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Three Abuse Cases, One Perpetrator


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He has now been arrested three times for "sexual contact with minors," for three different victims, over several years, all of which occurred at church functions and with leaders and parents nearby.

https://www.kiro7.com/news/local/redmond-police-re-arrest-man-child-molestation-charges-involving-new-victims/6TGM7LGHZRAHLNA37WCY2QLSMA/

Quote

REDMOND, Wash. — Redmond police re-arrested a man last week for allegedly having sexual contact with minors, the police department announced Monday.

Buckland Darrell, 44, was arrested on April 11 and charged with four counts of first-degree child molestation involving three victims. He is being held in the King County Jail on $500,000 bail.

Redmond police detectives previously arrested Darrell in March after he allegedly had sexual contact with a boy in 2020 while attending a church in Redmond. Darrell was also arrested for child molestation involving another victim in December 2022. He was released on bail in both cases.

 

According to Redmond police, the cases are all similar in that they involve boys under the age of 12, and the incidents happened near or in the presence of the victims’ family members. The three most recent victims are also affiliated with the same Redmond church.

 

After his arrest, Darrell told police there were more victims but did not provide names or details.

Police said Darrell has attended many church events and gatherings over the last decade and believe there could be more victims. The Redmond Police Department asks anyone with information to contact their tip line at 425-556-2500.

 

Story after the 2nd arrest wherein he was identified as a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints: https://www.redmond.gov/CivicAlerts.aspx?AID=1366

Additional background and details here: https://floodlit.org/a/a586/

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According to someone that is in the know who is from the area, multiple members had misgivings about him and did all they could to keep him away from kids. Local leaders didn’t think he was a threat though.

Its horrific.

 

Edited by bluebell
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18 minutes ago, blackstrap said:

Has there been a court case/trial from any of the previous arrests and charges.? If not , I wonder why and would those be flagged for church leaders? 

I believe all three arrests are between December of 2022 and now, so I can't imagine there would be any trials yet.

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What will occasionally happen with such events, is one scared brave soul (either the kid or a parent or a teacher) will come forward, and then all hell breaks loose as dude's other victims all see the one coming forward, and find their strength to say 'me too'.  

Kudos to our church for mandating that everyone involved in kids take the training, and mandating that we MUST be the brave soul.  Doesn't matter if we're reporting a family member, or a spouse, or a bishop.  We don't tolerate CSA, and we don't stay quiet about it.

(That's the talk.  You will always be able to find individuals struggling to do the walk.)

Edited by LoudmouthMormon
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47 minutes ago, ttribe said:

No comment on the fact that local leadership ignored people's misgivings about the man before someone finally went to the police?

I'm seeing @bluebell's comments, but don't know what to say about them.  Kind of hard to have any sort of relevant comment about thirdhand unsourced information from someone who heard from "someone that is in the know who is from the area".

I can speak from principle and things I've personally witnessed.  These things are all true, at the exact same time:
- Parents get to act on their misgivings and gut reactions.   
- Parents' misgivings, where there's just a general feeling of creepiness, are sometimes spot on.
- At other times, parents' misgivings are based on ignorance coupled with prejudice.  (We can all google up endless 'Karen loses it' videos.)  
- A third thing that happens, is someone will witness blatant CSA, and just fail to react.  It's entirely possible that Bluebell's source actually saw criminal activity, and just plain old didn't have the tools, the sense, the knowledge, the understanding, or the guts, to break out of human complacency and take action.
- A fourth thing that happens, is after we see the first victim, and then the rush of 'me too' victims, everyone will finally be forced to deal with what happened, and it's quite common to hear a bunch of "I knew there was something wrong with the guy from the start."
- A fifth thing that happens, (and I am speaking from direct firsthand knowledge here), is someone will see problem behavior, alert people with stewardship over the growing perpetrator, and get viciously turned on.  Told they're making it up.  Criticized for blowing things out of proportion.  Accused of holding grudges and making it harder for the perp to be a good person.   

Honestly, I've seen the fourth thing happen a whole bunch.  In and out of the church.  It's a human social behavior thing. 

This crap thrives in darkness and ignorance. Some humans simply don't have the ability to call foul when they see a child being molested.  So yeah, kudos to the church for forcing everyone involved with kids to deal with the subject through the online training class.  It helps.  

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30 minutes ago, Rain said:

Sadly too many times I am seeing that one brave soul come forward, and sometimes others follow, but they are sometimes ignored or criticized or told it isn't their business.  

Yep.  In a situation I'm personally aware of, my friend had been abused years prior as a child, told abuser's mom, and decided to let it go.  (This was in the '90's.)  Upon hearing of another victim who was going to the cops, she immediately went to the cops and filed a report.  It was years later, and from another state, but her reasoning was 'I need to help this victim, and obviously I wasn't the only one.'  Abuser's mom turned on my friend.  Accused her of failing to forgive.  Accused her of making it harder for perp to go on a mission.  The mom lied about my friend in court, claimed she was mentally ill and had a history of lying about this stuff.  The mom, dad, and siblings all locked arms and banded together against both my friend, and the 8 yr old 2nd victim.  It was the most amazing bit of human behavior I'd ever witnessed.  

Anyway, yes, it happens.  Another thing that happens, is sometimes folks will make false accusations, accusing an innocent person of abusing them, when there was no abuse.  This can be done for reputation destruction, revenge, money, mental illness, regret, or to maintain social standing in a group.   As my friend went through counseling and became involved in rape crisis centers, she saw a few of these liars in the system.  She tells me they're not hard to spot, and if they're discovered in group counseling, it tends to not go well for the liars.

And again, this isn't a church thing, this is a human thing.  

And again, kudos to the church for forcing the issue to the forefront and making people who work with kids deal with it.

Edited by LoudmouthMormon
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9 minutes ago, bsjkki said:

I don’t understand how, if he was accused in 2020 and arrested, how the ward did not then protect ward members from further abuse. A 🧵

 

I'm not seeing anywhere that he was arrested in 2020.  It looks like he was arrested in March 2023 because the victim from 2020 came to the police.

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8 minutes ago, bsjkki said:

I don’t understand how, if he was accused in 2020 and arrested, how the ward did not then protect ward members from further abuse. A 🧵

He wasn't.  Read carefully:
- Perp arrested in Dec 2022 and released.  $100k bail.
- Perp arrested again in March 2023 and released  $200k bail. 
- Perp arrested again on April 11, 4 new counts, 3 new victims.  $500k bail.

The molestations go back to 2020.  It's not like everyone knew about the accusations until December 2022.  

Again, this crap hides in darkness.  Victims keep secrets out of shame, fear, guilt.  For years, even decades.  Someone finally speaks up in 2022, the cops act quickly, then there's a tidal wave of 'me too' events.   

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1 hour ago, ttribe said:

No comment on the fact that local leadership ignored people's misgivings about the man before someone finally went to the police?

If you were a local leadership and a parent came up to and said "So-and-so seems to be a little weird around kids", what exactly would you do?  I don't see that strong enough suspicion to go to the police.  Maybe I'd talk with the person but if the person was malicious, that really wouldn't be useful either.  It looks like, in this specific case, he was released from primary callings and never had them again.  So it does seem like they did react to it.

The 2020 case is interesting because it says there were multiple witnesses.  Why didn't any of those witnesses go to the police?  Who did they talk to?  We have got to get rid of this culture of "go to the bishop first about crimes".  If you see a crime, go to the police first.

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11 minutes ago, webbles said:

I'm not seeing anywhere that he was arrested in 2020.  It looks like he was arrested in March 2023 because the victim from 2020 came to the police.

Oh, that twitter thread says something was reported in 2020.  It is an image from a report so here it is transcribed:

Quote

This case was originally reported to the Redmond Police Department in February 2020, after multiple witnesses observed the defendant massaging sex-year-old <> groin area during a church service.  The defendant and <> have no familial relationship.  The defendant attended the same church as <> family.  On March 16, 2020 <> provided a Child Forensic Interview and confirmed that his fly was unzipped and that the defendant touched his thigh during the church service.  However, <> denied that the defendant touched his private parts and did not disclose any additional details to establish probable cause for a crime, so the

So, the 2020 incident was reported to the police, they investigated, and found no "probable cause for a crime".

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20 minutes ago, blackstrap said:

I think I mis read this too. He was accused and arrested in March for behavior that took place in 2020. 

Thank you. Rumors about this guy were swirling for years. Members expressed concerns. They were ignored.

 

Edited by bsjkki
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12 minutes ago, webbles said:

The 2020 case is interesting because it says there were multiple witnesses.  Why didn't any of those witnesses go to the police?  Who did they talk to?  We have got to get rid of this culture of "go to the bishop first about crimes".  If you see a crime, go to the police first.

Yes.  So glad to see the issue clearly addressed in the church training:

ktkiUAW.png

It's right there in black and white.  No ambiguity.  "Immediately contact legal authorities".  And yeah, the bishop too.

No excuses folks.

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3 minutes ago, webbles said:

Oh, that twitter thread says something was reported in 2020.  It is an image from a report so here it is transcribed:

So, the 2020 incident was reported to the police, they investigated, and found no "probable cause for a crime".

It seems the victim recanted but there were multiple witnesses…so, this guy should have been on a tight leash from at least that point forward but he was allowed to continue grooming families in his ward. Sick. 

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1 minute ago, pogi said:

How is this mandated exactly?

Unfortunately, this doesn't always play out in reality.  As you noted, many stay quiet.  

Yep.  Imperfect system, absolutely.   Perhaps a future enhancement to the church's system, will be auto-generated emails that get issued as soon as a calling is recorded.  Seems like a good thing to do.

Nobody mistake me here - anything humans touch will never be perfect.  That absolutely includes the church and it's policies and procedures around child safety.  @pogi, your experiences and conclusions are totally valid.  

It stinks that only deep pockets tend to push hard on these policies, while smaller poorer orgs (strip mall churches, small town community centers, the kid play place at the community meeting held by the utility company, etc), don't.

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20 minutes ago, pogi said:

How is this mandated exactly?  I am the ward music leader but also work in the nursery.  When my wife and I were called to work in the nursery, no one mentioned the training.   I was the one who told my wife about it.  We both procrastinated and worked with children in the nursery for around 4 months before finally completing the training.   No one followed up.  Literally zero oversight or accountability.   It seems that "mandated" is a relative term based on your local ward/leaders. 

Where is this mandated?

Unfortunately, this doesn't always play out in reality.  As you noted, many stay quiet.  

People would get their training done if they were not allowed to serve until it was complete. We do need more accountability in the system. 

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