From this morning's Wall Street Journal, I found the quote from Judge John Cleland to hit it exactly. Like Sandusky, RND took pleasure and satisfaction not only in the physical abuse but also in the manipulation of so many young hearts and souls, often under the noses of their parents.
"The tragedy of this crime is that it's a story of betrayal," Judge Cleland said before handing down the sentence in Centre County Court. "Those who have never encountered a pedophile can hardly begin to understand the anguish of those who have been so expertly deceived.…The crime is not only what you did to their bodies but what you did to their psyches and souls."
If you were abused by RND and the statute of limitations has not expired, please consider a criminal action against him. For me at least, he is not entitled to my forgiveness.
4 comments:
Davis was my teacher at the Harvey School in Katonah NY in the late 50s and early 60s. By the time I finished there at the end of eighth grade it was pretty clear to me that he was a predator. Weekend ski trips with him and other boys were great fun, but after I reported some mildly salacious behavior to my parents, I was never again allowed to go on trips with him. They knew. I was never abused by him, but my late brother told me that he was. I have always wondered if my brother's miserable life was not a result of that abuse.
What astonishes me is to learn from reading these posts that he continued to get teaching jobs in very good schools. I believe he left Harvey after some scandal, and yet he managed to move on to another position. In those days the teacher-pedophiles just went off to other schools, much as the priests were re-assigned to new parishes.
County Executive Rob Astorino wants to keep Westchester County schools safe. But he did nothing when he was given documentation that Victor Rosselli, of Lake Carmel, had voluntarily resigned from the Harvey school maintenance department (after working there for 19 years) when the Harvey school was given documentation that Victor Rosselli had sexually abused a close family member for years (Rosselli's wife will not turn him in). The Harvey school refused to inform the parents of children who had attended the school because no one ever came forward to say Rosselli did anything to them. C. Graziosi went to Astorino for help, but he did not respond.
Please contact me about this story. Cgraziosi1@yahoo.com
I added a comment to this post some years ago and have kept the link handy to see others' comments. When I last posted it was then likely that Neville Davis had passed.
I experienced abuse in the seventh grade at Harvey School in 1962. Now 62 years later the memory comes back to haunt me. What bothers me most is not my own experience but what may have happened to others. It was in the early 80s that I saw in a news letter from Salisbury School a photo of Davis showing him teaching a photography class. I contacted the Headmaster and followed up with a letter detailing the extent of my abuse. In a later phone conversation the Headmaster said he had confronted Davis who told him that he had gotten help for his "problem". The headmaster said he believed Davis and that he didn't expect any further incidences, as the young men at Salisbury were older and less vulnerable. Typically, that was the mindset in the 1980's.
More recently, after reading this blog, In 2020 I spoke with a headmaster from Harvey when as an alumnus I was sent a letter detailing their experience with a Mr. Wyland who had been employed there in the 1990's and they were taking steps to insure the safety of the students in the event of any new predators were on the scene. A better response.
It has been healing to read these comments and I hope they never stop.
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