Now here is another wrinkle of this story that worries me. These events happened shortly after the incident just discussed.
Within 13 days, Flanagan was fired by the department.
Perry and his colleagues were stunned that he was let go because they believed his story. The department’s administration didn’t tell them what led to Flanagan’s termination. A petition was circulated in support of the young officer, who, like Perry, entered the force right out of the military. All but one officer, including Perry, signed it.
“Seeing him summarily dismissed quickly, that’s why the letter came out,” Perry said. “We were like, ‘Hey this is a good guy. Tell us something. What’s going on? Why are you firing this guy who has an allegation, just a mere allegation? He has no record. He has no nothing. He’s an Air Force guy. How about some due process? How about suspending him? I felt like he was getting railroaded off of an allegation.”
Ah, but Jeff, there’s the rub. You see, you uncritically accepted what Flanagan told you, even though it beggars belief that a 16 year old girl would do what Flanagan said she did. Then, having learned that Flanagan had been fired, you signed a petition asking that he be reinstated, because you thought he was “a good guy” and “an Air Force guy,” as if those things have any relevance. Did it not occur to you, upon reflection, that there might be something to the allegation? Did it not occur to you that the department might have more information than you did, and that Flanagan might have been lying? Even if you didn’t know about the previous 1991 incident (as you say you didn’t, even though you were on the scene at the time), shouldn’t this have set off some warning bells?
What this boils down to for me is this: I think Perry showed extraordinarily poor judgment. His instinct, throughout this ghastly saga, was to believe the cop and disbelieve the victim, even when the cop’s story was transparently a lie, and even when the police department had determined that the cop’s conduct was bad enough to warrant his being fired. Perry’s failures resulted in his missing a serious crime, and in subjecting his employer to a significant lawsuit that the town ultimately lost. And he continues to show poor judgment, because even now, with the benefit of hindsight, he cannot see that he might have missed something. Flanagan’s crimes got him four years in prison, for God’s sake, yet Perry cannot look back and see a single warning sign?
Perry’s actions and comments reflect a mindless, uncritical, authoritarian way of thinking that I think ill-serves anyone in a position of authority, whether that position be shift supervisor in the Wareham police department, or the United States Congress. Perry’s “the cop is always right” attitude is especially ironic since his own view of government is precisely to the contrary:
our Founding Fathers did not trust government and thus they loaded up the Constitution and the Bill of Rights with numerous protections concerning individual rights and limits on government’s power…. These rights were provided to protect us from an abusive government and not to grant additional power to the government….
Our Founding Fathers did not trust government, whether it was the old one in England or the new government forming in the American colonies. They undoubtedly understood that if the ultimate power to alter an unresponsive government was to be retained by the people, that these very same people must possess the right to keep firearms to defend themselves against a tyrannical government that could possibly develop at some point in the future.
Apparently, none of that applies when it comes to the cops. Because the cops are always right.
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p>because he clearly didn’t get to the fourth.
No taxation without representation.
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p>One nation, under God , indivisible with liberty and justice for all.
The best entry I’ve read on this site in ages.
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p>
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p>Hear hear.
Right? Right?
While I’d like to believe a teenage girl would not voluntarily strip, it is certainly POSSIBLE that she did so. Do we have testimony from her or other witnesses saying otherwise? It was a bit rash, but given the way teenage minds work sometimes I could see one thinking maybe if I just drop my pants and show I have nothing I can get the cops to go away. Perry didn’t handle the visit part well. If I were he and my subordinate relayed that story to me I would visit the home with a key purpose of following up on that aspect, not just mention it off-handily on my way out the door. As for the petition to bring Flanagan back if he were fired out from under me and as far as I knew there was a single yet unproven allegation I’d question the fairness of that too. Based on what you describe calling for suspension is reasonable and I probably would have signed the petition as well. Cops may not always be right, but they are entitled to due process in both employment and the courts.
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p>Teenagers’ minds work? A 16-year-old girl? Dropping her pants to a man, a cop she doesn’t know?
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p>I suspect, Christopher, that you are not the only male posting on this site who would suggest such a thing is “possible.” A 16-year-old girl who would actually do something like this has serious emotional issues, if not down-right mental health issues. Were that the case, there might be a whiff of that in the accounts we’re read. I’ve not seen any. Have you?
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p>I’ve worked with, well, let’s just say a lot of 16-year-old girls in my life. This “possible” behavior seems from another planet to me, knowing girls as I know them. In the absence of any suggestion that this girl is emotionally disturbed, raising the so-called possibility is about as tone-deaf as I’ve seen here.
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p>*****
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p>I’m just going to add this as an aside, too, not directed particularly at you, but to the “audience” in general. I’ve spent a lot of time with men in my life given my experiences, and I have to say that rarely have I felt the gender divide to be so unbridgeable in any other place. Maybe it’s the anonymity of the medium, maybe it’s not. The last experience regarding the burqa discussion was positively otherworldly, and I say that as the out-numbered female commenting, clearly inadequately, about what it is to be female and feminist with men suggesting they are more authoritative about the female experience as well as the subtleties of gender oppression and male hegemony than I–and missing the irony entirely. All “possibilities” aside, there really are some things that just aren’t really “possible” in a society that actually values reasoned thinking and an appreciation of what it is to be a 16-year-old girl.
Fourth Amendment – Protection from unreasonable search and seizure.
The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.
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p>I am a white male, and I am among those most disgusted with what happened here.
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p>I have no concerns whatsoever with what the young, female victims did or didn’t do to save themselves from these tyrants, or why.
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p>I see this case as part of a broader trend.
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p>As posted above, the fourth amendment to the US Constitution outlaws unreasonable search and seizure.
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p>I say that all drug searches are unreasonable searches and seizures. What gives the government the right to tell people what they can or can’t put in their own bodies?
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p>The majority of the victims of the drug war are BLACK MALES.
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p>What occurred here is not primarily a sexual issue, but is an example of the results of the destruction of the fourth amendment.
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p>This NEVER would have happened were there not a drug war.
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p>The answer to this is, ultimately, to stand up for civil liberties and the fourth amendment and END THE DRUG WAR.
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p>As a male, hearing what they did, I would worry that I could be stopped by thugs like this and given a “cavity search,” which is when a gloved hand is inserted up the rectum to find contraband.
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p>When there are no civil liberties, this is what you get.
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p>Please, for the love of God, can we all unite, end the tyranny of the drug war, and restore the profound moral values of the FOURTH AMENDMENT to US law and government?
…and am in no way suggesting it would have been the appropriate thing to do on her part.
But, Christopher, you are still suggesting that she might have stripped voluntarily, whether or not doing so was “appropriate.” But she didn’t. We know that, because we know Flanagan was a liar and a criminal. There are still grey areas in this matter, but this issue is not among them.
Did even read what I wrote? Who is even addressing the concept of what is or isn’t appropriate?
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p>I am not talking about appropriateness. I am saying that your suggestion that the possibility exists that she pulled down her pants voluntarily is not only wrong (on so many levels) but also reveals you to be tone-deaf.
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p>That ought to clear things up.
…that a teenager would not do something rash, incredibility stupid, and without regard for or knowledge of her own legal rights? David pointed out that we now know more and that’s fine. Based on that it seems it did not happen the way Flanagan says it did, but as I mentioned to David below I was trying, I suppose maybe “inartfully” as he put it, to think as one might have at the time.
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p>”Something rash and incredibly stupid”? All incredibly rash and stupid acts are equivalent in your world? A 16-year-old girl is as likely to drop her pants to a total stranger as she is to lie or to cover up her actions, for example?
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p>”It seems,” apparently, that you cling to your qualitative language either in an attempt to cover your egregious lack of knowledge on the issue or your lingering doubt as to the girl’s behavior. Your “defense,” as you put it in another comment, of the police’s behavior in this case is simply bizarre given the claims, and your desire to be open to the “possibility” that a young girl would drop her pants to a man she doesn’t know says more about your attitudes about teen-age girls than I suspect you’ll ever realize.
…try to read my mind about attitudes, etc. People who know me realize I would NEVER think of people this way in general or objectify anyone, but I also know that plenty of things happen in this world that leave moe rolling my eyes and shaking my head.
I think that his point was that it isn’t fair to simply conclude that this wasn’t voluntary, absent evidence to the contrary, however unlikely that might be. hence the question, “is there testimony…?”
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p>Christopher, the negative reaction here is because there must necessarily have been testimony, or other evidence that this was not voluntary. The officer conducting the search wound up being charged with, and pleading guilty to, sexual assault on account of this (and one other) incident. The family filed a civil lawsuit, which was settled out of court. Even if we are not privy to the intimate details, it is reasonable to conclude that there was sufficient evidence to convict the searching officer of a crime, and to establish liability against the town.
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p>All that established, I don’t think that it is particularly fair to question whether the incident was voluntary.
I am stunned. Wow.
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p>Given that this statement is accurate:
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p>
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p>…it means that the girl’s option to voluntarily “consent” has totally been removed by the police officer. There is absolutely no way in hell that true consent can coexist with such a radical imbalance of power. No way.
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p>Read any and all literature on child sexual abuse and it will say the exact same thing. Seriously, ask any social worker she will tell you that this is the text book definition of an authority figure using power imbalance to get this girl to remove her pants. This cannot even be argued, Christopher.
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p>The most kind characterization of the officer’s behavior is that he coerced the girl into this act. I urge you to reconsider your position and retract it.
I finally got a chance to read the full Globe article linked in the diary. I use a very slow dial-up internet connection which means that I get very impatient with following links and often rely only on what is in the diary itself. It is clear from the article that Flanagan ordered the girl to take off her clothes, and as such it cannot be in any way spun as “voluntary”. You are absolutely correct about the imbalance of power and while many of us would know to invoke the 4th amendment a teenager would not necessarily think of that. The image I had in my mind was of a girl offering to do this on her own initiative to instantly clear herself. That would be awfully rasy as I’ve said, but I wouldn’t put it past a teenager. Obviously, that image was inaccurate. I of course don’t know what exactly Flanagan told Perry, but Perry apparently still believes he did the right thing and I hope in the campaign context he will be forthcoming. Flanagan, on the other hand, is it would seem a creep of the highest order.
Your speculation about what this underage girl might have done (“… but I wouldn’t put it past a teenager”) comes perilously close to simple (and inappropriate) erotic fantasy. Christopher, I don’t understand why you are doing handsprings and backflips to support this creepy candidate. I remind you that the reason we are discussing any of this is that this sleazebag is the GOP candidate for the congressional seat being vacated by William Delahunt.
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p>Whatever the outcome of legal actions taken against the candidate, either then or now, in my view his actions then make it crystal-clear that he is a pig (in the venerable “male chauvinist pig” sense) who has no business at any civilized table, never mind being put forward as a candidate for national office (no matter how much lipstick the GOP smears on him).
…except for your first sentence, which was really uncalled for. I’ve said several times that to do such would be inappropriate, etc, but teenagers do dumb and inappropriate things. I assume you’ve heard of “sexting” for example. It’s a big concern these days, but certainly shows that it happens. Doesn’t mean I like it.
I was tempted to write that first sentence too. Only I was going to write something more along the lines of In the world you, Lightiris, and I inhabit, this behavior would be odd enough to count as a symptom for the psychiatrist; in a world of people “gone wild”, I imagine, it would be much more common.
I assume you are basically asking what I think the relative probability of the scenarios are. I figure (and certainly hope) the scenario I suggested is extremely UNLIKELY, but I just wanted to cover the bases. Your italicized sentence above is something I can definitely agree with. I certainly don’t think that taking off one’s clothes is automatically and every context erotic, but one has to wonder about Flanagan.
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p>A. ) How does the first part of the sentence relate to the second part, B.) what does one have to “wonder” regarding Flanagan?
…in the first part I was trying to push back against the accusation made against me that at least strongly suggested I was inappropriately fantasizing about the incident under discussion. Flanagan strikes me as a creep so I was suggesting that maybe HE has issues in this regard.
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p>Let me also take this opportunity to clarify that in my comment above I lapsed back into the mode of what was known immediately following the incident. I acknowledge now that based on the evidence we know that the suggestion I have previously made is not accurate.
I think you can finish up with the ‘wondering’ and the ‘suggesting that maybe’ now. It is about as well-established as these things ever get, what with the conviction and prison term, and all.
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p>You’re trying to be even-handed by balancing a cannonball with a helium balloon.
Think of bell shaped curves. In the middle of the bell, are the things that are likely to occur. Way out to the left and the right are the tails of the distribution. These are the things that are less likely to occur. Some probability distributions have “heavy” tails meaning that rare events are more frequent. (See Wikipedia.)
I believe that I have no right to bash in a passer-by’s skull with a Louisville Slugger because it is wrong to pound someone who isn’t touching me or bothering me.
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p>The victim’s personal characteristics are irrelevant.
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p>Judgment calls about who or how the girls were, or what they did or didn’t do or why are irrelevant and distract from the real question:
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p>How dangerous would Perry be as a congressman?
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p>In this case, what officers did was sick, wrong, abusive, and insane. Not only did they take away the girls’ rights, they provided provocation that could have lead to riots that would “burn down the town.”
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p>Being young and being around is NOT A CRIME.
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p>Abusive tyrants must be kept from joining legislative bodies AT ALL COSTS.
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p>I am very interested about why nobody here but me sees the next step for these types is CAVITY SEARCHES?
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p>
I can only how and under what conditions Mr. Flanagan abused his power while in the military as well as in his private life. He is, for all intents and purposes, a sex offender.
I can only imagine….
Something is not right upstairs with this Flanagan character.
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p>Was he so feeble-minded that he thinks that this is how you police a town in Massachusetts in the 1990’s? Is he delusional?
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p>There are institutions that are a blend of jail and a mental ward. Someone like this Flanagan needs a place like that.
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p>If he does “lash out” later on, there is a chance that it could be something non-sexual. Maybe he will blow-torch the woods, thinking that he is killing 10,000 devils.
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p>Maybe he will tackle someone at a store, and smash their face on the pavement.
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p>He is bonkers.
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p>He is blown.
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p>He is cookoo for cocoa puffs.
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p>When they are this far gone, you need them off the police force FAST, and getting professional help.
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p>No. No. No.
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p>This does not happen without coercion (at a minimum). Coercion, by definition, makes the act of stripping involuntary.
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p>It’s hard for me to imagine anyone, teenager or otherwise, going through such great lengths to humiliate themselves to prove innocence. A teenager voluntarily (without coercion) stripping to prove innocence? I would categorize this as an extreme and bizarre action and I have no idea why you would imagine such a thing happening.
to avoid speaking in absolutes.
Yes, we do have information from the girl saying otherwise. Did you see the whole story in Saturday’s Globe? I am guessing from your response you did not.
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p>This wasn’t the first time this happened with this cop. Perry was at the scene of the first event. He says he didn’t see the act occur, but he clearly KNEW about it… to then sign a petition to get him back on the force?
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p>No girl voluntarily strips. A strip search by an opposite sex cop, without other supervision? that calls for a dramatic internal affairs investigation.
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p>He closed ranks like cops have been known to do… at the time he didn’t realize he would be off the force in 6 months, but it would be “unrelated reasons”… or running for Congress 20 years later. Very poor judgment, but if you’ve met him, I bet it wouldn’t surprise you.
You might be idly interested in whether the teenage girl stripped or not. (And apparently, so too was Jeff Perry, that paragon of conservative moral rectitude, only idly interested.)
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p>By contrast, Flanagan’s lawyer must have been keenly interested in that question. If she had, in fact, dropped her drawers, Mr. Flanagan might have been spared a four year prison sentence.
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p>So if there was any doubt there, it would have come out at the trial. We can safely say, then, that it did not happen voluntarily.
No, Christopher, it is not possible. Have you forgotten that we now know, for a fact, that Flanagan was lying? He pled guilty and served four years, and his town lost a lawsuit over the whole wretched business.
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p>Now, perhaps what you meant to say, but said extremely inartfully, was that Perry at the time thought it was “possible” that Flanagan’s story was true and that he therefore saw no reason to question it. But my whole point is that, at the time, given Perry’s limited knowledge of the situation, it was indeed possible that Flanagan was not lying — but it was very unlikely, for the reasons lightiris and others have stated on this thread. That’s the whole point of my post.
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p>So I’m afraid it’s you who are making huge assumptions — and they are entirely without foundation.
I guess what I’m trying to say is that if I were a police officer and my partner or subordinate who I had every reason to trust came to me and relayed this story, I would raise my eyebrows and try to confirm, but not automatically think he was lying. I may be making a few assumptions of my own, but since I’m kind of acting for the defense here I have more leeway to do so. I believe in the concept of presumption of innocence until proven guilty as an ethical principle, not just a legal right. If we know now that Flanagan was lying, great, but you are correct that I am trying to assess whether Perry was acting reasonably at the time.
the accused is a 16-year-old girl, apparently.
She has rights too, which were violated quite a bit, but in this particular diary she was not “on trial”, the cop was.
I know I’ve written comments very much like this post from David. However, at this point, it seems to me as if we are still relying too much on blog posts from two people about whom I at least know nothing. We lack reports from journalists based on going to Belmont and pulling the requisite legal documents.
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p>I have no reason to either trust or distrust the posts on Cape Code Online or Plymouth Daily News. Before anyone takes out any ads, paints large billboards, or shoots some damning YouTube videos, it would be wise to make sure that the key facts in this case are nailed down.
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p>I believe Christopher senses some of this, but I doubt that the weaknesses — if there are any — in this story concern voluntary disrobing. Nonetheless, we should be looking for the weaknesses.
your caution, while sensible, does not apply to my post. I have so far not posted on this story precisely because of the issues you raise. But I was very careful in this post to rely only on what Jeff Perry himself has admitted, either to the Globe or to Cape Cod Online. Based only on those statements, I am quite comfortable with what I’ve written here.
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p>Of course, things could actually be much worse than what I’ve stated here. But that would require knowing more for sure than we know right now.
http://www.capecodtoday.com/bl…
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p>
Explain why we should trust Richard Latimer. Who is he?
Post, plus a back and forth between Latimer and Kennedy.
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p>I find it difficult to say that he is not being truthful.
Richard Latimer is a 1972 graduate of U. Mass, Amherst and a 1975 graduate of the Columbia University School of Law and was admitted to the Massachusetts Bar in 1975, the U.S. District Court, D. Mass. in 1976, and the First Circuit Court of Appeals in 1977.
He and his wife of 39 years, Adrienne, have a 22-year-old son Brian, a 2006 graduate of Falmouth High School, who is presently enrolled at Fitchburg State College majoring in media, communications and film studies.
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p>He is the author who researched from the United States District Court and Plymouth County Superior Court Archives all the sworn and signed statements of the victims, parents, witnesses and depositions which clearly demonstrate that Jeff Perry not only covered up for the serial child molester Jason Flanagan once, but at least twice:
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p>Click on the link to read all of these court documents:
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p>http://www.capecodtoday.com/bl…
Does anyone here believe that they have a right to bash my head in with a baseball bat because I am “no great shakes”?
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p>These victims DID NOT take vigilante action against these thugs. That is more than adequate for their civil duties.
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p>From the day they were born until today, THESE TWO PEOPLE ARE NOT ANSWERABLE FOR WHAT HAPPENED OR WHAT THEY DID ON THOSE DAYS IN ANY WAY, SHAPE OR FORM.
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p>The focus here has to be this:
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p>Deep down, Mr. Jeff Perry wants to put a gloved hand up your rectum searching for contraband. He wants total surveillance and no freedom for individuals.
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p>Mr. Robert O’Leary and Mr. William Keating do not want to do this.
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p>It is good to have congressional representation that does not SCARE YOU TO DEATH.
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p>Back in the days of the US Senate election, I was for Mike Capuano. He is opposed to the Patriot Act. I could tell that he had an appreciation for civil liberties, and I appreciated that very much. We need more politicians of that type and less of the “goon squad” types.
TPM front paged a story.