I find it amusing that you write about variable and transparent organizations and list an article about this one particular situation.

Before I proceed any further I'm just going to ask you one question.

Are you stupid?


That's a real, sincere question. Because, for starters, you don't talk about many instances of predators and only site one. And, you hit this somewhat hard, so I'm curious if perhaps you have some personal involvement with this particular instance.

And, to be honest, I do. Because I was very close to that situation. I was so close, in fact, the "victim" called my house looking for him one night, only to find out the cops or DCFS were also on the line. It was stated there, though it wasn't
written in the police reports, that she "didn't want him to get into any trouble." I bet that was why she quickly got off the phone. Good thing I didn't get to ask her any questions, because I have a few I'm dying to ask.

Or, perhaps when I called the victim from a payphone to tell her she needed to stop calling him because it was going to get him into trouble and she asked "why? I want to talk to him"... sounds victimy, right?

I won't go into much detail about her screaming out of a window from her place of employment, shouting "Tell him I love him!!"

Or, how he didn't fight this in court because he didn't want his attorney to drag her through the mud.

I will not stand here and say that relationships of this nature are perfectly fine. For the record, if I can recall, the victim was 17, possibly 18. Old enough that she and a girlfriend of hers stopped by my apartment once because she wanted to get the
hell away from her family and she was looking to rent one there. I wasn't home my wife was, so she showed them around.

The legal age of consent in Illinois is 17, maybe even 16 if I can remember. However you view it, the reality is that there are people younger than that procreating with people older than that. Some end up getting married. I know of one that is on the
registry who is married to the victim right now! Happily married, going on well over 20 years and have kids out of highschool now!! This is your tax dollars working on keeping an eye one one time offenders who are in a lifetime committed relationship.
I'm thinking that's a waste of money.

Now, I'm not advocating for these actions to happen. I would love to hear if it never happens again. But, none of us walk on water.

That said, I have friends as educators at all grade levels. It is no hidden secret that today's youth has less respect for their peers, their teachers, and their parents. It's a soundbyte or microwave generation and teachers are younger and younger.
Every teacher except 2 from kindergarten on were at least in their 40s. One was a math teacher when I was a junior or senior. They're younger now, and you can't discipline kids to pay attention anymore. You cant do anything except to try to be outward
focused if you want them to get half a decent grade these days. It's not easy trying to help kids you want to see succeed. You related with them! Unfortunately relating with them can have negative consequences. This is a good example of it. The lack
of government funding, or the lack of experience behind today's wave of teachers with a joke of a support system at school, along with kids who have no serious relationship with their parents because they're trying to be their friends because they're
growing up as well... there is a lot of stuff here to make this little batch of disaster.

And it does in fact happen. Nobody will deny that it does happen. It doesn't make it right. It doesn't make it any more or less wrong. But if you are trying to convey that this is a textbook example of a predator using a system to exploit kids, this
is not the example you need to state your case. At all. This was a young adult making a choice to engage in this behavior with another young adult.

I will not let you, or anybody else for that matter, portray my best friend as a monster. He isn't, and he never was. He taught music because he believed that if there was anything that everyone could agree upon, it is that music can make the world a
little better. And there is science there to back that claim up. Music was his passion. And a lot of today's young adults have benefitted from taking his music class on a grade school, or a high school, or collegiate level.

I believe many of his students would back my claims up. He was a great great guy, and an even greater friend. You would be so lucky to have known him. Sadly, for you, you won't get that chance.

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