The Lesson from Penn State: Beyond Mandatory Reporting
Seattle Times, Dec. 10, 2011.
As the nation recoils from allegations that unambiguous acts of child molestation at Penn State University never were reported to law enforcement, the indignant policy-making response in states across the country has focused mostly on strengthening mandatory child abuse reporting. In this op-ed column, Mr. Patterson and Mr. Hutton argue that these proposals may be fine as far as they go, but they are limited by their focus on responding to abuse that already has been committed. An earlier institutional focus on maintaining the professional boundaries between children and supervising adults, they argue, would be more effective in preventing abuse in the first place.
Patterson Buchanan has defended hundreds of high-profile sex abuse cases nationwide and assisted the Washington State School Directors' Association as it led the way for Washington's school districts to apply the hard lessons learned from such cases and adopt preventive "boundary invasions" policies and practices.