Marriage & family therapist sentenced for possession of child porn, perjury

On June 27, 2011, marriage and family therapist Thomas Henry Ceglarek was sentenced to three years and 10 months in federal prison for possession of child pornography and perjury.  He was further sentenced to 15 years supervised released and was ordered to pay a $5000 fine and register as a sex offender.

Ceglarek admitted that he possessed two computers containing images of minors engaged in sexually explicit conduct.  He also admitted that he had falsely claimed to have been unemployed in October 2010 in order to obtain a court-appointed attorney when in fact he was then earning $70,000 a year in his position as an elementary school counselor with the San Diego School District.

Ceglarek’s marriage and family therapist license with the state of California is listed as inactive as of March 31, 2011.

Source: Susan Shroder, “Former school counselor sentenced in child-porn case,” San Diego Union-Tribune, June 27, 2011.

Andrew William Young awaits sentencing on child porn charges; counseled children on air force base

According to the docket of the U.S. District Court for the District of Alaska, clinical social worker Andrew William Young, who is licensed in Alaska, Massachusetts and New Hampshire, pleaded guilty to charges of sexual exploitation of a child (production and attempted production of child pornography) and receipt and attempted receipt of child pornography.

Young, a Lieutenant Commander with the U.S. Public Health Service Commissioned Corps, worked with children at Elmendorf Air Force Base in Anchorage, until his arrest in October 2009.

According to the plea agreement signed by Young, he was identified during a 2009 police investigation.  Following up a tip that Young possessed child pornography, a detective with the Anchorage Police, using “Limewire peer-to-peer file sharing software,” downloaded videos which, upon review, were found to contain child pornography and which were traced as having come from a computer belonging to Young.

The Internet Crimes Against Children Task Force executed a search warrant for Young’s house in which they seized additional child pornography dating back to 1983, including a computer hard drive containing 747 videos and 4,300 digital images of child pornography.  The amount of material removed from Young’s residence has been characterized as the largest amount of physical evidence of any single children pornography case to date.

Further analysis of other of Young’s computer hard drives revealed nude images of a boy that Young himself had photographed in his home.  The boy was located and interviewed by U.S. Immigration and Customs Officials. He identified himself in the photos and reported that Young had taken them when he was ten years old in Young’s then-home in Wichita Falls, Texas.

Authorities interviewed friends of Young’s who were stationed with him at Sheppard Air Force Base (in Wichita Falls) at the time.  Those friends reviewed sanitized versions of the photos and identified both the room in the house where they were taken and the boy.

Sentencing in the matter has been continued numerous times and is currently scheduled for July 20, 2011.

Source: Criminal Docket and Plea Agreement, USA vs. Young, Case No. 3:09-CR-00129-JWS, in the United States District Court for the District of Alaska and James Halpin, “Social worker charged with possessing child pornography,” Anchorage Daily News, October 23, 2009.

Catholic League outraged about “debased psychiatrists”

Dr. Steve Taylor, a Louisiana psychiatrist who has worked with the Survivors Network for those Abused by Priests (SNAP), has been sentenced to two years in prison for possession of child pornography. The news drew the following response from Catholic League president Bill Donohue:

How many more morally debased psychiatrists are working with SNAP? Did SNAP leaders know about the leisure-time activities of Dr. Taylor? When did they know and what did they do about it? It’s time we learned the truth.

What we know already is nauseating. In 2008, Dr. Taylor’s computer was seized by the authorities after they learned that he was downloading child pornography. He was jailed on 107 counts at the time, and in September of last year a grand jury indicted him. The court accepted a plea bargain from him this week.

Dr. Taylor got off easy, at least according to his own standards. In 2003, speaking for SNAP clients, he argued that the confidentiality of the confessional seal should not be respected by the law. In a contemptuous statement against the Catholic Church, he voiced his objections to a unanimous decision by the Louisiana House Committee on the Administration of Criminal Justice protecting the confidential communication of priests, ministers, rabbis and other clergy members. He said at the time that the seal has to be broken because “We have faces now.”

Well, SNAP, we now have the faces of the children your colleague downloaded to feed his sick habits.

If breaking the priest-penitent privilege is something you support, will you now support turning over the patient records of Dr. Taylor? Will you support a probe of this matter? What if there is more evidence against him? What if there are more victims? You’re always looking for new victims, aren’t you? Strike when the iron is hot—who cares about psychiatrist-patient privilege?

Jeff Field

Director of Communications

The Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights

450 Seventh Avenue

New York, NY 10123

212-371-3191

212-371-3394 (fax)

Louisiana psychiatrist Steve Taylor sentenced to two years prison for possession of child pornography

A retired Covington (Louisiana) psychiatrist booked in 2008 with possessing more than 100 sexually explicit pictures of children on his computer has pleaded guilty to less severe charges.

Dr. Steve Taylor, 71, admitted to attempted possession of juvenile pornography during a hearing at the St. Tammany Parish courthouse in Covington on Tuesday, according to the District Attorney’s Office. In exchange for his plea, state Judge Peter Garcia sentenced him to two years in prison.

Ralph Whalen, Taylor’s defense attorney, said his client will begin serving his sentence April 22. He declined to answer questions about the reasoning behind the plea.

Meanwhile, DA spokesman Rick Wood explained that prosecutors struck the deal because they had concerns about evidence in the case and were unsure that a trial verdict would be favorable.

“It was the right thing to do,” Wood said.

Taylor, prior to his arrest, had been honored for his work with health care organizations and had been affiliated with a group dedicated to counseling victims of sexual abuse.

Sheriff’s Office deputies began investigating Taylor three years ago after receiving a tip that child pornography had been downloaded on his computer.

Investigators later seized Taylor’s home computer and uncovered images downloaded from websites showing non-local youths under the age of 17. On April 9, 2008, they searched Taylor’s home and office and jailed him on 107 counts of juvenile pornography possession, each of which was punishable with a $10,000 fine and two to 10 years in prison.

Authorities have declined to say where the tip originated.

A grand jury indicted him last September. The court scheduled his trial for this week, but he accepted a plea bargain rather than combat the charges before a jury.

Attempted possession of child pornography carries a maximum five-year sentence. Assistant District Attorney Joseph Oubre handled the prosecution.

Taylor was well-known as a psychiatrist on the north shore. He served on St. Tammany Parish Hospital’s Ethics Board, counseled residents after Hurricane Katrina and ran a support group for survivors of suicide. Late in the month during which he was arrested, he was supposed to receive an “Angels Among Us” award from the Hospice Foundation of the South. But organizers canceled the event.

He also collaborated with the Louisiana chapter of the Survivors Network for those Abused by Priests, or SNAP.

Taylor attended the first meeting of the organization in Metairie in 2003. He also accompanied members of the organization to Baton Rouge when they urged the Legislature to require clergy to report abuse suspicions.

At the time, he told The Times-Picayune the right of clergy to keep confessions private did not outweigh the importance of discovering potential abuse cases. “The privilege is not as important as helping the next child,” he said. “The cycle has to be broken.”

Source: Ramon Antonio Vargas, “Retired Covington psychiatrist pleads guilty to attempted possession of child pornography,” The Times-Picayune, April 13, 2011.

Former state psychiatric hospital director gets 248 years prison for sex abuses; courtroom applauds as max sentence handed down

LONG BEACH, Calif. — A former state mental hospital director was sentenced Wednesday to 248 years in prison for molesting his adopted son over eight years as part of what prosecutors claimed was a pattern of abuse that spanned four decades and ensnared a dozen young boys.

Superior Court Judge James B. Pierce called defendant Claude Foulk, 63, a “sick, sick man” and said he should have been the No. 1 patient at the mental hospital he oversaw.

The judge drew applause from the courtroom after issuing the maximum possible sentence.

“Someone was selected out of an adoption book, totally selected at a very young age, and made a sex slave,” the judge lectured Foulk. “I don’t think the word father or dad belongs in the same sentence with Mr. Foulk. A father or dad couldn’t do these things.”

The victim is now 27 and living in Atlanta. The Associated Press is not naming the man because it has a policy not to identify alleged victims of sexual abuse.

Foulk, the former head of Napa State Hospital, was convicted of 20 counts of forcible oral copulation, nine counts of sodomy and two counts of lewd acts for abuse between 1992 and 2001. He was acquitted of two counts each of sodomy and oral copulation for charged acts that occurred after the victim was 18.

“It’s beyond the comprehension of most human beings,” the judge said. “It’s not unlike slavery of old, to go through the (foster) system and obtain a human being and attempt to mold that individual to satisfy one’s own sexual desires. Disgusting. This one has got to be the worst. It’s the worst of the worst.”

Foulk, who has repeatedly denied the allegations, testified at trial that his adopted son had a history of lying.

Superior Court Judge James B. Pierce called defendant Claude Foulk, 63, a “sick, sick man” and said he should have been the No. 1 patient at the mental hospital he oversaw.

Prosecutors said another 11 men came forward to claim Foulk molested them as children dating back to 1965, but only the son’s case could be prosecuted because of the statute of limitations.

Foulk was fired from his post at Napa State Hospital after his arrest last year.

During a weeklong trial, five adult men testified that Foulk had abused them for years. They claimed the man they knew as an uncle and foster father bought them pizza and took them to a mountain cabin before forcing them to engage in sex acts.

One of Foulk’s two adopted sons told jurors Foulk abused him from the time he was 9 until he was 21, telling him it was how a man shows love.

Foulk worked as a nurse, obtained a master’s degree in business administration and held previous state jobs before working at Napa State Hospital. He was a foster parent to two boys and adopted two sons.

Prosecutor Danette Gomez argued that Foulk used the foster care system to acquire boys to meet his insatiable sexual appetite, knowing they had no parents to turn to.

She said the years of horrific abuse led the boys to turn to alcohol and drugs and to have trouble forming lasting relationships.

Foulk’s attorney Richard Poland argued there was a lack of physical evidence.

The investigation into Foulk began when someone reported sexual abuse to police after learning Foulk was head of Napa State Hospital.

Source: “Former Hospital Director Sentenced to 248 Years for Sex Abuse,” Associated Press, February 23, 2011.

Arizona counselor William L. Riedel convicted of drugging and sexually molesting 11-year-old girl

A judge on sentenced a Mesa man to 20 years in prison for sexual exploitation of a minor and 15 years in prison for child molestation, attempted child molestation, attempted sexual exploitation of a minor and unlawful administration of drugs.

In addition to that prison time – the sentences will run back to back – William Lewis Riedel also got lifetime probation on two other charges.

Riedel, a former family counselor, was arrested in January 2008.

According to investigators, Riedel, who was 43 at the time, convinced his then girlfriend to give her 11-year-daughter sleeping pills – they told the child they were allergy pills – and then the couple took pictures as they molested her. This happened in 2006 and went on for three months.

It all came to light nearly two years later when the daughter of Riedel’s new fiance found the pictures on Riedel’s computer. She told her mother and the mother contacted the police.

Investigators confiscated the computer and found a variety of disturbing images or Riedel with the victim. They said the victim appeared to be drugged or unconscious in all of the pictures. Police said they also found other images depicting child pornography.

Riedel allegedly told investigators he “groomed” the victim’s mother, teaching her and encouraging her to take part in the molestation.

Riedel eventually pleaded guilty to the counts for which Maricopa County Superior Court Judge Paul McMurdie sentenced him.

Source: Catherine Holland, “Mesa man gets 35 years in child molestation case,” http://www.azfamily.com, February 11, 2011.

Prosecutors bring additional charges against therapist Thomas P. Jewell; already facing child porn charges

In December 2010, Contra Costa (California) County prosecutors amended the charges against marriage and family therapist Thomas P. Jewell.

Jewell had initially been arrested on child pornography charges last November, after police found a large amount of such material in his home.

Jewell had been employed for several years by the mental health division at Contra Costa County Health Services, assigned to Juvenile Hall.

Investigators found 13,000 images of child pornography on computers seized from Jewell’s home in November.

The complaint against Jewell was amended when one of the victims was identified in the images.

Jewell was additionally charged with 46 counts of child molestation, one count of posing a child for the purpose of pornography, one county of showing pornographic material to a child and one count of possession of child pornography.

His bail was increased from $1 million to $5.8 million in light of the molestation charges.

Source: Robert Salonga, “Contra Costa Juvenile Hall counselor arrested in child pornography case,” Contra Costa Times, 18 November 2010 and ”Youth counselor charged with porn, molestation,” Associated Press, December 6, 2010.

Kaiser-Permanente psychiatrist under police and board investigations for child porn

On November 24, 2010 the Medical Board of California issued an Accusation against psychiatrist Mark B. Zweifach for “general unprofessional conduct.”

Zweifach agreed to the voluntary suspension of his license on September 16, 2008.  According to the Board’s Accusation, “In or about July, August and September 2007, [Zweifach], a physicians with Kaiser Permanente in San Diego, California, used his Kaiser Permanente assigned computer in his office in the Kaiser Permanente Bostonia Medical Office building, located in El Cajon, California, to access suspected child pornography websites on the internet. When confronted by Kaiser Permanente investigators, [Zweifach] admitted accessing the websites at work, and further admitted an addiction to internet pornography.”

According to the Board’s Stipulation for Voluntary Suspension of License, investigations are currently pending against Zweifach by both the Board and the San Diego Police Department.

Source: Stipulation for Voluntary Suspension of License and Accusation in the Matter of the Investigation Against Mark Zweifach, M.D., Physician and Surgeon’s Certificate No. G48626, Case No. 10-07-188130, Medical Board of California.