Edward Rodgers was in charge of investigating cases of Child Abuse at the
FBI
THE DENVER POST - Voice of the Rocky Mountain Empire
May 17, 1990
Sisters
win sex lawsuit vs. dad $2.3 million given for years of abuse
By Howard
Prankratz
Denver Post Legal Affairs Writer
Two daughters of former
state and federal law enforcement official Edward Rodgers were awarded
$2.319,400 yesterday, after a Denver judge and jury found that the women
suffered years of abuse at the hands of their father.
The award to
Sharon Simone, 45, and Susan Hammond, 44, followed testimony of Rodgers’ four
daughters in person or through depositions, describing repeated physical abuse
and sexual assaults by their father from 1944 through 1965.
Rodgers, 72,
who became a child abuse expert after retiring from the FBI and joining the
colorado Springs DA’s office, failed to appear for the trial. But in a
deposition taken in March, Rodgers denied ever hitting or sexually abusing his
children.
He admitted that he thought of himself as a "domineering
s.o.b. who demanded strict responses from my children, strict obedience." But it
never approached child abuse, Rodgers said. "Did I make mistakes? Damn right I
did, just like any other father or mother..."
Thomas Gresham, Rodger’s
former attorney, withdrew from the case recently after being unable to locate
his client. Rodgers recently contacted one of his sons from a Texas town along
the Mexican border. Gresham said his last contact with Rodgers was on April 24.
The sisters reacted quietly to the verdict, and with relief that their
stories of abuse had finally been told.
"I feel really good that I’ve
gone public with this,"Hammond said. "I am a victim, the shame isn’t mine, the
horror happened to me. I’m not bad.
"My father did shameful and horrible
things to me and my brothers and sisters. I don’t believe he is a shameful and
horrible man, but he has to be held accountable," Hammond added.
The
lawsuit deeply divided the Rodgers family, with Rodgers’ three sons questioning
their sister’s motives.
Immediately after the verdict, son Steve
Rodgers, 37, reacted angrily, yelling at his sisters in the courtroom.
Later, Rodgers said he loves his father and stands by him. He said his
sisters had told him their father had to be exposed the way Nazi war criminals
have been exposed.
"In a way I’m angry with my father for not being
here. But I’m sympathetic because he would have walked into a gross
crucifixion," Rodgers said.
Steve Rodgers never denied that he and his
siblings were physically abused, but disputed that his father molested his
sisters.
Before the jury’s award, Denver District Judge William Meyer found
that Rodger’s conduct toward Simone and Hammond was negligent and "outrageous."
Despite the length of time since the abuse, the jury determined the
sisters could legally bring the suit. The statute of limitations for a civil
suit is two years, but jurors determined that the sisters became aware of he
nature and extent of their injury only within the last two years, during
therapy.
The jury then determined the damages, finding $1,240,000 for
Simone and 1,079,000 for Hammond.
The sisters had alleged in their suit
filed last July that Rodgers subjected his seven children to a "pattern of
emotional, physical, sexual and incestual abuse."
As a result of the
abuse, the women claimed their emotional lives had been left in a shambles,
requiring extensive therapy for both and repeated hospitalizations of Hammond,
who was acutely suicidal. Simone developed obsessive behavior and became so
unable to function she resigned a position with a Boston-based college.
Despite the judgment yesterday, Rodgers cannot be criminally charged.
the statue of limitations in Colorado for sexual assault on children is 10
years.
Rodgers, who worked for the FBI for 27 years, much of it in Denver,
became chief investigator for the district attorney’s office in Colorado
Sp;rings. during his employment at the DA’s office from 1967 until 1983, he
became a well-known figure in Colorado Springs, and lectured and wrote about
child abuse both locally and nationwide.
He wrote a manual called " A
Compendium -- Child Abuse by the National College of District Attorney’s," and
helped put together manuals on child abuse for the New York state police and a
national child abuse center.
Ex-FBI Agent Pleads Guilty to
Child Abuse
Tuesday February 17, 2004 11:46 PM
By JOHN
SOLOMON
Associated Press Writer
WASHINGTON (AP) - The former
chief internal watchdog at the FBI has pleaded guilty to sexually assaulting a
6-year-old girl and has admitted he had a history of molesting other children
before he joined the bureau for what became a two-decade career.
John H.
Conditt Jr., 53, who retired in 2001, was sentenced last week to 12 years in
prison in Tarrant County court in Fort Worth, Texas, after he admitted he
molested the daughter of two FBI agents after he retired. He acknowledged
molesting at least two other girls before he began his law enforcement career,
his lawyer said.
Conditt sought treatment for sex offenders after his
arrest last year, said his attorney, Toby Goldsmith.
``The problem these
people have is they don't really feel like it is their fault,'' Goldsmith said.
``The treatment doesn't work unless you admit you are the one who instigated it,
and he did that.''
Conditt headed the internal affairs unit that
investigates agent wrongdoing for the Office of Professional Responsibility at
FBI headquarters in Washington from 1999 until his retirement in June 2001, the
FBI said. He wrote articles in law enforcement journals on how police agencies
could effectively investigate their own conduct.
FBI officials said
Tuesday they had no information to suggest that Conditt had any problems during
his career and he was never the subject of an investigation.
Tarrant
County Assistant District Attorney Mitch Poe, who prosecuted the case, said he
wanted a longer prison sentence and was skeptical of Conditt's claim that his
molestation of children subsided during his FBI career.
``Both myself
and the judge in open court, we were kind of skeptical but we don't have any
evidence,'' Poe said.
A recently retired FBI whistleblower who brought
allegations to Conditt's office that agents had not aggressively pursued
evidence of sexual abuse in Indian country said Tuesday she now questions
whether his personal history affected that decision.
``Before, it never
made any sense,'' retired agent Jane Turner said of the FBI's decision to
decline to further investigate her allegations. ``Now I can understand. Why in
the world wouldn't you want to investigate that?''
Goldsmith said he was
concerned about the safety of his client in prison given that he is a former FBI
agent and an admitted child molester. ``He's not going to be comfortable in the
penitentiary,'' the lawyer said.
Goldsmith said his client had admitted
that he had molested at least two other girls before he became an FBI agent more
than 30 years ago, but that there was no evidence of any wrongdoing while he
served in the bureau.
``It seems that he never did because he had
stricter control at that time,'' the lawyer said.
Conditt could have
faced life in prison, and prosecutors requested he get 50 years. The judge
sentenced him to 12 years in prison, in part citing Conditt's decision to spare
the victim the trauma of a trial, Goldsmith said.
Conditt's conviction
is the latest controversy to strike the FBI's Office of Professional
Responsibility.
Last year, FBI Director Robert Mueller transferred the
head of the office to another supervisory assignment outside Washington, three
months after rebuking him for his conduct toward a whistleblower.
That
whistleblower, John Roberts, alleged the FBI disciplinary office had a double
standard that let supervisors off easier than rank-and-file agents.
Those allegations prompted investigations by Congress and the Justice
Department inspector general. The inspector general concluded that there was no
systematic favoritism of senior managers over rank-and-file employees but that
there was a double standard in some cases involving crude sexual jokes and
remarks.
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