posted on September 4, 2001 10:32:41 PM new
Local officials find a positive factor to this, although they're at a loss for a solution. They say that the arrest and conviction, with accompanying investigations has brought the issue into the light of day so that it can be talked about.
And I'd bet that the whole town IS talking about it.
UNION BRIDGE,
Md. -- The day two years
ago when Kimberly
Merson first went to
Francis Scott Key High
School in rural Maryland
to teach, she told herself,
"Don't work at a high
school. It will just be too
tempting."
Merson, who turns 25 in September, had considered herself
unattractive as a teen-ager at nearby Liberty High School. But the
braces, glasses and permed hair disappeared, and now she is tall and
slender with brown hair and hazel eyes. Teenage boys were drawn to
her.
And she to them -- never mind that she considered herself a Christian
and was married to a Key High teacher who was an assistant football
coach.
Merson recounted all this for police this spring after being charged with
-- and later pleading guilty to -- various crimes for engaging in numerous
acts of sex with nine Key High boys, some star athletes, some as young
as 15. Sometimes, several in one night.
As shocking as this was to Carroll County Public Schools, a
countryside community long on Christian churches, Merson was the first
of three district teachers arrested this spring on unrelated charges
stemming from sexual advances on students. The others involved a
21-year-old female student-teacher who allegedly drank alcohol with
teen-age boys at her house, and a 49-year-old male elementary school
teacher indicted on charges of molesting six young boys over two
decades.
posted on September 4, 2001 11:34:51 PM new
It was always the coaches fooling with cheerleaders at my school but it was the cheerleader who was a "nice girl" who was raped in her classroom by a student the first year she taught at a college.
T
posted on September 5, 2001 06:06:20 AM newKRS I don't mean to derail from the original story but here's a new twist on the perversion of using your position to exploit and abuse children... I took this one personally.
Three members of a search and rescue team in Houston were indicted on conspiracy to pay children to have sex on video tape and one is accused of sexual assault on a minor. All of this apparently as part of creating a child pornography web-site.
XXX (one of those arrested) contacted my husband last year and had him travel (at our expense) to Houston to train his members in the techniques of search and rescue. As a state instructor my husband trained and certified these monsters.
After which XXX went through great lengths to wreak havoc on the Houston area search and rescue teams in apparent attempts to discredit and spread rumors about the "competing" teams so that they would no longer be utilized by police departments. And, when he couldn't get my husband to join him in those efforts he went after him in an apparent effort to get him disallowed from teaching search and rescue. Those efforts failed only because of my husband's longstanding reputation and the fact that he documents the hell out of everything.
It looks to me like these guys wanted to destroy the professional search and rescue groups in their area and to learn what techniques would be used in searching for missing children so that they would know where and how to hide the bodies. Otherwise, why did they go through all the trouble of being trained? What was their motive? I can only hope that there really is a "special" place in hell for them.
editing out names.
Not paranoid anywhere else but here!
[ edited by mybiddness on Sep 5, 2001 07:59 AM ]
posted on September 5, 2001 06:34:51 AM new
mybiddness-I'm very familiar with this incident. I'm on a listserver for EMS in Texas, and this Thomas guy was on there, making some bizzare statments, the week he got busted. Nothing to do with the case at hand, but generally causing trouble with some members of local EMS systems. Your husband is not the only one this deviant has tried to discredit, but the whole community knew that something just wasn't right. The next day, we all hear about the bust. I'm so angry and humiliated about the whole thing. We work so hard to gain community trust, and to protect the public, and this one (or three) freaks come along a destroy it. It is also amazing how I can still run into people on completly different sites that this idiot has affected.
I can't print what I hope happens to him. I'm just glad you husband got done with this moron, unscathed.
posted on September 5, 2001 06:47:36 AM new
You're right Connie Small world we live in... Luckily for my husband he doesn't seem to know where the "delete this email" button is on his computer. He's got all kinds of really odd emails sent to him from XXX. In one XXX sent out an "anonymous" letter from a "law enforcement officer" citing problems with search team members in Houston. Someone was able to trace it and that's how they discovered it was him. Since it's unlikely they'll get enough time in jail for the porno offense we're hoping that he'll at least get a little more tacked on for impersonating a police officer.
edited to remove names.
Not paranoid anywhere else but here!
[ edited by mybiddness on Sep 5, 2001 07:58 AM ]
posted on September 5, 2001 07:00:36 AM new
If that situation is still under investigation and/or hasn't resulted in convictions yet you might want to take pause before posting the names and suspected activities of others.
Not to defend this person at all, but it sounds like at least your husband, mybiddness, would be easily identified from your post, and there's no telling who might read this and pass it along.
posted on September 5, 2001 07:12:01 AM new
Thanks KRS I'm sure you're right. Although I haven't said anything here that isn't already widely known by the dozens of people effected... but, since it's an ongoing investigation I guess the less said about specifics - the better.
The whole thing just makes me ill. We read more and more about people in positions of trust using their position against the very ones they're supposed to be helping. I thought this one just hit an all new low. But, maybe that's just because I take it personally.
posted on September 5, 2001 09:06:18 AM new
Mybid,
Haven't been here forever but saw your post and had to answer.
You are right!!!!! What these guys did is at an all time low and I'm glad your husband documents.
Back to the orphan kittens, one of which just learned to climb my chair for the first time and is sitting on my shoulder.
Jeesh, I've forgotten how to do the faces.
posted on September 5, 2001 10:37:58 AM new
Hi Calamity Great to see you again! Last we heard from you your son was about to get married? Hope all is well.
Yeah, people like this make me crazy... I've heard of teachers taking advantage of their positions - but this mess takes the cake.
He's got all kinds of really odd emails sent to him from XXX. In one XXX sent out an "anonymous" letter from a "law enforcement officer" citing problems with search team members in Houston. Someone was able to trace it and that's how they discovered it was him. Since it's unlikely they'll get enough time in jail for the porno offense we're hoping that he'll at least get a little more tacked on for impersonating a police officer.