Child Protection System

Child Protection System
Name:
Course:
Professor Name:
(February 17, 2012)
Child Protection System
Current law on Child Sexual Abuse
Sexual abuse in minors has been identified as maltreatment and harassment of a minor within the American federal law. Child harassment is illegal in all the American states. This also includes the federal law. Within the various states, the child abuse laws specifics vary. On the contrary, certain characteristics of these laws are similar among all the states.
The law on sexual exploitation and molestation in children is found in Code, Title 18, Part 1, and Chapter 10 of the American law. Part of (a) of this law states than any individual employing, using, persuading, enticing, or coercing any child to participate in sexual explicit conduct for the objective of getting any observable depiction of such conduct will be punished by law. The law also states that an individual having the custody of a minor who knowingly allows the minors to participate in sexual explicit characteristics shall also be punished by the law. Additionally, the law states that any person making, printing or publishing a notice aimed at get, produce or reproduce visual depictions shall be punished by the law (Spratt, 2001).
There are also the laws which deal with given practices which relate to material constituting sexual harassment among minors. These laws are found within Title 18, Part 1, and Chapter 10. It states that an individual transporting or shipping minors between and within boundaries by any means shall be prosecuted by the American law. This includes individuals who produce such like visual depiction constituting the utilization of a child to engage in sexually explicit behavior. It also includes such conduct like visual depiction. In addition, a person knowingly receiving or distributing visual depictions mailed or transported shall be punished by the law.
The fact that minors are not normally in a position to give consent within the law provides a big challenge. The word “minor” denotes an individual who has not yet attained the majority age. This is the age whereby a person is able to give consent in any legal issue. On the contrary, the real laws and the optimal ages which make up breach of laws vary from state to state. An individual who engages in sexual activity with a child below the ages of sixteen to eighteen no matter the seemingly consent of the child or compliance constitutes an offence. This is according to federal law. In the majority of the states, a lot severe sentences and cases are found within young kids of less than twelve years. Additionally, in the majority of the states plus their individual penal cords, some exceptions occur in a case whereby the sexual activity takes place between a young adult and a child whose age brackets are adjacent to each other. The above exception prevents prosecuting the young adult with a sexual offence. This normally occurs in cases where the young adult did not use force on child.
Penalties and punishment for sexual offences in minors vary depending on the given offence in which the accused has been convicted. The penalties may include fines, imprisonment, recordings as a sexual perpetrator, and various restrictions including paroles and probations. Civil penalties are damage liabilities, injunctions, loss of custody rights, and involuntary commitment. During the recent times, the majority of state legislations have added terms of prison and other punishments for sexual abusers of children. The trend on strict sentences normally targets those offenders who have repeated committing the same offence.
It also targets the offenders who molest many children and those who were to be trusted by the children like parents, pastor, teacher or guardians. A good example is Colorado where lawmakers made a proposition for new legislation which would allow the death penalty for repeat offenders. On the contrary, the bill was refuted by the senate of the state.
Literature Review
Child sexual abuse and exploitation normally takes place an older child, adult or an adolescent takes an advantage of a child or youth for sexual reasons. This includes participation in prostitution, performances of pornography and its production. Sexual molestation and abuse occurs on children of all the age groups starting from infancy towards adolescence. Sexual activity constitutes all sexual contact including sexual fondling to sexual intercourse. With little exceptions in the ages of the children, majority of sexual activity with a minor under the age of fourteen denotes a serious criminal offence. This is normally the case despite whether the child gave consent or not. Youth within the age bracket of fourteen to seventeen years cannot also legally agree towards sexual activity with an individual within a position of authority and trust. This is the same person the youth is in a relationship of dependency. In cases like these ones, activities of sex with fourteen to seventeen year old children are considered a criminal offence under the American law. This is normally the scenario no matter if the minor gave consent or not. There exist various overlapping perspectives which concern sexual exploitation and abuse in both children and youth. A kid or youth might be sexually harassed and abused by single or more family members. They can also be harassed by those outside the family plus others known to the kid or by a queer person.
The perpetrator may carry out the act singly or within an organized network or group. The culprit may be either being the opposite sex or the same sex with the child. On the contrary, current research indicates that most of these culprits are male. However, regardless of the nature of the sexual ordeal, the perpetrator or whether the child gave consent or not, sexual exploitation and abuse in children and youth remains a massive betrayal of power abuse and trust. Generally, sexual abuse in children constitutes various types of sexual activity. This includes sexual dialogue, touching of the genitals, anal, vaginal, voyeurism and compelling kids to participate in prostitution and pornography. The culprits of sexual abuse in children emanate from various age groups, races, gender and socio-economic foundations. Women also abuse children sexually but the cases are not as frequent as compared to their male counterparts. The perpetrators among the youth constitute the majority of the offenders. The most common characteristic is that the victim in most cases trusts and knows their abusers.
These perpetrators seduce children by rendering gifts and attention. They manipulate and threaten the children by using a lot of force. Additionally, they employ a mixture of different tactics. Research indicates that molesters of children are in most cases very aggressive. In some cases, the victims were held down, shaken aggressively or struck down on the ground. (Becker, 1994). On the other hand, research also indicates that there are no variations in sexual abuse prevalence in children among various social races or classes. Nevertheless, unavailability of parents and their inadequacy constitute some of the features which make the risk of children being sexually abused distinct.
Others include conflict and bad parent-child relationship (Finkelhor, 1994). Basing on the Third National Incidence Study, girls are normally abused sexually three times compared to the boys. On the other hand, the probability of boys dying or getting seriously injured as a result of abuse is higher than in girls (Sedlak & Broadhurst, 1996).
Symptoms of Child Sexual Abuse
The majority of sexually exploited and abused children show physical, emotional and behavioral symptoms. Examples of physical symptoms are pain discomforts around the genital area. Others are penile or vaginal discharge and urination difficulties. Victims of known perpetrators may get less physical trauma because the injuries may bring about a lot of suspicion (Hammerschlag, 1996). Changes in behavior often follow physical symptoms as the initial sighs of sexual molestation in children. Symptoms of behavior include aggressive or nervous behavior towards adults and provocactiveness in sex prior to the right age. Other behavioral sighs are alcohol and drug use. The likelihood of ...