I witnessed Child Molestation, What shall I do?

[Kitsune]

Last week I saw some officer guy in a uniform in a school molesting a kid.

He has quite a big guy, around 30/40 years old, he was sitting on a chair at the school entrance, and was play-fighting with a kid lying across his lap. His left hand was groping the kids crouch while he was playing with the child. The child attempted to remove his hand from his crouch but the man grabbed him somewhere else, so the kid had to let go and let his hand massaging his crouch.

What shall I do?

[Mrjlh]

Sounds simple to me. But you better have proof. Video or second witness.

[jacksam]

Do nothing. Too hard to tell if this was assault or play fighting. You didn't mention if the bloke was Thai. Anyway why ask this? If you felt it was out of line when you witnessed it what did you do......run to the nearest WiFi hot spot and ask thaivisa.

[Kitsune]

Sounds simple to me. But you better have proof. Video or second witness.

No just me.

[Kitsune]

Do nothing. Too hard to tell if this was assault or play fighting. You didn't mention if the bloke was Thai. Anyway why ask this? If you felt it was out of line when you witnessed it what did you do......run to the nearest WiFi hot spot and ask thaivisa.

Yeah it looked out of lines

[jacksam]

Its to late now. Seems you didn't approach the bloke in uniform at the time. I've seen Thai and Vietnamese adults play fighting like this often . also I along with most boys did this when were school kids. Point is I don't get your need for advice here. The horse has bolted. You were the one there to witness it and did nothing. That's the end of it. If your feeling you should of done something don't fret you will maybe do it different next time. You didn't even try to clarify it at the time??. Busy street to cross maybe

[Seastallion]

Last week? You have pondered this for some time, indicating that the scene disturbed you. Probably too late now, but perhaps next time you will be proactive.

[ubonjoe]

Moved to family and children forum. It seems to be the appropriate place for this topic.

[namdocmai]

Crouchgrabbing is the national sport, look in any shop with much (young) personell, they do this all day.

[crazykopite]

Nothing you can do it is in the past you should have taken action there and then

[lostinsurin]

You should report what you have seen,and whoever it was that saw the incident should do so as well.

The school board,the director of the school and police should be made aware of what happened (all if necessary).

You say a man in uniform? was he a teacher or the gate guard? are you a teacher?

[lostinsurin]

If he was a gate guard he will still work there, some school gate guards are local alcoholics (paid small money)

But I am amazed you have done nothing.

[johnlandy]

Sounds simple to me. But you better have proof. Video or second witness.

Sounds like a bit of a no brainer to me. REPORT IT, to school authorities, the police and / or post all the details on TV

[realenglish1]

I would at least tell the School authorities

[mogy]

If he was school security you could go back and watch for similar behavior - armed with a camera or another witness

[jobsworth]

of course you were disturbed by the incident. i would be too. so would we all. this is the area that the many so called child protection ngo,s are supposed to be working in. but thai on thai - there is no money in that. now if you had been doing like that the ngo's would be very interested. i would just let it go. you might well be accused yourself.

[sirchai]

That already happened last week, all you know is that they guy wore a uniform. Was it a gate guard playing with his own kid?

You should have dome something when you saw that. Approaching him and asking him in any language what he was doing, then you'd have seen his reaction.

We had a gate guard at our school who always molested our girls. Took me a long time that they're actually listening to me. He's gone, no cops were involved.

An Indian guy who worked at our school being an English teacher even topped that.He was caught in a toilette with a grade five girl..

A Thai teacher reported that to the director, but he thought it was just gossip. Then almost 10 months later, he got caught on the toilet again, with the same girl.

I tried all to involve cops that this guy would get deported, but none of our superiors was interested to inform the cops, nor the girl's parents.

Same Indian guy then opened an orphanage in the same city. The girl he'd molested was a "facebook friend" of our son, so I could get details that gave me a huge headache.

I couldn't go to the cops, as nobody would have backed me up.Neither the school, nor the girl.

[ebcal]

Some say that it is a game or national pastime, but then I would say that those cases refer to a situation among equals, so boys doing it to other boys their own age, or adults with other adults, and in a manner of horsing around. But, this case mentioned by the OP was an adult doing this to a small boy, which makes this significantly different, and it was done in a way that triggered the OP to deem it as inappropriate, so could have been more than just horsing around and could have had some sexual overtones that would make it seem as to not be just horsing around.

So, I think it is irresponsible to brush it off so quickly as just a game, or that you have seen Thai kids do this among themselves, so this was the same. (especially if you are not the one that saw it happening, which can give one a better indication if it was playing around or molesting) And I think it is premature to say do nothing or that it is too late.

You can bet if this was in another country, the responses would probably be different. Or if this happened to the kids of one of the people on here who gave advice, you can be sure their answers would be different.

To those that say he should have done something immediately, or dont think he should ask what to do on TV, then what do you think is so clearly the right course of action that he should have done. Confront the guy? Probably not a good idea and would not resolve anything and could lead to violence. Yes, a video would have been nice, but when something is unfolding before our eyes, we dont always think immediately to take a video of it before it finishes, often we need to process what happened before we can think what we should have done. It is easy to say in hindsight from a posting what he should have done, but much harder to do in reality when you are hit with something in real time.

And yes, do nothing, turn our cheeks and stick our heads in the sand is also a possible course of action. A safe action (or non-action, as the case may be) no doubt, but not one that some people can live with, or something that goes against some people's moral fiber. I do agree that he should be careful and think this through carefully, as jumping to conclusions too fast, either way (they were just playing, or it was molesting) can have negative ramifications. A few points I would make:

1. I dont think it is so easy to know what to do, and certainly not easy to have known what to do in the spur of the moment.

2. I dont see the issue people might have with the OP asking for suggestions on TV. There may be some good suggestions on how to handle this that may be offered.

3. I dont think it is too late to try and still do something about it, if the OP wants to.

Some initial ideas off the top of my head are below, but would need more thinking through, as this is just thinking out loud. And I am sure some other posters may have better ones, or can offer some pros and cons of these ideas:

1. Go back again and observe if this happens again, and be prepared to discreetly record it on video. This is only if you feel strongly enough and are in a position to be able to go back and observe, and of course, assuming this is something you want to do. And once you have it on video, you can let others view this and deem it as inappropriate or not.

2. Report what you saw (without making a judgement whether it was appropriate or not) to school officials, and maybe not even identify the specific individual, just to ask them to keep an eye out, or to give some instruction to the kids on being cautious, or teach them what is not appropriate and what should be reported. Or ask a school official to talk with the child about it in a very careful way. Although I realize the school officials there may not be sensitive or have enough knowledge or experience/training in these matters to handle it.

Just my 2 cents.

[pineconehead]

yes I'll echo thetry to catch him at it again, this time with a camera, BUT be bloody careful. For a foreigner I'd suggest trying to find out if they are on public record or a sex offenders list in their home countries. Some countries will inform the appropriate people in Thailand, others will try to extridite.

My last trip I saw some guy "borrow" a beggar boy on Sukumvit. By the child's posture trailing the Farang it was pretty obvious what was going on. Imanaged to keep track of this using my video camera and the overhead walkways. I took it to the BiB at the cop station at sukumvit and Ratchadapiesek. The did,t look to interested, but at least they took the memory card. Have say it fairly soured my whole trip.

[car720]

Crouchgrabbing is the national sport, look in any shop with much (young) personell, they do this all day.

I am a teacher and this is just a guess mind you, but, at my school, all day long I see the boys and girls grabbing boys crutches. It appears to be a form of recognition of the male. A weird form of right of passage.

I would like to say remember that we are not in your own culture, and while elsewhere we are constantly and rightfully reminded to care for the defenseless and innocent young, that this is not our culture but theirs. This culture is naively focused around the male persona or lack thereof. I find it extremely confusing and more often than not, paradoxical. I continue to observe in the hope of understanding.

[salapau]

Why didn't you react staight away and approach the guy. Surely there must have been other people about. What were you doing there ? He who does nothing in these situations will always have regrets. No guts !

[Minnehaha]

you could play grab-ass with the uniformed guy and see how it works out

[lostmebike]

If he was a gate guard he will still work there, some school gate guards are local alcoholics (paid small money)

But I am amazed you have done nothing.

Agreed, you should have done something and it seems like because you didn't, you now feel guilty.

A week later, you're asking what to do on a forum???

[tetleythedog]

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That already happened last week, all you know is that they guy wore a uniform. Was it a gate guard playing with his own kid?

You should have dome something when you saw that. Approaching him and asking him in any language what he was doing, then you'd have seen his reaction.

We had a gate guard at our school who always molested our girls. Took me a long time that they're actually listening to me. He's gone, no cops were involved.

An Indian guy who worked at our school being an English teacher even topped that.He was caught in a toilette with a grade five girl..

A Thai teacher reported that to the director, but he thought it was just gossip. Then almost 10 months later, he got caught on the toilet again, with the same girl.

I tried all to involve cops that this guy would get deported, but none of our superiors was interested to inform the cops, nor the girl's parents.

Same Indian guy then opened an orphanage in the same city. The girl he'd molested was a "facebook friend" of our son, so I could get details that gave me a huge headache.

I couldn't go to the cops, as nobody would have backed me up.Neither the school, nor the girl.

So how did the Indian get a permit for that? When authorities do nothing, a baseball bat usually does the trick !

[Runamile]

Obviously, you should have flagged it up with the school authorities, whilst openly admitting that you could prove nothing. Then it would have been their call. Probably nothing would have happened. Equally, you might have been surprised. With security of tenure being so limited in Thailand, the guy might have been given his marching orders, to be on the safe side.

Whoever posted about Thai on Thai was just so right. It wouldn't surprise me if a lot of Isaan girls were pleased to come to Bangkok and at least get paid, as opposed to the abuse from fathers, brothers and brothers friends, that's reported to be rife. Of course those ideas may just be urban legend. Equally, they may not.

[Donnie Brasco]

Witnessed this brand of abuse of a 4-year-old boy twenty years ago in Ko Pangan in Tong Nai Pan.

It was nap time. An extremely sinister "gramps" Thai male type signalled a Mommy figure that it was *indeed* nap time.

The young boy began to whimper and whine as he was led to a small cabana structure near where I was seated. He went limp as "Gramps" followed him into the structure.

After a silence of a minute or so the boy began to whine and cry.

This continued for fifteen minutes or so until he left to rejoin Mom"

Mom have us one of those lovely grins we grow to detest here.

This was a fishing village back then.

There was no one to report to.

My companion, a middle class girl declared that there was NOTHING to be done.

Sent from my iPhone using Thaivisa Connect Thailand mobile app

[ChiangraiTony]

Spend some money and hire a private investigator to video and document any unusual activity such as what you observed. If you can bring this evidence forward to the school officials then you can get this potential low-life away from children at school. It you do it yourself as a foreigner you could find yourself in an awkward position. Getting the priviate investigator involved will allow you to keep your distance.

[belg]

did not have your iphone or whatever with you ? best is to film and put on ...

[TheReporter]

Sick man of Asia!!

[Mario2008]

The uniform is probably a guard uniform from the school.

Best you can do is to contact the pavena foundation and tell them of your concerns.

https://www.facebook.com/pages/Pavena-Foundation-for-Children-and-Women/180015578707050