First things first
By Eileen McNamara,
Globe Columnist | August 30,
2006
Memo to members of the ministry: When
the accusation against an employee is rape, 911 is the first number
to dial, not the last.
Alerting police to an alleged sexual
assault does not preclude praying with the accuser, launching an
internal review of hiring practices, or purchasing surveillance
cameras to keep an eye on employees. It does ensure that the
appropriate authorities are in full command of a potential criminal
investigation from the outset.
The account offered by the Rev.
Eugene F. Rivers III of the aftermath of the alleged rape of a
17-year-old girl at a youth center he founded in Dorchester leaves
one wondering whether the broader religious community learned a
fundamental lesson from the sexual abuse crisis in the Roman
Catholic Archdiocese of Boston. Transparency means not only
following the letter of state law that requires clergymen, teachers,
and social workers to report a suspicion of sexual abuse; it also
means avoiding any appearance that institutional self-preservation
trumps the protection of children.
Rivers, who is president of the board
of the Ella J. Baker House on Washington Street, says the first
thing he did when informed of the allegation was go to the girl's
home to pray with her and her mother. He says he then sought out the
accused, 32-year-old Derrick Patrick, and had a ``long conversation"
with him. The Baker House notified authorities of the rape
allegation the next day, a timeline that Rivers's defenders say puts
him above reproach.
Patrick was arrested last month in
connection with the case and charged with paying for sex and
inducing a minor into prostitution. The young woman, who says she
had consensual sex with Patrick several times at Baker House before
the alleged assault, contends that he raped her there after she
refused to submit to anal sex. Additional charges could still be
filed against Patrick, who has denied any wrongdoing.
A fuller investigation, now underway,
will determine whether Rivers simply was offering pastoral care, as
he contends, or trying to derail the charges, as the accuser
maintains. What is certain is that his first impulse was not to
notify police or the state agencies that provide services to at-risk
teenagers in Massachusetts and substantial funding to Baker House. A
social worker with the Department of Youth Services told the Herald
she learned of the rape allegation first from the victim and her
mother and only later from officials at Baker House.
As troubling as the rape accusation
is the girl's contention that she routinely accepted rides home from
Patrick and had consensual sex with him in Baker House, long a
highly regarded haven from the streets in this city's most violent
neighborhoods. Did no one on the staff question the relationship
between this girl and Patrick, an administrator for a program for
preadolescent boys? Were there no safeguards in place to prevent
such fraternization?
Rivers's candor about governmental
indifference to poor people of color might be more responsible than
his considerable ego for the mixed reviews his ministry sometimes
gets in Boston. He is a vigorous advocate for a constituency easily
overlooked, and because he pushes the envelope -- hiring ex-convicts
to work with troubled kids on the theory that they speak the same
language, for instance -- Rivers is a liability to a Republican
governor with presidential ambitions. That, as much as anything that
happened at Baker House, accounts for the precipitous decisions by
the state Department of Youth Services to cut ties to the youth
center after a 10-year association and the Massachusetts Executive
Office of Public Safety to withdraw a $350,000 grant.
No urban program for vulnerable
teenagers can afford to lose that kind of money, but there is a
potentially greater loss for Rivers in credibility if it turns out
that he tried in any way to put the brakes on a rape investigation.
Eileen McNamara
is a Globe columnist. She can be reached at
mcnamara@globe.com. 
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