Randi Bregman has been in the field of sexual abuse advocacy for two decades. But until recently, Vera House’s executive director had never seen more attention on the crime than these past few months.

‘I think there’s probably more awareness and more conversation now than I ever remember in the past, and so of course it would be my hope that we can maintain this level of conversation,’ Bregman said. ‘And not miss the opportunity to continue to educate ourselves, to improve awareness and to do more to keep children safe in our community.’

Awareness about sexual abuse has grown in light of the cases at Syracuse University, with the sexual abuse allegations against former associate men’s basketball coach Bernie Fine, and Pennsylvania State University. With two publicized cases gaining so much attention in what has been a difficult couple of months, sexual abuse advocacy centers hope there is a silver lining.

Although Bregman said she hasn’t seen a major variation of actual sexual abuse survivors calling the center or the hotline, there has been an upswing of concerned family members and friends calling for people they think might have been abused at some point.

Bregman said those family members and friends are more aware that people they know might be in a difficult situation and are trying to become more of a support system since the allegations hit SU.

‘People were trying to explore the options about how they could be an empowered bystander and offer their friends and family members more than they may have been able to offer in the past,’ Bregman said. ‘And that part of these last few months have been real positive for all of us.’

Scott Berkowitz, the president and founder of the Rape, Abuse and Incest National Network, said in the month following the cases at both Penn State and SU, there was a 54 percent increase in people calling in concerning sexual abuse.

Berkowitz said some people are calling as soon as a couple of days after the abuse takes place. Others are calling up to 10 years after they were abused.

The difference between these cases and other publicized cases that involve sexual abuse is that the calls keep coming in. Berkowitz said there is usually a spike in the first couple of days and then the volume of calls goes back down again. Even two months after the abuse cases at Penn State and SU, there is still a higher percentage than normal.

‘I think it’s definitely alerted people to the availability of help and encouraged more to reach out for help,’ Berkowitz said. ‘Many of the people who contacted our hotline say this is the first time they’ve ever talked about whatever happened to them.’

Lisa Friel, the former chief of the Manhattan district attorney’s sex crimes unit for nearly a decade, said she expects an influx in the amount of people coming forward about the sexual abuse they might have endured.

Friel said the influx of people talking about their abuse could be comparable to another highly publicized abuse case about a decade ago. In 2002, The Boston Globe came out with a series of stories about five Catholic priests being prosecuted for sexual abuse — a story that was pushed into the national spotlight. As a result, more victims were encouraged to come forward with their allegations as well.

‘As more and more people see this and hear from people willing to come forward and say, ‘I was a victim,’ it gives people who didn’t come forward strength, and now they are coming forward,’ Friel said last month in a phone interview. ‘And I think we’re going to see a wave of this for a while, and I think that’s a good thing.’

Though these allegations have helped victims come forward, they have also been an opportunity to help people in the community understand what sex abuse is all about.

Janet Epstein, associate director of SU’s Advocacy Center, said this is a situation in which educating people could prove to be invaluable.

‘The key is educating the members of the community,’ Epstein said, ‘to get the facts out about child sexual abuse, the prevalence of it, the techniques that people use when they are looking to abuse children. The fact is that it can affect people from all walks of life.’

This is especially important with some of the misconceptions the allegations have brought out about the recent cases. Bregman said one misconception is that a sexual predator is usually a stranger lurking in the shadows, not a person a child trusts. But she said because there is trust between the two, it makes it difficult for children to come forward and accuse their abuser.

Berkowitz said another misconception is that sexual abuse is easy to overcome. Rather, it can be a very damaging crime for children and can be a lifelong burden.

But the hope is those misconceptions can continue to be erased as people become more mindful about what sexual abuse is.

Said Berkowitz: ‘One outcome of all the press attention these stories have gotten is that people are a lot more aware of the frequency and severity of the crime, which I think will help efforts to prevent future crimes.’

dgproppe@syr.edu

Published on January 16, 2012 at 12:00 pm