Rivers defends
response: Official says rape wasn’t reported until next day
By Casey Ross and Michele McPhee
Tuesday, August 29, 2006 - Updated: 01:34 AM
EST
A
state official said the Rev. Eugene Rivers III did not promptly
notify social workers about the alleged rape of a girl at the Ella
J. Baker House even as Rivers yesterday defended his handling of the
incident.
The alleged rape took place Jan. 5, but an official with the state
Department of Youth Services said the Baker House, of which Rivers
is founder and president, did not notify the agency of the incident
until the morning of a meeting with the girl and her mother the day
after the alleged attack.
The official, DYS Chief of Staff Mary Silva, said a DYS case worker
was first notified of the alleged sexual assault by the girl’s
mother and had to hastily rearrange her schedule to get to the
meeting at the Baker House.
Silva said the Baker House then followed up with a voice mail
message asking the case worker to attend the meeting. She said the
case worker, who did not know the full scope of the allegations,
arrived to find the meeting already in progress between Baker House
officials, the girl and her mother.
Asked if such a meeting with an alleged rape victim is unusual,
Silva declined to respond, citing the ongoing investigation.
DNA evidence did not link Baker House staffer Derrick Patrick, 32,
to the attack on the teen until July, two law enforcement sources
said yesterday.
Rivers, founder and president of the Ella J. Baker House, adamantly
defended his handling of the alleged incident yesterday, saying he
opted to immediately reach out to the victim and her family rather
than call police.
“Our first response was to the parent, and we reached out
immediately to pray with the mother and begin the process of doing
whatever needed to be done to ensure that this young person was
dealt with in a fair and compassionate way,” Rivers said yesterday.
Rivers could not be reached for additional comment last night, but
he said during a morning press conference that Baker House staff
members took quick action after learning of the alleged rape.
“There was an immediate response to the allegations on the part of
the senior staff and it is not appropriate for me to say more than
that,” Rivers said. He clarified the immediate response was not to
police, but to “the family, to the staff and to the needs of the
child.”
The teen said Rivers accused her of making up the rape account.
“He should not even be a reverend,” the teen told the Herald in a
recent interview. “The rev tried to say I was lying. There was no
point for me to lie about what a lowlife . . . did to me.”
Rivers said surveillance cameras were immediately installed in the
Baker House following the alleged incident, and he welcomed state
and city input into a review being conducted to refine and improve
the organization’s programs.
DYS severed its relationship with the Baker House in the wake of the
alleged incident, and the organization has also lost a $350,000
grant from the state and become the focus of a city audit.
Asked about the effect of a sudden loss of funding, Rivers said he
has faith his mission will go on and he sought to emphasize the
importance of the Baker House’s work with high-risk youths in the
city’s most dangerous neighborhoods.
“If the Ella J. Baker Houses of the world don’t exist, there is an
entire class of children that are going to drown in their own
blood,” Rivers said. “We’re not going to let that happen, funding or
no.
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