SEX, VIOLENCE AND APATHY

From Jurnalul National Thursday April 27, 2006

SEX, VIOLENCE AND APATHY
By: Toma Roman, Jr.

Horrible Orphanages--Historical Events from Arges County are Repeated at the Children's Home in Ludus

The whole history of this shocking report began with a message received on an internet forum following our investigation concerning abuses to which children are subjected in institutions in Arges County. One man, Bruce Thomas, asked us to contact him. Bruce Thomas revealed the inhuman treatment to which children were subjected in Ludus. The authorities don't seem concerned about the gravity of the situation.

We had taken off for Tirgu Mures without knowing very well what we would find. We found evidence of a nightmare which for us, a group of journalists who are hard to impress, made us go green in the face with indignation.

American, Bruce Thomas, is the coordinator of Fundatia Loc--A Place to Belong--a religious association from the U.S.A. which at the moment has 48 children under its legal guardianship. In the early 90's, Bruce came from Dallas and began to work with the institutionalized children from Mures County. He is a practicing Baptist. We saw that at the headquarters of the foundation the children receive a religious education and they pray before every meal and the walls have various posters with Bible verses. Even though we are not in agreement with the religious indoctrination of children, we had to admit that the conditions were excellent at the foundation. We asked Bruce why he wanted to work with us in this campaign against a defective system of child protection and his response was that he wants to fight for the easing of the procedures for international adoptions by people in the U.S. for all these Romanian children.

M.G.A. is 10 years old. He is a dark skinned little boy. Until a few months ago, he lived in the orphanage number 5 in Ludus. At the moment in which he was taken into the legal care of the Foundation, the psychologist hired by Bruce realized that this little one was severely marred by something. M.G.A. drew pictures for the psychologist of how he was raped in the bathroom and beaten in the dormitory. With a sad look, the psychologist said that Zsolti "made fun of him".

M.G.A. said, "They abused me 14 times." He (Zsolti) grabbed him in the shower or locked himself in a room with M.G.A. and forced him to masturbate or to have oral sex. If he didn't want to, he was beaten with a stick, trampled, and pummeled. He was also abused by a 21 year old, Bogdan, who was a kind of informal leader in this orphanage.

"Bogdan was a big, bad boss. He pulled my hair, he beat my head against the wall until my nose bled. And he made me do bad things with his penis." And as if what we heard to this point wasn't sufficient, the boy told us that the previous fall, "In the bathroom 5 bigger boys forced me to take their penises in my mouth." Also, M.G.A. related that a bigger boy beat him with a broom handle when he refused to submit to all their freakish whims, and when he refused to let himself be used as a slave for all sorts of housekeeping chores.

M.S. also is 10 years old. He speaks with a calm voice despite what has happened to him. He said that Bogdan, as well as a group of boys between 14 and 19 years of age had abused him. "They would force me to do bad things. They made me smoke their cigarettes. They beat me so that I would give them my candy and do other things." We wanted to find out just what were these other bad things. The child responded quietly, "they made me give them massages, lick their butts, and have oral sex. If I didn't want to, they beat me to a pulp. I would bury my head in a pillow so that my screams would not be heard."

The story of M.S. does not end here. The child further told us that this group of older boys who seemed to make the law, made him simulate sex acts with a 10 year old girl from the orphanage.

How was this possible? Both children told us that the adults in charge of this orphanage beat them with sticks, even on the soles of their feet. At night, so as not to have problems, they (the adults in charge) would chain the door of the hall shut and go to sleep in their part of the building. Practically speaking, behind that locked door, anything could happen. If, for example, there would be a fire, the children would have had no way to escape. The two abused boys told the adults in charge what was happening, but these people preferred the ostrich's policy.

Cristina-Antigona Dancu, former director, said, "What you are telling me is something new to me now. Only one case of sexual abuse was discussed with me. I don't want to say the name of the child, but there were three minors abused by one older teenager."

We managed to penetrate the interior of the orphanage in Ludus as volunteers from Bruce's humanitarian foundation. Everything looked like a pigsty. The building itself is nothing but a ruin. The walls are cracked and the windows are missing, though there are bars on the windows. Inside the building there was the stench of spoiled food. All the toilets were nothing but piles of ceramic chips. The former director, Cristina-Antigona Dancu, became indignant when we challenged her about the condition of the building.

We asked ourselves how this all was possible. Until two months ago, Cristina Dancu, the wife of the mayor of Ludus, was the director of this orphanage. This mayor, Social Democrat Ovidiu Dancu, killed a man under obscure conditions during a hunting expedition in January of this year. He has many local connections. He hopes to finish his term, even though he may have a suspended sentence for man-slaughter. Bruce Thomas tried to bring these things to the attention of the police, as well as the County Council and the Child Protection Services from Mures County, but he hit a wall erected by the local authorities around Mrs. Dancu. Being a bit skeptical, the Texan asks whether these abuses, beatings and horrors mentioned above are still taking place even now.