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And with us is Okay, Cannon, I'm the co founder
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of Meso Allies and the co hosts of the podcast
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The Ugly Truth spot Girl next Door. I'm also a
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survivor of family controlled human trafficking.
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And I'm Lori Croll. I'm a clinical social worker and
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also the co host of the Ugly Truth podcast and
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the co founder of Mezzo Allies.
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Could you tell us what Mezzo Allies is?
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Yeah, So, Mezzo Allies is a nonprofit that Laurie and
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I founded about a year and a half ago. So
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really baby new organization, our mission being to bridge the
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gap to safety for victims of family controlled human trafficking.
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After doing the podcast and after looking for help and
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all of the places, we kind of popped our heads
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up out of this and we were hearing from survivors
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across the world, honestly who were saying me too, right,
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this happened to me too. And I also couldn't find help,
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and I also found the system to be failing and
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all of the things, and so we kind of looked
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at each other and said, Okay, well, nobody's talking about this,
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so I guess you know, if not us, then who,
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And so Meso Allies was born. Meso is the Italian
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word for the middle, and throughout our entire journey together
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we referred to this space of you know, bad things
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not really happening anymore entirely, but also not totally free
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and safe, as like this messy middle, right and is
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the middle gonna hold? And so that's where Mezzo Allies
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came from, as everybody needs an ally. All of these
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survivors who are saying me too, me too, they need
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allies who know about family controlled human trafficking, who are educated,
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who know the very unique complexity of this type of crime,
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did walk alongside them. So yeah, that's our nonprofit.
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And those allies need supports to be able to hold
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the middle. You know, some of that conversation Can and
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I had was about how many times the middle fell
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out from under her, that she would be trying to
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cross that bridge to get to a place of safety.
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She would reach out, you referenced before, multiple times she
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told people what they needed to know so that they
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could help her, and the bottom just fell out.
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People who have to you know, talking to a teacher
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at school, you know you you did everything that you
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needed to do, and and they they just did not
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do anything. Not the right thing they did. In fact, no,
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they did the wrong thing. They did the worst thing.
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When you tell somebody that that you're being sexually victimized
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by your father and they call your father, it's so wrong.
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So I know you mentioned at some point that the
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church that you were in, that your family was in,
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that your father was in, that your grandfather was in,
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that that many of these men who sexually victimized you
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were in, that that there were tenants of this church
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or teachings of this church that promoted this kind of thing.
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Can you tell us about that?
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Yeah, So there's two churches. The church that my parents
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grew up in. My mom's brother in law is actually
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the current pastor there still he's also an offender. And
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in this church there was a lot of this type
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of stuff going on. All of these offenders, many of
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these offenders, I shouldn't say all, but many of these offenders,
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they grew up together. They grew up kind of in
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this baked in this insane kind of hyper religious culture.
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And you know, people ask us all the time, how
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do these people find each other. I don't really know
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the answer to that, but I imagine that it's more that
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they influence each other. You know, pornography is such a
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big part of this, and that in this in these churches,
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it was like an absolute like we don't look at pornography,
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and men would go to these men's group to like
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support each other and not looking at pornography. So I'm
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totally like hypothesizing here. I don't actually know how they
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find each other.
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But but at the same time, they created.
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They created space and yeah, exactly right, and so it's
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kind of like this fueling of you know, the deeper
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we talk about like dark, darker, darkest, right, like if
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someone's coming to with a dark thing, and then it
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just kind of write any addiction, right, we moved from
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one thing to the next thing. So yeah, there was
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definitely a very a very dark element to to that church.
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That church actually split because the pastor, I mean the
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story is she had he had an affair with the
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church secretary, but it was actually more of a sexual
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misconduct type of situation.
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No matter what he had been born.
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Yeah, there is a power dynamic there for sure, and
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all a lot of these offenders and my parents moved
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them to another very cult like cult adjacent type of
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church where you know, everything just stays very closed. It's
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a very closed community, and so things are able to
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happen in these churches and in these spaces because nobody
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really has access to them. It's a closed off community.
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There's an internal group think that happens right where there's
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no light or sunshine coming in from the outside, and
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so there's no new ideas. There's a lot of patriarchal ideas,
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and so there's a whole lot of women being silent
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and women who are not really empowered to stand.
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Happened in many churches, for sure.
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Yes, yeah, absolutely.
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Very ugly, some kind of very ugly sexual route within
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this community, within these church communities that I think spread
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How it spread, right, You guys could probably comment on
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that better than we can. I would say that there
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were probably, again Kate's point, they were meeting each other,
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and then there would be subtle ways that they would
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kind of initiate conversation around some of these ideas and
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then influence one another. And then once they found out
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actually we know that now they were right.
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We know that we've had people come to us after
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the podcast came out and say, oh my god, you know,
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my my, this one woman came to us and said,
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my boyfriend went he was struggling with addiction to pornography.
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He went to one of the elders of this church
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asked for advice. And this elder, who happens to be
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related to a name defender also, you know, gave him
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the advice that, you know, my wife and I have
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an agreement that there are certain things that she can't fulfill,
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and so and kind of almost opened the door right
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into this, and so we know that that's how it's
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happening or how it you know, exactly like when and
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where and how. Yeah, you guys could probably answer that,
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but you can't.
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But any other thing.
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Sorry, No, I was just that the whole It's so
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fascinating how they're preferring actually hands on sex abuse to pornography.
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Exactly.
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That is a better decision, right.
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As if pornography is the evil, but they're allowed to
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rape their children and other people's children, that's fine, that's okay.
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I don't think they ever really thought that the pornography
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was evil. They said those things because that was the
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way to keep the shiny bright. You know, in the church,
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we say that pornography is bad, but actually behind the scenes,
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they're like, yeah, this is this is our jam right
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here about it?
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Yeah.
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Yeah, it's also that religious concept of you know, in
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these in in this particular religious sector, children are property.
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It's they don't the children are viewed as just a property,
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and so are.
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Women property too.
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Yeah, there's certainly disempowered. They certainly don't have pros. I mean,
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the whole evangelical idea of women can't be in positions
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of leadership. Women shouldn't be preaching that whole patriarchal concept, right,
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It just sort of spreads into you know, women certainly
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don't have voice.
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You want to go kick their butts, Kathy.
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Oh yeah, let's.
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Listen. My eight year old wrote an incredible paper on
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the patriarchy last year.
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So if you need.
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To si, that's awesome, I agree. Yeah. Yeah.
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Well, at least we're lucky enough to see you smile
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a little bit, that's great.
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Yeah.
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But when you went to your teacher and she called
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your father. There we at least three other times where
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you tried you either inadvertently or just by you know,
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the sheer weight of everything coming down on you. You
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told people, and each time I mean within the church,
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within the school where are where? What other places did
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you go?
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So after the after that escape attempt, when I told
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my teacher and my father's actually abusing me, she called
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my father. I recanted, I said I wasn't my dad.
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It was forced to recant. You didn't you didn't decide. Hey,
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you know what I really mean that, right? You were
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forced to because you were forced to confront the guy
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who was doing it to you, who had all the power,
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who had, you know, literally had control of your life.
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So exactly. Yeah, and truthfully, my my uncle was also
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part of this entire network, and so it was just
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an easier He lived in Minnesota at this point, and
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so it was like, you know what, it was my
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uncle also true, but he lives in Minnesota. Kind of like,
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I just want to I just want to close this
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off now, right, I just want to. I just want
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to take it back and close it off because now
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I'm in so much trouble and this is going to
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be so bad because I broke the cardinal rule. I
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did the one thing I was never supposed to do.
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I was never supposed to talk about it. I was
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never supposed to let it show, and I did.
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And by the way, I tried to die. I tried
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to tell Neither one of those escape plans worked, So
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what choice do I have but to put it back
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in the box. I will literally die if I can't
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figure out how to put this back in the box.
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Right.
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But so then the public story became, oh, her uncle's
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actually abused her. That's the you know, that's the narrative
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that we're going to go with.
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So, which was just a convenient way for your father
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to brush off the experience that I mean, excuse me,
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the responsibility and the culbility. But then he brought you
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up to confront the uncle and that, yep, that was
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a sham too, right.
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Yeah, absolutely, yeah, it was you know, we're not going
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to call the police. We're not going to call law enforcement.
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We're gonna handle this in the family. We're going to
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go to Minnesota and confront him. That was again the
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public facing story. We did, we flew to Minnesota, but
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that was not to confront him. That was just another
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layer of hell again because I had told, I told,
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and I did the one thing I wasn't supposed to do,
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so that became the public story though that was for
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for the rest of my childhood. That was you know, well,
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she's damaged. She was she was actually abused by her uncle.
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She's fine, but she's damaged, and she doesn't like to
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talk about it, so don't talk about it. And then
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in high school, my grandfather died, and my grandfather was
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a pretty central figure in all of this, and so
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there there's a lot of ritual abuse that goes with
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this type of traffic, often with this type of trafficking,
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and so the weekend surrounding his funeral there was some
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pretty significant abuse experiences. And once again I went to work.
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I worked at a coffee place, and I had been
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really badly injured. And again a friend asked, Hey, are
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you okay, And it was just that like, no, I'm
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not okay. And so I told my friend, you know,
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my uncle had been in town for the funeral. I said,
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my uncle was here. He's actually abused me when I
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was a kid. He raped me when he was here.
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And my friend went home and told her mom, who
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was outside of my parents' circle, like this. I was
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now going to public school, I was working at a
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coffee shop. I was seventeen, and of course that my
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friend's mom called my mom, because what else do you do?
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Right when your kid comes home and says, my friend
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just told me she was raped this weekend. You call
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the parents. I guess so. But because it was outside
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of the closed circle of the Christian school and the church,
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my parents had to do something. They had to at
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least like pretend that they were going to do something.
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But side note, my father's legitimate business, like his front
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facing business, had a contract with our local sheriffs has
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currently a contract with our local sheriff's office to be
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he owns an auto repair shop, and his shop is
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the ones who work on all of the squad vehicles.
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Every time I give a training, I have one lot
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of working person that's like, that's they're not called squad vehicles.
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They're all patrol cars, are they? They always want to
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tell me what they're called.
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Yea, that's the important thing. Yes, thank you so much,
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because that's so important.
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There's always one.
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The sheriff didn't do his job, but he got into
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his patrol vehicle.
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There you go, the guy with the badge on the
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belt and the like you know, he's law enforceding from
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the minute he walks in. Right, it's always that guy
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and always like I already know you're gonna tell I
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already know you're gonna crack me.
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Uh yeah, I'm sorry, go ahead. No.
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So, yeah, my dad's business had this contract with them,
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and so he knew so the guy so they called
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the police, right, But the guy to come to take
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the report is my dad's really good friend, and so.
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You can't tell him obviously what's really going on there.
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Did eventually end up a report to the FBI. Child
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Avacy centered this whole experience, and they did send information
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out to Minnesota because the allegations were against the uncle
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who now lived in Minnesota. What we heard later is
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that the person who was assigned to investigate out in
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Minnesota was actually brought up on charges eventually for mishandling
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sexual assault investigations.
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System failures.
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But even at the child Advocacy center, your parents were
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sitting on the other side of the window, right, I mean,
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so it was not they.
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Were No, they were sitting at the kitchen table as
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I'm trying to tell my dad's friend what happened.
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Uh.
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Then I go to the child Advocacy center and they
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say to me, don't worry, your parents are on the
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other side of the glass.
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This is like an evil, dark you know horror film, right,
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this is this is how you know how much weight
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was put on your shoulders. It's just it's unbelievable. I
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you're so strong. I mean it's amazing. I'm serious. So
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I would say it because you're here, You're still here.
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I mean, it's amazing, it really is. I know, you
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fall down, you you you fall apart, you have you're
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carrying so much, you went through so much. You've been
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you've been taking advantage of in a way that is
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just so debilitating. Yet you have managed to survive. And
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not only you're doing that, you're surviving and you're speaking
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out about it. You're trying to help other people. And
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I would like to shift our focus now about what
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you're doing with Lori and and your mission, what you've
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been out there doing and what you want to accomplish.
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And that's why we wanted to have you on Real
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Crime Profile, because we have great listeners all over the
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world and they're they're they're out there, they want to help.
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We get messages from them all the time about, you know,
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things that that we've covered and people that we've had
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on and they want to help so and they want
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to learn, so please tell us what you've been doing now,
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so if I can come first.
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So you talked about doing those conference speaking engagements with
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your with your therapist, and yeah, I wish I could
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say that Kate and I started out in that really
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auspicious way, but in truth, we started the podcast as
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an act of desperation because we had gone to every
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support that we could find, anti trafficking organizations, the anti
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trafficking Task Force in our area, the churches that the
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supposedly better churches that were involved here, every branch of
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law enforcement in our area, and found zero help anywhere.
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So we finally woke up and we said, well, okay,
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this is still a problem. There's still a safety concern,
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and no one is listening. So ultimately, the decision that
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Kate made together with me was well, it's going to
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be my voice goods for you.
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That's amazing, That's what I'm saying.
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That's bravery right there.
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It is. No, it's not, it's not an instant fixed
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but the fact that you're able to do it, I mean,
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it says so much. And the fact that the motivation
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for you doing it not only is for your to
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protect your children, but also to protect people you don't
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even know.
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Yeah, and that's really no idea, no, And it really
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developed into that of you know, it started really as
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just you know, Okay, So they're threatening to wipe me
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off the face of this planet because I talked, because
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I said, I told Laurie, I told, I confronted them,
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I broke contact, right, And so now they're threatening to
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kill me. So at least my experience will be encapsulated
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forever in my own voice and my own words out
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into the stratosphere, and nobody will be able to question
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why this happened or what happened. That was the original
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thought process. But then it was yeah, other survivors coming
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to us and boring their experiences out and saying, oh
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my god, I've never heard anybody talk about this before.
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This also happened to me. I've never had a name
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for it. I don't know where to find help, and
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so I don't know. I'm not the type. I don't
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I don't say this to be whatever, but I'm just
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not Laura, and I not the type of people to
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be like, yeah, super sorry that that happened to you, like,
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good luck, right, And so we started this nonprofit too.
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We didn't even really have like a great uh, like, okay,
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how are we going to do this? It just was
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like we have to do something.
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Well, that's good, that's that's an instinctual move that was
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going in the right thing. Yeah to me, o, Kathy,
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if you agree with me, But to me, that's your
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subconscious that does calculations that billions two hundred billion times
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faster than your conscious mind. You knew in your gut
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it was the right thing to do, and you found
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your way to it. And yeah, I think what you've
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gotten how many episodes now?
353
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I think guys just looked it was like eighty eight.
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That's great.
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Yeah, And we're now so a year and a half
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into our nonprofit. We have the opportunity to train law enforcement,
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which is so fun. Uh. DCS staff Child Wealth, our
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staff child advocacy centers across the country. Teachers, teacher preachers,
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they don't really want to hear from us. I'm sure
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we'll see.
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We're not sure to talk to them either, but.
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Yeah, talk to their insurance companies ensuring them. That's who
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you need to talk to.
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Yeah, but it's been such a privilege, honestly again, to
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have you know, seasoned social workers, seasoned law enforcements say
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to us, I will forever. We've actually had this said
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to us, I will forever be a better bill in
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the social worker, police officer, whatever because of this training,
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because now I know and I didn't know.
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Well, you can add two FBI profilers to that list,
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will be better FBI profilers because of talking to you
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and the work you two are doing.
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We call regularly doctor Michael Salter, who's a criminologist out
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of Australia who's done a lot of research in organized
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sexual abuse, and what he says is, if you don't
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believe that this kind of abuse can happen, then you
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will miss it when it's staring you right in the face.
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And that's really what MEZO is about. It is about
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making sure that as many people as possible are prepared
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to know that, yes, there are people who can walk
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among us seemingly perfectly normal, who can keep up the bright,
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shiny facade, when underneath it all and behind the scenes,
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they are actually very depraved hanus human beings who can
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do these terrible things to kids.
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Well, I have said for a very long time, if
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you call people monster predators, everybody's going to miss the
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real effects. Who are smiling right in your face, and
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it's just it's so misleading. It just I mean, you know,
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stranger danger. Yeah, okay, so you know, there's a tiny
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little percentage of offenses that that are that are committed
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by strangers, but the vast majority ninety five ninety seven
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percent are by people you know, love and trust. They're
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in that cab.
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I say all the time, if a sex offender looked
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like a sex offender, Hue or she would never get
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access to children. They don't like a sex offender, and.
397
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You're not the monster under the bed exactly right.
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It's it's just something that we need to actually address.
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And this is something that I was so happy that
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we were able to do this in Criminal Minds, I mean,
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get this message out to people. And I really worked
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with casting director Lisa Zambetti, who was one of the
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original founding members of Real Crime Profile with me and
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Laura and and I worked with her to make sure
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that they're casting people who look like average, ordinary citizens. Yes,
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there's some monsters that we had on the show, but
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most of the people were just average Jo's and James.
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And that's important to know because there's no way, there's
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no way that you can tell a kid, you know,
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watch out for monster predators, and have that kid expect
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that the person that you told them to listen to
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to look up to, that's mommy and daddy's friend, or
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mommy and daddy themselves, that that's going to somehow protect them.
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So we have to be realistic about this, and if
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we're going to actually protect children, we have to be honest. Well,
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and you know, another pet peeve that I have in
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that same vein is that we think that we protect
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our children by keeping them sheltered and naive, right, and
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unfortunately that doesn't protect them. You would never protect a
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child from a busy street that you lived on by
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not telling them that it was dangerous. You would always
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walk them to the street, tell them to look both ways,
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show them how to do it, walk to the corner,
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hold their hand, and do it with them till they
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can do it on their own safely.
426
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It's also about giving kids power and voice.
427
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Yeah, but it's also giving kids the knowledge about sexual
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victimis zation.
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00:24:21.799 --> 00:24:26.960
Yeah, my kids does it. Yes, my kids know far
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more than their age, right than most kids their age.
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They're twelve to eleven and eight.
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And it's very much supportive ways.
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00:24:35.000 --> 00:24:40.640
Right, I'm sorry and you're welcome, because honestly, like my son,
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My son, on the very first day of sixth grade,
435
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eleven years old, walked into his health class, walked up
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to his health teacher and said, are we going to
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be covering sexual abuse in class this year? Yeah? Like
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they know the weight of this, the enormity, because you're right,
439
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I want them to know. And yeah, it's so scary
440
00:24:59.000 --> 00:25:01.759
as parents to coach that subject. But if we don't,
441
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we are not doing our kids a good service.
442
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Earlier they broach it, the easier it is for the parent.
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You know, while the child is in the womb is
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the first opportunity to start and then just keep going
445
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from there. If you wait, you have to get over
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your own hang ups to be able to talk. Remember
447
00:25:20.319 --> 00:25:23.119
Kathy about how Joe Sullivan used to talk about the
448
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you know, sort of the spiral. Yet jumping over that wall.
449
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You know that at first it's it's a it's a
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brick wall that you have to climb over. This is
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this is He talks about how offenders kind of go
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on this downward spiral and they each time they go
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over this wall, they knock a brick off and by
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the time they've done it a hundred times, there's no
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wall there and it's just stepping over a line. Well,
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it's the same with parents talking about sex and sexual
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victimization with their kids. I mean, you know, the first time,
458
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it's it's tough, you know, because you don't want to
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you don't want to take away their innocence. But at
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the same time, would you rather that they get they're
461
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more vulnerable to being abused. And like Joel Casthetics book,
462
00:26:08.920 --> 00:26:11.640
The Well Armed Child is a really good resource and
463
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it teaches parents how to how to talk to their
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kids about it, and you know, it's just and obviously
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Protecting the Gift by Gavin de Becker goes into that
466
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as well, and I think these are these are tools
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that parents should use to help protect their children from this.
468
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So I have to say this is one of my
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pet peeves. You know, we can it's critically important that
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we educate our kids, but we also have to create
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a culture where children have power and voice. If everything
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about our parenting says you must be compliant, you must
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be quiet, you must be obedient, absolutely, they're not prepared
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to say no, right, They're not.
475
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They're not only not prepared to say no. The people,
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obviously in Kate's situation are the parents, right, there has
477
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to be an opportunity for somebody in that situation. The
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people that are supposed to protect you and teach you,
479
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and and and shelter you and give you love, they're
480
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the ones doing it. Yeah, we have to have an
481
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opportunity to or people in your situation to be able
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to safely get out of that without running the risk
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that they're going to call your father or your mother.
484
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And then people don't want to think about that though
485
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they don't, especially mothers. There's this cult of motherhood, right,
486
00:27:38.519 --> 00:27:41.279
How could a mother possibly do this to her child?
487
00:27:41.359 --> 00:27:43.200
We don't want to believe it, and we don't really
488
00:27:43.240 --> 00:27:46.319
want to believe that families do that, but they do
489
00:27:47.960 --> 00:27:49.880
way more often than we're willing to admit.
490
00:27:50.079 --> 00:27:56.240
Well, Kathy did our study on maternal philicide, right, you know,
491
00:27:57.279 --> 00:27:59.839
she could tell you exactly what mothers are.
492
00:28:01.000 --> 00:28:04.799
That's right, the biological mothers that are murdering their kids,
493
00:28:04.880 --> 00:28:09.079
you know, as Yeah, you know it's hard other I
494
00:28:09.160 --> 00:28:10.160
understand what you're saying.
495
00:28:10.240 --> 00:28:12.079
Yeah, but I also don't.
496
00:28:11.920 --> 00:28:14.119
Want to think about the fact that sixty percent of
497
00:28:14.200 --> 00:28:16.920
child pornography depicts children under the age of eleven. That's
498
00:28:16.920 --> 00:28:19.599
according to Nick Nick. If it's under the age of eleven,
499
00:28:19.640 --> 00:28:22.319
how do we think people are gaining access to children
500
00:28:22.359 --> 00:28:25.400
that age without a parent or guardian being complicit.
501
00:28:25.599 --> 00:28:26.720
It's exactly right.
502
00:28:26.880 --> 00:28:28.680
That's a lot of kids, it is.
503
00:28:31.000 --> 00:28:31.319
Yeah.
504
00:28:31.920 --> 00:28:35.680
So kay, you meant you mentioned the backlash, and I
505
00:28:35.720 --> 00:28:38.400
had a question about that since you've gone public with
506
00:28:38.480 --> 00:28:43.240
this podcast, and congratulations because it's been incredibly successful. So
507
00:28:43.319 --> 00:28:47.440
that's a credit to you both. But I would imagine
508
00:28:47.480 --> 00:28:49.960
there is a dark side to this exposure to Can
509
00:28:50.000 --> 00:28:52.000
you tell us a little bit about that, you know,
510
00:28:52.079 --> 00:28:54.400
and still it seems like we're supposed to be protecting
511
00:28:54.400 --> 00:28:55.960
you are not the ones protecting you.
512
00:28:57.160 --> 00:29:01.759
Yeah, So people always are kind of like, well, I mean, uh,
513
00:29:01.839 --> 00:29:05.240
you're getting threats you went public with you know, you
514
00:29:05.319 --> 00:29:12.200
named all these offenders, you went public, right, It's actually yes, yeah, yeah, yeah,
515
00:29:12.359 --> 00:29:15.880
but it's actually the reverse. I started. I've been receiving
516
00:29:15.880 --> 00:29:17.960
threats my whole life. I mean, I I you know,
517
00:29:18.200 --> 00:29:20.400
this is my father with lay threats on my pillow
518
00:29:20.400 --> 00:29:22.599
at night. It was this is a long time thing.
519
00:29:23.559 --> 00:29:27.920
But when I broke contact with my family, which was
520
00:29:27.960 --> 00:29:32.240
five years ago, actually this in November. That is when
521
00:29:32.519 --> 00:29:35.759
it really started to amp up. I had people stalking me,
522
00:29:35.799 --> 00:29:40.200
I had people around my house. I was being stalked, assaulted.
523
00:29:41.559 --> 00:29:45.680
Horrendous things happening only because I broke contact, so I
524
00:29:45.720 --> 00:29:48.799
hadn't even gone public yet, And it was because of
525
00:29:48.839 --> 00:29:51.160
the intensity of those threats and because we had gone
526
00:29:51.160 --> 00:29:57.480
to glocal law enforcement, we had gone to literally the FBI. Anything, Well,
527
00:29:58.720 --> 00:30:00.720
we did all the things.
528
00:30:00.880 --> 00:30:03.480
Uh, they didn't do anything.
529
00:30:03.559 --> 00:30:07.240
Yeah, they didn't. My I Actually one of the threats
530
00:30:07.240 --> 00:30:09.720
that was left at my house was an old school
531
00:30:09.759 --> 00:30:14.079
Polaroid camera and inside of it was stuffed inside of
532
00:30:14.119 --> 00:30:16.839
it was a threat and was an old report card
533
00:30:16.880 --> 00:30:19.079
of mine from the school that I went to when
534
00:30:19.079 --> 00:30:22.400
I disclosed this abuse. And we took it to the
535
00:30:22.480 --> 00:30:25.759
FBI agent that we're working with, and she took it
536
00:30:25.799 --> 00:30:30.119
and confronted my father and he said that's I do
537
00:30:30.240 --> 00:30:34.240
have a polaroid camera collection, but that one is not mine.
538
00:30:34.640 --> 00:30:45.039
And the FBI agent was like, yeah, oh, okay.
539
00:30:41.759 --> 00:30:46.119
Yeah, I hope it's not an agent that hope, I
540
00:30:46.160 --> 00:30:46.720
will say.
541
00:30:46.559 --> 00:30:50.640
In her defense. We met this FBI agent in UH
542
00:30:51.160 --> 00:30:54.759
in March of twenty twenty so, and then the world
543
00:30:54.759 --> 00:30:57.559
blew up with COVID and she was a single parent
544
00:30:57.640 --> 00:31:02.000
trying to raise two kids during it a global pandemic.
545
00:31:02.920 --> 00:31:07.599
When sexual sex trafficking transition from the FBI at Homeland Security,
546
00:31:08.039 --> 00:31:09.400
so her role changed.
547
00:31:09.599 --> 00:31:12.000
Oh I didn't even okay, right in the middle of.
548
00:31:12.000 --> 00:31:14.440
It, so like she wasn't the best, but she also
549
00:31:14.640 --> 00:31:16.960
there was a lot of stuff going on that was
550
00:31:17.000 --> 00:31:19.920
working against her. I guess, so I don't want to
551
00:31:19.960 --> 00:31:22.799
like too much the rod of the bus, but yeah,
552
00:31:22.880 --> 00:31:24.319
we did everything.
553
00:31:25.839 --> 00:31:27.920
You should never have been I mean, come.
554
00:31:27.759 --> 00:31:33.000
On, yeah, yeah, all right, yeah, okay. So then we
555
00:31:33.039 --> 00:31:37.599
did the podcast. You know, honestly, the threats, it was
556
00:31:37.799 --> 00:31:40.559
we I mean we started naming names. We literally got
557
00:31:40.640 --> 00:31:42.279
to a point where it was like, okay, next time
558
00:31:42.319 --> 00:31:44.920
a threat comes, next time a person, I have camera
559
00:31:44.960 --> 00:31:49.160
footage of people skulking around my backyard in masks. I mean,
560
00:31:49.200 --> 00:31:52.240
it's horrendous. You know, we got to a point where
561
00:31:52.240 --> 00:31:54.319
we're saying, Okay, we're gonna just we're gonna name names
562
00:31:54.319 --> 00:31:56.920
of offenders. We're just gonna we've already we've already named
563
00:31:56.920 --> 00:32:01.119
my parents, We're gonna name names offenders. We did get
564
00:32:01.160 --> 00:32:03.119
sued for defamation on that one.
565
00:32:03.880 --> 00:32:08.160
For naming someone who was doing children's sports camps, and
566
00:32:08.279 --> 00:32:11.200
even though the church knew I'd been named, they were
567
00:32:11.240 --> 00:32:13.119
still letting him participate.
568
00:32:13.920 --> 00:32:18.839
Yeah yeah, because of doing that. I you know, the threats.
569
00:32:19.160 --> 00:32:21.680
I mean, I don't go anywhere alone. I still safety
570
00:32:21.759 --> 00:32:24.680
plan my way through life. I don't even go to
571
00:32:24.759 --> 00:32:29.920
target by myself because I just don't know. I mean, fortunately,
572
00:32:30.000 --> 00:32:32.480
we have my house is Fort Knox. We have all
573
00:32:32.480 --> 00:32:36.000
the security cameras and uh and alarm systems that I
574
00:32:36.359 --> 00:32:43.599
really yeah a really big, awful so snugly dog. Yeah,
575
00:32:43.720 --> 00:32:45.680
but we'll probably rip your throat out.
576
00:32:45.759 --> 00:32:49.880
So don't don't mention about the poisoned darts and all that.
577
00:32:50.000 --> 00:32:52.279
Okay, yeah, no, we're not going to talk about that one.
578
00:32:52.960 --> 00:32:56.880
No no, no, yeah, or the taser that I carry,
579
00:32:57.000 --> 00:32:59.839
none of that. But yeah, So it's it's still very
580
00:33:00.079 --> 00:33:06.000
much a reality of my existence, but its the podcast
581
00:33:06.079 --> 00:33:11.279
actually being vocal has has deterred in that, like we're
582
00:33:11.279 --> 00:33:13.480
not afraid to just call it out and just say
583
00:33:13.519 --> 00:33:17.519
it like it is. We also, thanks to getting sued
584
00:33:17.519 --> 00:33:21.519
for defamation, have the most kick ass attorneys in the
585
00:33:21.559 --> 00:33:25.400
whole Western New York area. I don't know if my
586
00:33:25.440 --> 00:33:27.440
attorney will listen to this, but I always say, he's
587
00:33:27.440 --> 00:33:30.599
like an he's an actual asshole, but like he's my asshole.
588
00:33:30.640 --> 00:33:31.920
Like do you know what I seem like.
589
00:33:34.640 --> 00:33:36.279
He's on your side.
590
00:33:37.039 --> 00:33:38.799
Yeah, Like I would never want to be on the
591
00:33:38.880 --> 00:33:42.319
other side of him, but he is. Yeah, He's an
592
00:33:42.400 --> 00:33:46.920
incredible human and I'm so grateful. So yeah, it's not
593
00:33:46.960 --> 00:33:50.440
been easy at all. Yeah.
594
00:33:50.440 --> 00:33:53.319
I want to say that when threats against Kate were
595
00:33:53.359 --> 00:33:56.440
not enough to get her to be quiet, they would
596
00:33:56.440 --> 00:33:59.960
threaten me, they would threaten anybody she cared about. That again,
597
00:34:00.119 --> 00:34:02.480
was an ongoing pattern. These are not people who are
598
00:34:02.599 --> 00:34:05.599
just going to stop. These are people that have to
599
00:34:05.599 --> 00:34:06.119
be stopped.
600
00:34:06.200 --> 00:34:09.679
Have there any been any prosecutions of these people for
601
00:34:09.880 --> 00:34:10.719
these No.
602
00:34:12.400 --> 00:34:15.599
So our work with the Yeah, I work with the FBI.
603
00:34:16.000 --> 00:34:19.440
You know. Basically her statement to us was, my boss said,
604
00:34:19.519 --> 00:34:23.360
is anyone dead? And she said no? And he said, okay, great,
605
00:34:23.440 --> 00:34:25.840
then we're god here and.
606
00:34:25.840 --> 00:34:27.840
It might be out of statute. It was a long
607
00:34:27.880 --> 00:34:30.280
time ago. We would have to like follow the trail
608
00:34:31.000 --> 00:34:35.360
of everything to bring it up to current day harassment.
609
00:34:35.159 --> 00:34:39.880
Which is an investigation, which is what their freaking job is,
610
00:34:40.519 --> 00:34:43.199
all right, So the next thing to do is to
611
00:34:43.239 --> 00:34:46.519
be as you know, vocal to the press and complain
612
00:34:46.559 --> 00:34:49.480
about what they're not doing. And that's just that's just
613
00:34:50.599 --> 00:34:54.119
you know, call Nick Mick and you know, and say
614
00:34:54.159 --> 00:34:56.039
you wanted to you want to know how to do
615
00:34:56.079 --> 00:34:59.559
a press conference with them about this to raise awareness
616
00:34:59.559 --> 00:35:02.679
about this because you know, and you know some of
617
00:35:02.719 --> 00:35:06.840
our former colleagues work there and Nick Nick and they
618
00:35:07.199 --> 00:35:11.039
I'm sure they'll, they'll, they'll help out. I mean, it's just, yeah,
619
00:35:11.760 --> 00:35:12.559
it's so hard.
620
00:35:12.599 --> 00:35:17.000
Actually, so I I'm engaged in some litigation against the
621
00:35:17.079 --> 00:35:22.400
local sheriff's office for some for mishandling of this, and
622
00:35:22.480 --> 00:35:24.880
again it was a situation where, you know, my attorney
623
00:35:24.960 --> 00:35:28.840
was like, they did they did this, We have options here,
624
00:35:29.239 --> 00:35:31.159
and I was like, Joe, not everybody has a Joe
625
00:35:31.199 --> 00:35:33.519
Manna in their corner. Not everybody has a kick ass
626
00:35:33.559 --> 00:35:35.519
attorney in their corner. So if I don't do this,
627
00:35:36.000 --> 00:35:38.760
who's going to Who's going to hold them accountable? Right?
628
00:35:39.679 --> 00:35:43.239
So that's not fun either, but somebody needs to.
629
00:35:43.480 --> 00:35:47.960
So well, thank you for doing it, and we really
630
00:35:48.000 --> 00:35:50.519
appreciate everything you're doing and we appreciate
1
00:00:00.120 --> 00:00:04.080
And with us is Okay, Cannon, I'm the co founder
2
00:00:04.120 --> 00:00:06.280
of Meso Allies and the co hosts of the podcast
3
00:00:06.320 --> 00:00:08.560
The Ugly Truth spot Girl next Door. I'm also a
4
00:00:08.560 --> 00:00:10.640
survivor of family controlled human trafficking.
5
00:00:11.919 --> 00:00:14.400
And I'm Lori Croll. I'm a clinical social worker and
6
00:00:14.519 --> 00:00:17.399
also the co host of the Ugly Truth podcast and
7
00:00:17.559 --> 00:00:19.320
the co founder of Mezzo Allies.
8
00:00:19.920 --> 00:00:22.280
Could you tell us what Mezzo Allies is?
9
00:00:23.440 --> 00:00:28.039
Yeah, So, Mezzo Allies is a nonprofit that Laurie and
10
00:00:28.120 --> 00:00:32.159
I founded about a year and a half ago. So
11
00:00:32.359 --> 00:00:37.039
really baby new organization, our mission being to bridge the
12
00:00:37.079 --> 00:00:40.359
gap to safety for victims of family controlled human trafficking.
13
00:00:42.280 --> 00:00:45.439
After doing the podcast and after looking for help and
14
00:00:46.000 --> 00:00:49.320
all of the places, we kind of popped our heads
15
00:00:49.399 --> 00:00:51.439
up out of this and we were hearing from survivors
16
00:00:51.600 --> 00:00:56.000
across the world, honestly who were saying me too, right,
17
00:00:56.079 --> 00:00:58.719
this happened to me too. And I also couldn't find help,
18
00:00:58.719 --> 00:01:01.600
and I also found the system to be failing and
19
00:01:02.240 --> 00:01:04.319
all of the things, and so we kind of looked
20
00:01:04.319 --> 00:01:07.439
at each other and said, Okay, well, nobody's talking about this,
21
00:01:07.560 --> 00:01:09.359
so I guess you know, if not us, then who,
22
00:01:10.640 --> 00:01:13.560
And so Meso Allies was born. Meso is the Italian
23
00:01:13.560 --> 00:01:17.480
word for the middle, and throughout our entire journey together
24
00:01:17.599 --> 00:01:22.239
we referred to this space of you know, bad things
25
00:01:22.319 --> 00:01:26.959
not really happening anymore entirely, but also not totally free
26
00:01:26.959 --> 00:01:30.280
and safe, as like this messy middle, right and is
27
00:01:30.319 --> 00:01:34.760
the middle gonna hold? And so that's where Mezzo Allies
28
00:01:34.799 --> 00:01:37.400
came from, as everybody needs an ally. All of these
29
00:01:37.439 --> 00:01:40.840
survivors who are saying me too, me too, they need
30
00:01:40.879 --> 00:01:45.959
allies who know about family controlled human trafficking, who are educated,
31
00:01:46.000 --> 00:01:50.120
who know the very unique complexity of this type of crime,
32
00:01:51.640 --> 00:01:56.400
did walk alongside them. So yeah, that's our nonprofit.
33
00:01:55.280 --> 00:01:57.719
And those allies need supports to be able to hold
34
00:01:57.760 --> 00:02:00.280
the middle. You know, some of that conversation Can and
35
00:02:00.280 --> 00:02:02.840
I had was about how many times the middle fell
36
00:02:02.920 --> 00:02:05.200
out from under her, that she would be trying to
37
00:02:05.200 --> 00:02:07.319
cross that bridge to get to a place of safety.
38
00:02:07.400 --> 00:02:11.280
She would reach out, you referenced before, multiple times she
39
00:02:11.400 --> 00:02:13.520
told people what they needed to know so that they
40
00:02:13.520 --> 00:02:17.520
could help her, and the bottom just fell out.
41
00:02:17.840 --> 00:02:21.080
People who have to you know, talking to a teacher
42
00:02:21.120 --> 00:02:25.360
at school, you know you you did everything that you
43
00:02:25.439 --> 00:02:28.560
needed to do, and and they they just did not
44
00:02:28.680 --> 00:02:32.360
do anything. Not the right thing they did. In fact, no,
45
00:02:32.479 --> 00:02:35.080
they did the wrong thing. They did the worst thing.
46
00:02:35.639 --> 00:02:39.400
When you tell somebody that that you're being sexually victimized
47
00:02:39.400 --> 00:02:45.319
by your father and they call your father, it's so wrong.
48
00:02:45.719 --> 00:02:50.319
So I know you mentioned at some point that the
49
00:02:50.479 --> 00:02:52.840
church that you were in, that your family was in,
50
00:02:52.919 --> 00:02:54.919
that your father was in, that your grandfather was in,
51
00:02:55.000 --> 00:02:57.680
that that many of these men who sexually victimized you
52
00:02:57.719 --> 00:03:01.319
were in, that that there were tenants of this church
53
00:03:01.400 --> 00:03:04.439
or teachings of this church that promoted this kind of thing.
54
00:03:04.520 --> 00:03:05.479
Can you tell us about that?
55
00:03:08.199 --> 00:03:12.840
Yeah, So there's two churches. The church that my parents
56
00:03:12.879 --> 00:03:16.520
grew up in. My mom's brother in law is actually
57
00:03:16.520 --> 00:03:22.439
the current pastor there still he's also an offender. And
58
00:03:24.199 --> 00:03:29.000
in this church there was a lot of this type
59
00:03:29.000 --> 00:03:33.360
of stuff going on. All of these offenders, many of
60
00:03:33.360 --> 00:03:35.800
these offenders, I shouldn't say all, but many of these offenders,
61
00:03:35.800 --> 00:03:37.759
they grew up together. They grew up kind of in
62
00:03:37.840 --> 00:03:44.400
this baked in this insane kind of hyper religious culture.
63
00:03:45.199 --> 00:03:49.240
And you know, people ask us all the time, how
64
00:03:49.240 --> 00:03:52.000
do these people find each other. I don't really know
65
00:03:52.039 --> 00:03:54.560
the answer to that, but I imagine that it's more that
66
00:03:54.599 --> 00:03:58.479
they influence each other. You know, pornography is such a
67
00:03:58.479 --> 00:04:02.400
big part of this, and that in this in these churches,
68
00:04:02.479 --> 00:04:05.000
it was like an absolute like we don't look at pornography,
69
00:04:05.439 --> 00:04:09.439
and men would go to these men's group to like
70
00:04:09.560 --> 00:04:14.199
support each other and not looking at pornography. So I'm
71
00:04:14.280 --> 00:04:17.439
totally like hypothesizing here. I don't actually know how they
72
00:04:17.439 --> 00:04:18.160
find each other.
73
00:04:18.240 --> 00:04:22.759
But but at the same time, they created.
74
00:04:23.240 --> 00:04:27.839
They created space and yeah, exactly right, and so it's
75
00:04:27.959 --> 00:04:30.600
kind of like this fueling of you know, the deeper
76
00:04:30.879 --> 00:04:33.680
we talk about like dark, darker, darkest, right, like if
77
00:04:33.720 --> 00:04:36.879
someone's coming to with a dark thing, and then it
78
00:04:37.040 --> 00:04:39.399
just kind of write any addiction, right, we moved from
79
00:04:39.439 --> 00:04:43.439
one thing to the next thing. So yeah, there was
80
00:04:43.439 --> 00:04:47.759
definitely a very a very dark element to to that church.
81
00:04:49.000 --> 00:04:54.839
That church actually split because the pastor, I mean the
82
00:04:54.879 --> 00:04:57.279
story is she had he had an affair with the
83
00:04:57.360 --> 00:05:01.720
church secretary, but it was actually more of a sexual
84
00:05:01.759 --> 00:05:04.040
misconduct type of situation.
85
00:05:05.120 --> 00:05:06.480
No matter what he had been born.
86
00:05:07.279 --> 00:05:11.160
Yeah, there is a power dynamic there for sure, and
87
00:05:11.560 --> 00:05:14.720
all a lot of these offenders and my parents moved
88
00:05:14.759 --> 00:05:21.800
them to another very cult like cult adjacent type of
89
00:05:21.879 --> 00:05:26.399
church where you know, everything just stays very closed. It's
90
00:05:26.439 --> 00:05:29.759
a very closed community, and so things are able to
91
00:05:29.839 --> 00:05:33.199
happen in these churches and in these spaces because nobody
92
00:05:33.199 --> 00:05:36.519
really has access to them. It's a closed off community.
93
00:05:37.759 --> 00:05:40.920
There's an internal group think that happens right where there's
94
00:05:40.959 --> 00:05:44.199
no light or sunshine coming in from the outside, and
95
00:05:44.279 --> 00:05:49.560
so there's no new ideas. There's a lot of patriarchal ideas,
96
00:05:49.639 --> 00:05:52.639
and so there's a whole lot of women being silent
97
00:05:52.839 --> 00:05:58.160
and women who are not really empowered to stand.
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Happened in many churches, for sure.
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Yes, yeah, absolutely.
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Very ugly, some kind of very ugly sexual route within
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this community, within these church communities that I think spread
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How it spread, right, You guys could probably comment on
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that better than we can. I would say that there
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were probably, again Kate's point, they were meeting each other,
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and then there would be subtle ways that they would
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kind of initiate conversation around some of these ideas and
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then influence one another. And then once they found out
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actually we know that now they were right.
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We know that we've had people come to us after
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the podcast came out and say, oh my god, you know,
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my my, this one woman came to us and said,
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my boyfriend went he was struggling with addiction to pornography.
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He went to one of the elders of this church
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asked for advice. And this elder, who happens to be
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related to a name defender also, you know, gave him
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the advice that, you know, my wife and I have
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an agreement that there are certain things that she can't fulfill,
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and so and kind of almost opened the door right
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into this, and so we know that that's how it's
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happening or how it you know, exactly like when and
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where and how. Yeah, you guys could probably answer that,
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but you can't.
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But any other thing.
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Sorry, No, I was just that the whole It's so
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fascinating how they're preferring actually hands on sex abuse to pornography.
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Exactly.
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That is a better decision, right.
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As if pornography is the evil, but they're allowed to
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rape their children and other people's children, that's fine, that's okay.
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I don't think they ever really thought that the pornography
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was evil. They said those things because that was the
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way to keep the shiny bright. You know, in the church,
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we say that pornography is bad, but actually behind the scenes,
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they're like, yeah, this is this is our jam right
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here about it?
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Yeah.
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Yeah, it's also that religious concept of you know, in
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these in in this particular religious sector, children are property.
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It's they don't the children are viewed as just a property,
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and so are.
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Women property too.
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Yeah, there's certainly disempowered. They certainly don't have pros. I mean,
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the whole evangelical idea of women can't be in positions
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of leadership. Women shouldn't be preaching that whole patriarchal concept, right,
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It just sort of spreads into you know, women certainly
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don't have voice.
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You want to go kick their butts, Kathy.
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Oh yeah, let's.
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Listen. My eight year old wrote an incredible paper on
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the patriarchy last year.
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So if you need.
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To si, that's awesome, I agree. Yeah. Yeah.
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Well, at least we're lucky enough to see you smile
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a little bit, that's great.
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Yeah.
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But when you went to your teacher and she called
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your father. There we at least three other times where
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you tried you either inadvertently or just by you know,
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the sheer weight of everything coming down on you. You
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told people, and each time I mean within the church,
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within the school where are where? What other places did
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you go?
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So after the after that escape attempt, when I told
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my teacher and my father's actually abusing me, she called
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my father. I recanted, I said I wasn't my dad.
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It was forced to recant. You didn't you didn't decide. Hey,
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you know what I really mean that, right? You were
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forced to because you were forced to confront the guy
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who was doing it to you, who had all the power,
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who had, you know, literally had control of your life.
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So exactly. Yeah, and truthfully, my my uncle was also
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part of this entire network, and so it was just
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an easier He lived in Minnesota at this point, and
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so it was like, you know what, it was my
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uncle also true, but he lives in Minnesota. Kind of like,
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I just want to I just want to close this
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off now, right, I just want to. I just want
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to take it back and close it off because now
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I'm in so much trouble and this is going to
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be so bad because I broke the cardinal rule. I
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did the one thing I was never supposed to do.
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I was never supposed to talk about it. I was
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never supposed to let it show, and I did.
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And by the way, I tried to die. I tried
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to tell Neither one of those escape plans worked, So
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what choice do I have but to put it back
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in the box. I will literally die if I can't
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figure out how to put this back in the box.
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Right.
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But so then the public story became, oh, her uncle's
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actually abused her. That's the you know, that's the narrative
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that we're going to go with.
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So, which was just a convenient way for your father
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to brush off the experience that I mean, excuse me,
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the responsibility and the culbility. But then he brought you
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up to confront the uncle and that, yep, that was
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a sham too, right.
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Yeah, absolutely, yeah, it was you know, we're not going
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to call the police. We're not going to call law enforcement.
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We're gonna handle this in the family. We're going to
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go to Minnesota and confront him. That was again the
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public facing story. We did, we flew to Minnesota, but
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that was not to confront him. That was just another
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layer of hell again because I had told, I told,
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and I did the one thing I wasn't supposed to do,
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so that became the public story though that was for
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for the rest of my childhood. That was you know, well,
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she's damaged. She was she was actually abused by her uncle.
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She's fine, but she's damaged, and she doesn't like to
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talk about it, so don't talk about it. And then
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in high school, my grandfather died, and my grandfather was
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a pretty central figure in all of this, and so
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there there's a lot of ritual abuse that goes with
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this type of traffic, often with this type of trafficking,
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and so the weekend surrounding his funeral there was some
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pretty significant abuse experiences. And once again I went to work.
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I worked at a coffee place, and I had been
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really badly injured. And again a friend asked, Hey, are
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you okay, And it was just that like, no, I'm
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not okay. And so I told my friend, you know,
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my uncle had been in town for the funeral. I said,
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my uncle was here. He's actually abused me when I
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was a kid. He raped me when he was here.
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And my friend went home and told her mom, who
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was outside of my parents' circle, like this. I was
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now going to public school, I was working at a
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coffee shop. I was seventeen, and of course that my
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friend's mom called my mom, because what else do you do?
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Right when your kid comes home and says, my friend
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just told me she was raped this weekend. You call
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the parents. I guess so. But because it was outside
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of the closed circle of the Christian school and the church,
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my parents had to do something. They had to at
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least like pretend that they were going to do something.
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But side note, my father's legitimate business, like his front
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facing business, had a contract with our local sheriffs has
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currently a contract with our local sheriff's office to be
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he owns an auto repair shop, and his shop is
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the ones who work on all of the squad vehicles.
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Every time I give a training, I have one lot
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of working person that's like, that's they're not called squad vehicles.
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They're all patrol cars, are they? They always want to
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tell me what they're called.
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Yea, that's the important thing. Yes, thank you so much,
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because that's so important.
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There's always one.
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The sheriff didn't do his job, but he got into
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his patrol vehicle.
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There you go, the guy with the badge on the
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belt and the like you know, he's law enforceding from
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the minute he walks in. Right, it's always that guy
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and always like I already know you're gonna tell I
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already know you're gonna crack me.
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Uh yeah, I'm sorry, go ahead. No.
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So, yeah, my dad's business had this contract with them,
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and so he knew so the guy so they called
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the police, right, But the guy to come to take
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the report is my dad's really good friend, and so.
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You can't tell him obviously what's really going on there.
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Did eventually end up a report to the FBI. Child
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Avacy centered this whole experience, and they did send information
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out to Minnesota because the allegations were against the uncle
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who now lived in Minnesota. What we heard later is
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that the person who was assigned to investigate out in
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Minnesota was actually brought up on charges eventually for mishandling
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sexual assault investigations.
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System failures.
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But even at the child Advocacy center, your parents were
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sitting on the other side of the window, right, I mean,
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so it was not they.
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Were No, they were sitting at the kitchen table as
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I'm trying to tell my dad's friend what happened.
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Uh.
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Then I go to the child Advocacy center and they
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say to me, don't worry, your parents are on the
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other side of the glass.
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This is like an evil, dark you know horror film, right,
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this is this is how you know how much weight
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was put on your shoulders. It's just it's unbelievable. I
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you're so strong. I mean it's amazing. I'm serious. So
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I would say it because you're here, You're still here.
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I mean, it's amazing, it really is. I know, you
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fall down, you you you fall apart, you have you're
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carrying so much, you went through so much. You've been
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you've been taking advantage of in a way that is
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just so debilitating. Yet you have managed to survive. And
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not only you're doing that, you're surviving and you're speaking
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out about it. You're trying to help other people. And
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I would like to shift our focus now about what
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you're doing with Lori and and your mission, what you've
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been out there doing and what you want to accomplish.
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And that's why we wanted to have you on Real
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Crime Profile, because we have great listeners all over the
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world and they're they're they're out there, they want to help.
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We get messages from them all the time about, you know,
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things that that we've covered and people that we've had
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on and they want to help so and they want
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to learn, so please tell us what you've been doing now,
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so if I can come first.
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So you talked about doing those conference speaking engagements with
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your with your therapist, and yeah, I wish I could
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say that Kate and I started out in that really
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auspicious way, but in truth, we started the podcast as
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an act of desperation because we had gone to every
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support that we could find, anti trafficking organizations, the anti
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trafficking Task Force in our area, the churches that the
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supposedly better churches that were involved here, every branch of
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law enforcement in our area, and found zero help anywhere.
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So we finally woke up and we said, well, okay,
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this is still a problem. There's still a safety concern,
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and no one is listening. So ultimately, the decision that
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Kate made together with me was well, it's going to
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be my voice goods for you.
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That's amazing, That's what I'm saying.
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That's bravery right there.
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It is. No, it's not, it's not an instant fixed
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but the fact that you're able to do it, I mean,
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it says so much. And the fact that the motivation
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for you doing it not only is for your to
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protect your children, but also to protect people you don't
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even know.
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Yeah, and that's really no idea, no, And it really
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developed into that of you know, it started really as
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just you know, Okay, So they're threatening to wipe me
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off the face of this planet because I talked, because
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I said, I told Laurie, I told, I confronted them,
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I broke contact, right, And so now they're threatening to
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kill me. So at least my experience will be encapsulated
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forever in my own voice and my own words out
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into the stratosphere, and nobody will be able to question
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why this happened or what happened. That was the original
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thought process. But then it was yeah, other survivors coming
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to us and boring their experiences out and saying, oh
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my god, I've never heard anybody talk about this before.
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This also happened to me. I've never had a name
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for it. I don't know where to find help, and
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so I don't know. I'm not the type. I don't
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I don't say this to be whatever, but I'm just
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not Laura, and I not the type of people to
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be like, yeah, super sorry that that happened to you, like,
341
00:19:22.920 --> 00:19:28.079
good luck, right, And so we started this nonprofit too.
342
00:19:28.559 --> 00:19:33.480
We didn't even really have like a great uh, like, okay,
343
00:19:33.519 --> 00:19:34.880
how are we going to do this? It just was
344
00:19:34.920 --> 00:19:35.920
like we have to do something.
345
00:19:36.000 --> 00:19:38.880
Well, that's good, that's that's an instinctual move that was
346
00:19:38.920 --> 00:19:42.160
going in the right thing. Yeah to me, o, Kathy,
347
00:19:42.279 --> 00:19:44.039
if you agree with me, But to me, that's your
348
00:19:44.079 --> 00:19:48.640
subconscious that does calculations that billions two hundred billion times
349
00:19:48.680 --> 00:19:52.200
faster than your conscious mind. You knew in your gut
350
00:19:52.319 --> 00:19:54.599
it was the right thing to do, and you found
351
00:19:54.599 --> 00:19:57.480
your way to it. And yeah, I think what you've
352
00:19:57.480 --> 00:19:59.319
gotten how many episodes now?
353
00:20:00.200 --> 00:20:02.279
I think guys just looked it was like eighty eight.
354
00:20:09.519 --> 00:20:10.160
That's great.
355
00:20:11.279 --> 00:20:14.079
Yeah, And we're now so a year and a half
356
00:20:14.079 --> 00:20:19.400
into our nonprofit. We have the opportunity to train law enforcement,
357
00:20:19.920 --> 00:20:23.559
which is so fun. Uh. DCS staff Child Wealth, our
358
00:20:23.640 --> 00:20:31.599
staff child advocacy centers across the country. Teachers, teacher preachers,
359
00:20:31.680 --> 00:20:34.720
they don't really want to hear from us. I'm sure
360
00:20:34.799 --> 00:20:35.279
we'll see.
361
00:20:35.440 --> 00:20:37.559
We're not sure to talk to them either, but.
362
00:20:38.119 --> 00:20:44.920
Yeah, talk to their insurance companies ensuring them. That's who
363
00:20:44.960 --> 00:20:45.839
you need to talk to.
364
00:20:46.880 --> 00:20:50.240
Yeah, but it's been such a privilege, honestly again, to
365
00:20:50.359 --> 00:20:54.039
have you know, seasoned social workers, seasoned law enforcements say
366
00:20:54.079 --> 00:20:57.279
to us, I will forever. We've actually had this said
367
00:20:57.279 --> 00:20:59.839
to us, I will forever be a better bill in
368
00:20:59.839 --> 00:21:03.720
the social worker, police officer, whatever because of this training,
369
00:21:03.839 --> 00:21:06.039
because now I know and I didn't know.
370
00:21:06.519 --> 00:21:09.200
Well, you can add two FBI profilers to that list,
371
00:21:09.720 --> 00:21:13.480
will be better FBI profilers because of talking to you
372
00:21:13.640 --> 00:21:15.519
and the work you two are doing.
373
00:21:16.400 --> 00:21:19.759
We call regularly doctor Michael Salter, who's a criminologist out
374
00:21:19.799 --> 00:21:22.200
of Australia who's done a lot of research in organized
375
00:21:22.200 --> 00:21:25.519
sexual abuse, and what he says is, if you don't
376
00:21:25.519 --> 00:21:27.920
believe that this kind of abuse can happen, then you
377
00:21:27.960 --> 00:21:29.640
will miss it when it's staring you right in the face.
378
00:21:29.960 --> 00:21:32.640
And that's really what MEZO is about. It is about
379
00:21:32.680 --> 00:21:36.160
making sure that as many people as possible are prepared
380
00:21:36.160 --> 00:21:39.480
to know that, yes, there are people who can walk
381
00:21:39.519 --> 00:21:42.680
among us seemingly perfectly normal, who can keep up the bright,
382
00:21:42.720 --> 00:21:45.720
shiny facade, when underneath it all and behind the scenes,
383
00:21:45.759 --> 00:21:49.759
they are actually very depraved hanus human beings who can
384
00:21:49.799 --> 00:21:50.960
do these terrible things to kids.
385
00:21:51.039 --> 00:21:54.079
Well, I have said for a very long time, if
386
00:21:54.160 --> 00:21:59.319
you call people monster predators, everybody's going to miss the
387
00:21:59.440 --> 00:22:02.680
real effects. Who are smiling right in your face, and
388
00:22:03.000 --> 00:22:06.880
it's just it's so misleading. It just I mean, you know,
389
00:22:07.000 --> 00:22:10.240
stranger danger. Yeah, okay, so you know, there's a tiny
390
00:22:10.279 --> 00:22:14.839
little percentage of offenses that that are that are committed
391
00:22:14.839 --> 00:22:19.279
by strangers, but the vast majority ninety five ninety seven
392
00:22:19.359 --> 00:22:23.319
percent are by people you know, love and trust. They're
393
00:22:23.359 --> 00:22:23.880
in that cab.
394
00:22:24.119 --> 00:22:26.400
I say all the time, if a sex offender looked
395
00:22:26.400 --> 00:22:28.480
like a sex offender, Hue or she would never get
396
00:22:28.480 --> 00:22:32.920
access to children. They don't like a sex offender, and.
397
00:22:32.920 --> 00:22:35.920
You're not the monster under the bed exactly right.
398
00:22:37.440 --> 00:22:41.519
It's it's just something that we need to actually address.
399
00:22:41.519 --> 00:22:44.200
And this is something that I was so happy that
400
00:22:44.279 --> 00:22:46.599
we were able to do this in Criminal Minds, I mean,
401
00:22:46.640 --> 00:22:49.759
get this message out to people. And I really worked
402
00:22:49.799 --> 00:22:53.240
with casting director Lisa Zambetti, who was one of the
403
00:22:53.240 --> 00:22:56.640
original founding members of Real Crime Profile with me and
404
00:22:56.720 --> 00:23:00.640
Laura and and I worked with her to make sure
405
00:23:00.759 --> 00:23:05.880
that they're casting people who look like average, ordinary citizens. Yes,
406
00:23:05.920 --> 00:23:09.240
there's some monsters that we had on the show, but
407
00:23:09.400 --> 00:23:13.079
most of the people were just average Jo's and James.
408
00:23:13.519 --> 00:23:18.720
And that's important to know because there's no way, there's
409
00:23:18.799 --> 00:23:22.119
no way that you can tell a kid, you know,
410
00:23:22.279 --> 00:23:26.920
watch out for monster predators, and have that kid expect
411
00:23:26.960 --> 00:23:29.640
that the person that you told them to listen to
412
00:23:29.640 --> 00:23:32.000
to look up to, that's mommy and daddy's friend, or
413
00:23:32.039 --> 00:23:35.839
mommy and daddy themselves, that that's going to somehow protect them.
414
00:23:36.319 --> 00:23:39.519
So we have to be realistic about this, and if
415
00:23:39.559 --> 00:23:44.279
we're going to actually protect children, we have to be honest. Well,
416
00:23:44.480 --> 00:23:47.599
and you know, another pet peeve that I have in
417
00:23:47.640 --> 00:23:51.599
that same vein is that we think that we protect
418
00:23:51.599 --> 00:23:55.960
our children by keeping them sheltered and naive, right, and
419
00:23:56.119 --> 00:23:59.480
unfortunately that doesn't protect them. You would never protect a
420
00:23:59.559 --> 00:24:02.119
child from a busy street that you lived on by
421
00:24:02.160 --> 00:24:05.359
not telling them that it was dangerous. You would always
422
00:24:05.440 --> 00:24:07.519
walk them to the street, tell them to look both ways,
423
00:24:07.559 --> 00:24:09.279
show them how to do it, walk to the corner,
424
00:24:09.319 --> 00:24:11.640
hold their hand, and do it with them till they
425
00:24:11.640 --> 00:24:13.319
can do it on their own safely.
426
00:24:14.400 --> 00:24:16.319
It's also about giving kids power and voice.
427
00:24:16.680 --> 00:24:20.240
Yeah, but it's also giving kids the knowledge about sexual
428
00:24:20.359 --> 00:24:21.000
victimis zation.
429
00:24:21.799 --> 00:24:26.960
Yeah, my kids does it. Yes, my kids know far
430
00:24:27.039 --> 00:24:30.640
more than their age, right than most kids their age.
431
00:24:30.640 --> 00:24:32.119
They're twelve to eleven and eight.
432
00:24:32.440 --> 00:24:34.880
And it's very much supportive ways.
433
00:24:35.000 --> 00:24:40.640
Right, I'm sorry and you're welcome, because honestly, like my son,
434
00:24:40.920 --> 00:24:42.920
My son, on the very first day of sixth grade,
435
00:24:43.039 --> 00:24:46.039
eleven years old, walked into his health class, walked up
436
00:24:46.039 --> 00:24:47.839
to his health teacher and said, are we going to
437
00:24:47.839 --> 00:24:52.279
be covering sexual abuse in class this year? Yeah? Like
438
00:24:52.400 --> 00:24:56.200
they know the weight of this, the enormity, because you're right,
439
00:24:56.240 --> 00:24:58.960
I want them to know. And yeah, it's so scary
440
00:24:59.000 --> 00:25:01.759
as parents to coach that subject. But if we don't,
441
00:25:02.319 --> 00:25:04.160
we are not doing our kids a good service.
442
00:25:04.640 --> 00:25:07.079
Earlier they broach it, the easier it is for the parent.
443
00:25:07.640 --> 00:25:10.359
You know, while the child is in the womb is
444
00:25:10.400 --> 00:25:14.160
the first opportunity to start and then just keep going
445
00:25:14.200 --> 00:25:17.319
from there. If you wait, you have to get over
446
00:25:17.359 --> 00:25:20.160
your own hang ups to be able to talk. Remember
447
00:25:20.319 --> 00:25:23.119
Kathy about how Joe Sullivan used to talk about the
448
00:25:23.319 --> 00:25:26.920
you know, sort of the spiral. Yet jumping over that wall.
449
00:25:27.319 --> 00:25:29.400
You know that at first it's it's a it's a
450
00:25:29.440 --> 00:25:32.079
brick wall that you have to climb over. This is
451
00:25:32.160 --> 00:25:35.319
this is He talks about how offenders kind of go
452
00:25:35.400 --> 00:25:37.960
on this downward spiral and they each time they go
453
00:25:38.079 --> 00:25:40.799
over this wall, they knock a brick off and by
454
00:25:40.839 --> 00:25:42.920
the time they've done it a hundred times, there's no
455
00:25:43.039 --> 00:25:45.319
wall there and it's just stepping over a line. Well,
456
00:25:45.319 --> 00:25:49.519
it's the same with parents talking about sex and sexual
457
00:25:49.559 --> 00:25:52.599
victimization with their kids. I mean, you know, the first time,
458
00:25:52.680 --> 00:25:54.799
it's it's tough, you know, because you don't want to
459
00:25:55.119 --> 00:25:58.759
you don't want to take away their innocence. But at
460
00:25:58.759 --> 00:26:03.119
the same time, would you rather that they get they're
461
00:26:03.160 --> 00:26:08.599
more vulnerable to being abused. And like Joel Casthetics book,
462
00:26:08.920 --> 00:26:11.640
The Well Armed Child is a really good resource and
463
00:26:11.960 --> 00:26:15.000
it teaches parents how to how to talk to their
464
00:26:15.079 --> 00:26:19.839
kids about it, and you know, it's just and obviously
465
00:26:19.880 --> 00:26:23.119
Protecting the Gift by Gavin de Becker goes into that
466
00:26:23.200 --> 00:26:26.319
as well, and I think these are these are tools
467
00:26:26.359 --> 00:26:30.039
that parents should use to help protect their children from this.
468
00:26:30.759 --> 00:26:32.480
So I have to say this is one of my
469
00:26:33.000 --> 00:26:36.119
pet peeves. You know, we can it's critically important that
470
00:26:36.160 --> 00:26:39.200
we educate our kids, but we also have to create
471
00:26:39.279 --> 00:26:42.480
a culture where children have power and voice. If everything
472
00:26:42.480 --> 00:26:45.839
about our parenting says you must be compliant, you must
473
00:26:45.839 --> 00:26:49.480
be quiet, you must be obedient, absolutely, they're not prepared
474
00:26:49.480 --> 00:26:51.720
to say no, right, They're not.
475
00:26:52.480 --> 00:26:56.960
They're not only not prepared to say no. The people,
476
00:26:57.880 --> 00:27:03.599
obviously in Kate's situation are the parents, right, there has
477
00:27:03.680 --> 00:27:07.559
to be an opportunity for somebody in that situation. The
478
00:27:07.599 --> 00:27:10.319
people that are supposed to protect you and teach you,
479
00:27:10.559 --> 00:27:15.240
and and and shelter you and give you love, they're
480
00:27:15.240 --> 00:27:18.480
the ones doing it. Yeah, we have to have an
481
00:27:18.519 --> 00:27:23.920
opportunity to or people in your situation to be able
482
00:27:23.960 --> 00:27:28.599
to safely get out of that without running the risk
483
00:27:28.680 --> 00:27:31.039
that they're going to call your father or your mother.
484
00:27:32.440 --> 00:27:34.680
And then people don't want to think about that though
485
00:27:34.720 --> 00:27:38.400
they don't, especially mothers. There's this cult of motherhood, right,
486
00:27:38.519 --> 00:27:41.279
How could a mother possibly do this to her child?
487
00:27:41.359 --> 00:27:43.200
We don't want to believe it, and we don't really
488
00:27:43.240 --> 00:27:46.319
want to believe that families do that, but they do
489
00:27:47.960 --> 00:27:49.880
way more often than we're willing to admit.
490
00:27:50.079 --> 00:27:56.240
Well, Kathy did our study on maternal philicide, right, you know,
491
00:27:57.279 --> 00:27:59.839
she could tell you exactly what mothers are.
492
00:28:01.000 --> 00:28:04.799
That's right, the biological mothers that are murdering their kids,
493
00:28:04.880 --> 00:28:09.079
you know, as Yeah, you know it's hard other I
494
00:28:09.160 --> 00:28:10.160
understand what you're saying.
495
00:28:10.240 --> 00:28:12.079
Yeah, but I also don't.
496
00:28:11.920 --> 00:28:14.119
Want to think about the fact that sixty percent of
497
00:28:14.200 --> 00:28:16.920
child pornography depicts children under the age of eleven. That's
498
00:28:16.920 --> 00:28:19.599
according to Nick Nick. If it's under the age of eleven,
499
00:28:19.640 --> 00:28:22.319
how do we think people are gaining access to children
500
00:28:22.359 --> 00:28:25.400
that age without a parent or guardian being complicit.
501
00:28:25.599 --> 00:28:26.720
It's exactly right.
502
00:28:26.880 --> 00:28:28.680
That's a lot of kids, it is.
503
00:28:31.000 --> 00:28:31.319
Yeah.
504
00:28:31.920 --> 00:28:35.680
So kay, you meant you mentioned the backlash, and I
505
00:28:35.720 --> 00:28:38.400
had a question about that since you've gone public with
506
00:28:38.480 --> 00:28:43.240
this podcast, and congratulations because it's been incredibly successful. So
507
00:28:43.319 --> 00:28:47.440
that's a credit to you both. But I would imagine
508
00:28:47.480 --> 00:28:49.960
there is a dark side to this exposure to Can
509
00:28:50.000 --> 00:28:52.000
you tell us a little bit about that, you know,
510
00:28:52.079 --> 00:28:54.400
and still it seems like we're supposed to be protecting
511
00:28:54.400 --> 00:28:55.960
you are not the ones protecting you.
512
00:28:57.160 --> 00:29:01.759
Yeah, So people always are kind of like, well, I mean, uh,
513
00:29:01.839 --> 00:29:05.240
you're getting threats you went public with you know, you
514
00:29:05.319 --> 00:29:12.200
named all these offenders, you went public, right, It's actually yes, yeah, yeah, yeah,
515
00:29:12.359 --> 00:29:15.880
but it's actually the reverse. I started. I've been receiving
516
00:29:15.880 --> 00:29:17.960
threats my whole life. I mean, I I you know,
517
00:29:18.200 --> 00:29:20.400
this is my father with lay threats on my pillow
518
00:29:20.400 --> 00:29:22.599
at night. It was this is a long time thing.
519
00:29:23.559 --> 00:29:27.920
But when I broke contact with my family, which was
520
00:29:27.960 --> 00:29:32.240
five years ago, actually this in November. That is when
521
00:29:32.519 --> 00:29:35.759
it really started to amp up. I had people stalking me,
522
00:29:35.799 --> 00:29:40.200
I had people around my house. I was being stalked, assaulted.
523
00:29:41.559 --> 00:29:45.680
Horrendous things happening only because I broke contact, so I
524
00:29:45.720 --> 00:29:48.799
hadn't even gone public yet, And it was because of
525
00:29:48.839 --> 00:29:51.160
the intensity of those threats and because we had gone
526
00:29:51.160 --> 00:29:57.480
to glocal law enforcement, we had gone to literally the FBI. Anything, Well,
527
00:29:58.720 --> 00:30:00.720
we did all the things.
528
00:30:00.880 --> 00:30:03.480
Uh, they didn't do anything.
529
00:30:03.559 --> 00:30:07.240
Yeah, they didn't. My I Actually one of the threats
530
00:30:07.240 --> 00:30:09.720
that was left at my house was an old school
531
00:30:09.759 --> 00:30:14.079
Polaroid camera and inside of it was stuffed inside of
532
00:30:14.119 --> 00:30:16.839
it was a threat and was an old report card
533
00:30:16.880 --> 00:30:19.079
of mine from the school that I went to when
534
00:30:19.079 --> 00:30:22.400
I disclosed this abuse. And we took it to the
535
00:30:22.480 --> 00:30:25.759
FBI agent that we're working with, and she took it
536
00:30:25.799 --> 00:30:30.119
and confronted my father and he said that's I do
537
00:30:30.240 --> 00:30:34.240
have a polaroid camera collection, but that one is not mine.
538
00:30:34.640 --> 00:30:45.039
And the FBI agent was like, yeah, oh, okay.
539
00:30:41.759 --> 00:30:46.119
Yeah, I hope it's not an agent that hope, I
540
00:30:46.160 --> 00:30:46.720
will say.
541
00:30:46.559 --> 00:30:50.640
In her defense. We met this FBI agent in UH
542
00:30:51.160 --> 00:30:54.759
in March of twenty twenty so, and then the world
543
00:30:54.759 --> 00:30:57.559
blew up with COVID and she was a single parent
544
00:30:57.640 --> 00:31:02.000
trying to raise two kids during it a global pandemic.
545
00:31:02.920 --> 00:31:07.599
When sexual sex trafficking transition from the FBI at Homeland Security,
546
00:31:08.039 --> 00:31:09.400
so her role changed.
547
00:31:09.599 --> 00:31:12.000
Oh I didn't even okay, right in the middle of.
548
00:31:12.000 --> 00:31:14.440
It, so like she wasn't the best, but she also
549
00:31:14.640 --> 00:31:16.960
there was a lot of stuff going on that was
550
00:31:17.000 --> 00:31:19.920
working against her. I guess, so I don't want to
551
00:31:19.960 --> 00:31:22.799
like too much the rod of the bus, but yeah,
552
00:31:22.880 --> 00:31:24.319
we did everything.
553
00:31:25.839 --> 00:31:27.920
You should never have been I mean, come.
554
00:31:27.759 --> 00:31:33.000
On, yeah, yeah, all right, yeah, okay. So then we
555
00:31:33.039 --> 00:31:37.599
did the podcast. You know, honestly, the threats, it was
556
00:31:37.799 --> 00:31:40.559
we I mean we started naming names. We literally got
557
00:31:40.640 --> 00:31:42.279
to a point where it was like, okay, next time
558
00:31:42.319 --> 00:31:44.920
a threat comes, next time a person, I have camera
559
00:31:44.960 --> 00:31:49.160
footage of people skulking around my backyard in masks. I mean,
560
00:31:49.200 --> 00:31:52.240
it's horrendous. You know, we got to a point where
561
00:31:52.240 --> 00:31:54.319
we're saying, Okay, we're gonna just we're gonna name names
562
00:31:54.319 --> 00:31:56.920
of offenders. We're just gonna we've already we've already named
563
00:31:56.920 --> 00:32:01.119
my parents, We're gonna name names offenders. We did get
564
00:32:01.160 --> 00:32:03.119
sued for defamation on that one.
565
00:32:03.880 --> 00:32:08.160
For naming someone who was doing children's sports camps, and
566
00:32:08.279 --> 00:32:11.200
even though the church knew I'd been named, they were
567
00:32:11.240 --> 00:32:13.119
still letting him participate.
568
00:32:13.920 --> 00:32:18.839
Yeah yeah, because of doing that. I you know, the threats.
569
00:32:19.160 --> 00:32:21.680
I mean, I don't go anywhere alone. I still safety
570
00:32:21.759 --> 00:32:24.680
plan my way through life. I don't even go to
571
00:32:24.759 --> 00:32:29.920
target by myself because I just don't know. I mean, fortunately,
572
00:32:30.000 --> 00:32:32.480
we have my house is Fort Knox. We have all
573
00:32:32.480 --> 00:32:36.000
the security cameras and uh and alarm systems that I
574
00:32:36.359 --> 00:32:43.599
really yeah a really big, awful so snugly dog. Yeah,
575
00:32:43.720 --> 00:32:45.680
but we'll probably rip your throat out.
576
00:32:45.759 --> 00:32:49.880
So don't don't mention about the poisoned darts and all that.
577
00:32:50.000 --> 00:32:52.279
Okay, yeah, no, we're not going to talk about that one.
578
00:32:52.960 --> 00:32:56.880
No no, no, yeah, or the taser that I carry,
579
00:32:57.000 --> 00:32:59.839
none of that. But yeah, So it's it's still very
580
00:33:00.079 --> 00:33:06.000
much a reality of my existence, but its the podcast
581
00:33:06.079 --> 00:33:11.279
actually being vocal has has deterred in that, like we're
582
00:33:11.279 --> 00:33:13.480
not afraid to just call it out and just say
583
00:33:13.519 --> 00:33:17.519
it like it is. We also, thanks to getting sued
584
00:33:17.519 --> 00:33:21.519
for defamation, have the most kick ass attorneys in the
585
00:33:21.559 --> 00:33:25.400
whole Western New York area. I don't know if my
586
00:33:25.440 --> 00:33:27.440
attorney will listen to this, but I always say, he's
587
00:33:27.440 --> 00:33:30.599
like an he's an actual asshole, but like he's my asshole.
588
00:33:30.640 --> 00:33:31.920
Like do you know what I seem like.
589
00:33:34.640 --> 00:33:36.279
He's on your side.
590
00:33:37.039 --> 00:33:38.799
Yeah, Like I would never want to be on the
591
00:33:38.880 --> 00:33:42.319
other side of him, but he is. Yeah, He's an
592
00:33:42.400 --> 00:33:46.920
incredible human and I'm so grateful. So yeah, it's not
593
00:33:46.960 --> 00:33:50.440
been easy at all. Yeah.
594
00:33:50.440 --> 00:33:53.319
I want to say that when threats against Kate were
595
00:33:53.359 --> 00:33:56.440
not enough to get her to be quiet, they would
596
00:33:56.440 --> 00:33:59.960
threaten me, they would threaten anybody she cared about. That again,
597
00:34:00.119 --> 00:34:02.480
was an ongoing pattern. These are not people who are
598
00:34:02.599 --> 00:34:05.599
just going to stop. These are people that have to
599
00:34:05.599 --> 00:34:06.119
be stopped.
600
00:34:06.200 --> 00:34:09.679
Have there any been any prosecutions of these people for
601
00:34:09.880 --> 00:34:10.719
these No.
602
00:34:12.400 --> 00:34:15.599
So our work with the Yeah, I work with the FBI.
603
00:34:16.000 --> 00:34:19.440
You know. Basically her statement to us was, my boss said,
604
00:34:19.519 --> 00:34:23.360
is anyone dead? And she said no? And he said, okay, great,
605
00:34:23.440 --> 00:34:25.840
then we're god here and.
606
00:34:25.840 --> 00:34:27.840
It might be out of statute. It was a long
607
00:34:27.880 --> 00:34:30.280
time ago. We would have to like follow the trail
608
00:34:31.000 --> 00:34:35.360
of everything to bring it up to current day harassment.
609
00:34:35.159 --> 00:34:39.880
Which is an investigation, which is what their freaking job is,
610
00:34:40.519 --> 00:34:43.199
all right, So the next thing to do is to
611
00:34:43.239 --> 00:34:46.519
be as you know, vocal to the press and complain
612
00:34:46.559 --> 00:34:49.480
about what they're not doing. And that's just that's just
613
00:34:50.599 --> 00:34:54.119
you know, call Nick Mick and you know, and say
614
00:34:54.159 --> 00:34:56.039
you wanted to you want to know how to do
615
00:34:56.079 --> 00:34:59.559
a press conference with them about this to raise awareness
616
00:34:59.559 --> 00:35:02.679
about this because you know, and you know some of
617
00:35:02.719 --> 00:35:06.840
our former colleagues work there and Nick Nick and they
618
00:35:07.199 --> 00:35:11.039
I'm sure they'll, they'll, they'll help out. I mean, it's just, yeah,
619
00:35:11.760 --> 00:35:12.559
it's so hard.
620
00:35:12.599 --> 00:35:17.000
Actually, so I I'm engaged in some litigation against the
621
00:35:17.079 --> 00:35:22.400
local sheriff's office for some for mishandling of this, and
622
00:35:22.480 --> 00:35:24.880
again it was a situation where, you know, my attorney
623
00:35:24.960 --> 00:35:28.840
was like, they did they did this, We have options here,
624
00:35:29.239 --> 00:35:31.159
and I was like, Joe, not everybody has a Joe
625
00:35:31.199 --> 00:35:33.519
Manna in their corner. Not everybody has a kick ass
626
00:35:33.559 --> 00:35:35.519
attorney in their corner. So if I don't do this,
627
00:35:36.000 --> 00:35:38.760
who's going to Who's going to hold them accountable? Right?
628
00:35:39.679 --> 00:35:43.239
So that's not fun either, but somebody needs to.
629
00:35:43.480 --> 00:35:47.960
So well, thank you for doing it, and we really
630
00:35:48.000 --> 00:35:50.519
appreciate everything you're doing and we appreciate
