Documentaries spotlight sex abuse victims' parents

NEW YORK — The mothers of the two accusers in HBO's “Leaving Neverland” said they were lulled by Michael Jackson's forlorn demeanor and fairytale world when they allowed him to take their boys into his bed.

An aunt who introduced her underage niece to R. Kelly and suspects abuse said in the six-part “Surviving R. Kelly” docuseries on Lifetime that she hoped the embattled star would propel the teen's music career. She alleges the girl wound up on a sex tape instead.

The parents of a 12-yearold girl kidnapped twice and chronically abused over several years by a trusted neighbor in Idaho called themselves “naive” in the Netflix documentary on the bizarre 1970s ordeal, “Abducted in Plain Sight.”

The trio of high-profile cases, the latest in a long line of media fare focused on child abuse over the years, have generated intense scrutiny of the people who should matter most to kids: their parents.

For those in these sad and painful documentaries, support and understanding have been abundant among strangers, abuse survivors and advocates fighting sexual violence. However, some viewers and commenters online, likely many who know nothing of how sexual abusers groom their victims, can't fathom how any parent could allow a child to be placed in the intensely vulnerable situations depicted.

There were missed red flags. Mistakes made and acknowledged. There were professional ambitions to be pursued for their starry-eyed kids, murky monetary payments and plenty of perks. And there was lots of regret once their children disclosed.

Experts, abuse survivors and their supporters said that when young victims are groomed by perpetrators so, too, are their parents in a vast majority of cases that don't include such crimes committed by parents themselves.

“The basic facts are that somebody who's intent on sexually abusing a child does actually groom both a child and a caregiver,” said Esther Deblinger-Sosland, who has written two books on the subject and is a psychology professor and co-director of the Child Abuse Research Education Service Institute at Rowan University in Glassboro, New Jersey.

“They're looking for situations and families that they can exploit. Any child can be sexually abused. That has to be put out there. It really could happen to any child. But when an offender is really looking to target a child, they do look for a child that might be more vulnerable, from a family that they think they might be able to manipulate in some way,” she said.

Parents may be coping with stresses and adversities that distract them, Deblinger-Sosland explained, but at the same time, “most people don't assume anyone who talks articulately, who appears to be friendly and caring, is a sex offender.”

Child sex offenders, she said, are often viewed by society as the “most heinous criminals,” she said. “If you have that image of a sex offender then it's unlikely, whoever you are, to just look at someone and assume that they're going to sexually abuse your child. And that's what's so difficult.”