Dragging them out into the light

I just read an online article by Gustavo Arellano that I wanted to share. We talk about how child molesters and pedophiles are monsters that hide and how we drag them kicking and screaming into the light. Well, Jeff Andrade recently got his comeuppance.

Jeff’s an admitted child molester. He was an assistant coach for a boy’s basketball team at Mater Dei High School. He lost that job in 1996 after a 15 year old girl came forward exposing him as a child molester. Jeff had sex with her in the coach’s office at the school.

He denied those allegations, but has since confessed in a sworn deposition. Amazingly, Jeff was able to work next as a substitute teacher in the Huntington Beach High School District and as a Westminster High boys’ basketball coach.

Now Jeff works for a high school fund raising firm called Varsity Gold. He’s a regional sales manager.

“He hosted an all-day seminar on June 20 at the Hyatt’s Crystal Cove meeting room, for sales representatives in what a Varsity Gold document described as the “Andrade Region” (believed to be the western United States). He rallied his reps in pitching Varsity Gold’s fund-raising opportunities for high schoolers.

But when the group broke for lunch, it found a surprise outside the Crystal Cove room: a yellow flier describing Andrade’s child-molesting past. The fliers were printed and distributed by five members of Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests. SNAP was there to ask Varsity Gold President Lyle Black why the company still employed Andrade.”

Although it is unclear as to whether or not Varsity Gold was aware of Jeff’s background as an accused child molester, Varsity Gold’s vice president of operations, Cherise Parsons, vehemently defended him and claimed he was a changed man.

SNAP volunteers were threatened and forced to leave the hotel, but they accomplished their goal. They drug Jeff the child molester, kicking and screaming out into the light for all to see. No longer able to hide in the shadows, Jeff’s co-workers know about his history of child molestation.

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Some may think this is too harsh. How could I condone ruining a man’s career? What a horrible thing to do or say!

I say how the did a high school assistant coach go from an accused child molester, to working at two high schools? How did he then get a job working for a fund raising company that works exclusively with high schools? Where’s the accountability? Mater Dei High School went so far as to defend Jeff even after they fired him! Talk about sending mixed signals.

Yes, he’s innocent until proven guilty. Or should I say until he confesses. But in the mean time, keep him out of teaching positions. Keep him out of positions of authority over children.

I wrote a few months back about flagging teachers who sexually abuse kids. There should be some kind of flag in teacher’s records if they are accused of abuse. If proven innocent, the flags would be removed.