANDREW WELLNER and BECKY STOPPA
Anchorage Daily News
Published: November 4, 2006
Last Modified: November 5, 2006 at 03:14 AM

WASILLA — A Wasilla man with a DUI and a domestic violence conviction on his record was arrested Friday, accused of groping and harassing six Wasilla Middle School girls in September while working as a school bus monitor.

Martin Fleming, 35, was arraigned at the Palmer Courthouse on three counts of second-degree sexual abuse of a minor, one count of attempted third-degree sexual abuse of a minor and three counts of second-degree harassment.

A drug test done on Fleming the day of the incident came back positive for methamphetamine and cocaine, according to the Alaska State Troopers.

Because Fleming did not have a lawyer Friday, Magistrate David Zwink entered a not-guilty plea for him.

AK – Yakutat man charged with sexual abuse

Article

A Yakutat man is in police custody after being charged with multiple counts of molesting children, officials said Friday.

Bruce Jensen, 42, is charged with two counts of first-degree sexual abuse of a minor and five counts of second-degree sexual abuse of a minor. A Juneau grand jury issued indictments against Jensen on Oct. 13.

According to court records, the incidents took place in Yakutat between February 1994 and August 2006. The court records do not identify the alleged victims, but police confirmed that all five victims were male. Yakutat Chief of Police John Nichols said that at the time of the attacks, the boys ranged in age from 9 to 17. He also confirmed that several of the alleged attacks were against members of Jensen’s extended family.

AK – Two Jesuits named in sexual abuse lawsuit

Article
The Associated Press
Published: September 23, 2006
Last Modified: September 23, 2006 at 03:30 PM

FAIRBANKS, Alaska (AP) – Two sexual abuse civil suits involving deceased Jesuits were filed this week in Alaska Superior Courts in Fairbanks and Bethel.

In Fairbanks, the Reverend Norman Donohue, who died in 1983, is accused of sexually abusing male children when he was a resident pastor in Kaltag and Nulato.

In Bethel, three women filed suit saying they were sexually abused as children by Jesuit brother Ignatius Jakes, an Inupiat Eskimo. Jakes died in 1999.

AK – Sexual abuse of minor charges filed

Article
September 19, 2006
By MARY AMES/Frontiersman

PALMER – A man indicted on 17 counts of sexual abuse of a minor and unlawful exploitation of a minor was indicted again on the same charges or 17 new charges.

Steven M. Knights, 48, who has been in jail since he was originally indicted in May, was indicted again on 17 charges last week. But when Superior Court Judge Beverly Cutler asked, no one in court could say whether all or some of the charges were new.

AK, CA, ID – Accused molester, serving as his own attorney, questions himself

Story
By Rodney Foo
Mercury News

Already acting as his own attorney in a molestation trial, convicted sexual predator Dean Schwartzmiller put himself on the stand this morning.

In the third week of testimony in a case that could send him prison for 150 years, the 64-year-old plasterer was asked shortly before 10 a.m. who his next witness would be.

CA, AK, ID – Co-defendant’s silence limits case of molestation suspect

Story
By Rodney Foo
Mercury News

Dean Schwartzmiller, defending himself against child molestation charges that could put him away in prison for life, was dealt a setback Friday when attorneys for a defense witness said their client will not willingly testify.

AK, CA, ID – Accused molester begins presenting own defense case

Story
By Rodney Foo
Mercury News

With the prosecution completing it case, a man accused of molesting two San Jose boys began his own defense today by playing recorded interviews police made with one of the alleged victims.

AK, ID, CA – PEDOPHILE WAS LIKE A GRANDFATHER, HE SAYS

Story
By Rodney Foo
Mercury News

With his mother seated by his side, a 13-year-old boy testified that Dean Schwartzmiller cornered him alone in a South San Jose bedroom and then fondled and performed a sexual act on him.

AK – Fort Rich Soldier Accused of Child Porn Possession

Story Created: Aug 30, 2006 at 12:43 AM AKST
Story Updated: Aug 30, 2006 at 3:04 AM AKST

A 19-year-old soldier from Fort Rich has been arrested and charged with 12 counts of possession of child pornography.

AK – Police fear accused child molester may have more victims

Story
Tuesday, August 29, 2006 – by Jason Moore
Anchorage, Alaska – The victim is a 10-year-old girl and the alleged perpetrator is 71 years old. The Anchorage Police Department says the man sexually abused the girl for the course of a year.

AK – Woman pleads not guilty to child sex abuse charges

Story

(August 29, 2006) The 34-year-old Fairbanks woman accused of sexually abusing a 13-year-old boy at an area snow dump site last week has pleaded innocent to child sex abuse charges.

AK, CA, ID – Molester’s trial begins

Story
John Cote, Chronicle Staff Writer
Monday, August 28, 2006
Dean Schwartzmiller was a predator who used positions of trust — as a football coach, an employer, a family friend — to molest dozens of boys, then chronicled his sexual exploits in a 456-page manuscript with chapters titled “Nature of the Beast,” “Programming the Young,” and “In the Beginning There Were Boys, Boys and More Boys,” a Santa Clara County prosecutor said today.