A bomb at home: when one of your own is an abuser

The families of sex abusers get little sympathy

Children’s rights campaigner Christina Noble told me recently that online child sexual abuse ‘is an Irish problem and a worldwide problem’. Events in Germany and Norway this week – as well as recent Garda raids on 31 homes across Ireland – prove how right she is.

Christina joined the debate on Liveline sparked by a newly formed group, Families of Abusers, who contacted me to detail their horror and trauma at discovering that a member of their family was visiting child abuse websites online.

For over a week I listened to harrowing stories but it came to a head when two remarkable women, Christina Noble and ‘Mary’, mother to a teenage son convicted and imprisoned for possession of child abuse images, spoke to each other.

‘Mary’ detailed how their world came tumbling down when six gardaí raided their home. Her son immediately confessed that he had been viewing images and downloading videos of children being abused – some as young as 18 months. ‘Within seconds, the child we loved had turned into a compete stranger,’ she said.

As the gardaí left, she asked them what she should do with her 19-year-old son until the court case, over a year away. One of them replied: ‘Bring him to a doctor.’ This lack of support prompted her to form Families of Abusers.

The BBC this week broadcast a powerful documentary on an epic scandal in Norway where a former leading child psychiatrist – who specialised in investigating child abuse – was sent to prison for possession of child abuse images. Liberal Norway has been rocked by the scandal – especially in light of the fact that the psychiatrist worked for the state and was renowned for the number of children he committed to care homes and foster care. But still his name cannot be published in Norway, though it is freely available on the internet, an indication to campaigners that the subject of online child sexual abuse is not taken seriously enough.

In Germany, a couple were imprisoned for sexually abusing and ‘selling’ their own son to paedophiles for unspeakable acts of barbarity and depravity. Christina Noble confronted ‘Mary’ with a shocking scenario: had she considered that her son, now in prison, went further than viewing images of children being sexually abused? Had she asked relatives and friends with young children did he have any interaction with them?

‘Mary’ revealed that she had and there were no suspicions – however, she then revealed that the prospect was so horrifying that one day before the court case, when she was travelling in her car with her son, she considered ‘driving into a wall’ to end it all for both of them.

Families of Abusers have set up a Twitter account where they are publishing testimonies from parents whose homes have been raided when one of their children was caught with these horrific images.

One father described how they had just returned from an idyllic family holiday when the gardaí raided their home. ‘It was like a bomb had gone off.’

Yes, it’s an unsavoury subject, but with an untrammelled internet and a cavalier attitude from service providers to even minimum controls, it is a knock on the door that could happen to any family. The One In Four organisation is trying to help families affected by these revelations too – they in turn deserve our support.