I agree with George AllenGÇÖs statement. Who doesnGÇÖt? On Monday night, when asked if Dennis Hastert should step down, George Allen also said this.
I agree with George AllenGÇÖs statement. Who doesnGÇÖt? On Monday night, when asked if Dennis Hastert should step down, George Allen also said this.
Let me first answer this as a father. I find this behavior deplorable and despicable.
I donGÇÖt know anyone who disagrees with that point of view either. Yet George Allen passed up his real opportunity to show leadership in speaking out against sexual predators back in 1993. Instead he indeed put politics first.
He chose silence. No comment. The payoff in that situation was that his reticence helped fan the flames of a media frenzy attacking his opponent at the time, Mary Sue Terry.
Among other things, Terry's office was in the business of prosecuting sexual predators, ironically enough. In 1993 George AllenGÇÖs silence on sexual predation helped him get elected to office as the voting public waited for another shoe to drop.
The wildly inflammatory, never-substantiated allegations received wide news coverage, and when Terry appeared at a Roanoke television studio for the debate that night, she was swamped by the media.
When a campaign aide urged a reporter to ask about Allen's tax filings, the reporter shot back, "That's personal," Terry recalled. [8]
Those who speculate as to why questions have not come up in the past about AllenGÇÖs financial activity, take a clue. Not only did the completely unsubstantiated outbursts of a sexual predator focus negative press on AllenGÇÖs opponent, those allegations had the added benefit of providing cover against legitimate concerns regarding his own questionable behavior.
And the only single female in politics under the age of 80 who isn't perpetually attacked on her private life is Condoleeza Rice (R).
The Blame Game
Silence is a predatorGÇÖs best friend. Predators count on the silence of their victims, in some cases going so far as to threaten the lives of parents, bunny rabbits and the victims themselves. And if the victims do speak out, their credibility is attacked.
"Most of these people, you can get them to say anything. Some are psychopaths, some are troubled, some want to please whoever they're talking to," [Gray] said. [1]
Whether the result of intimidation or denial, predators also count on the silence of friends and family members in many cases.
And they count on the silence of community members too embarassed or ashamed to speak up. The particulars of their behavior are outrageous and all but unbelievable. Some of them are so over the top that the lies and finger pointing almost make sense.
Before the campaign turned to speculation, throughout the previous year the protracted saga of sexual predator, William Gray, ran in newspapers across the Virginia. IGÇÖve seen some articles on the net referring to William Gray as an GÇ£obscure psychiatrist.GÇ¥ At the time in Virginia, there was nothing obscure about Gray or the tawdry incidents.
HereGÇÖs the partial litany of well-publicized facts about William Gray from that time period.
GÇó William Gray was charged in 1978 with child molestation in California and agreed to stop practicing in that state for three years. So he moved his practice to Virginia. [4]
GÇó In 1992, William Gray was charged in Roanoke County with molesting a 16-year-old boy. This charge was dismissed but resulted in the board's suspension of his license. Gray's license was suspended when the state Board of Medicine decided in emergency session that his continued practice would pose a "substantial danger to the community." [1]
GÇó In January 1993, Gray was charged in Franklin County with forcible sodomy and sex abuse. Franklin County prosecutors agreed to drop the charges in exchange for Gray's agreement to surrender forever his license to practice psychiatry or medicine in Virginia. [7]
GÇó About a week later, in January 1993, Gray was arrested on charges of interfering with Roanoke police. He himself called police to report that someone was breaking into his office, but when police arrived he had locked himself in the kitchen. Later two other people were attempting to leave in GrayGÇÖs Cadillac. When the police decided to conduct a sobriety test, Gray emerged from hiding and ordered the police off of his property. He ended up in jail for a few hours. [3]
GÇó In March 1993 the state Board of Medicine conducted a hearing in considering permanent revocation of Gray's license. The concern was that the suspension that Gray had agreed to instead of a revocation would allow him to practice in other states. The hearing examiner ruled that Gray sexually exploited five young patients, sometimes plying them with free food, housing and cars. A decision was expected in June.[4]
GÇó In September 1993 a lawsuit was filed in Roanoke Circuit Court by one of his former patients claiming that he was sexually abused for more than a decade by Gray, "who totally misused his position as a psychiatrist in order to obtain personal sexual gratification." In the lawsuit Gray was accused of forcing sex on the young man by playing on his fears that he would send him to a mental hospital - allegations similar to those heard by the state Board of Medicine.[5]
GÇó In October 1993, Gray said that he himself was under psychiatric care, as he claimed there was a conspiracy against him headed by Mary Sue Terry. Even his own attorney was shocked. [6] [7]
At least 76 children and adolescents in public and private agencies were under Gray's care. First he blamed them because they were GÇô well - crazy.
Then he claimed it was a conspiracy on the part of the patients.
Dr. Gray's lawyer, John Grad of Alexandria, said yesterday the charges were concocted by the group of mentally sick young men bent on revenge and blackmail.
"I had a feeling it was a conspiracy," Dr. Gray said, recalling that one of them told him " `I'm going to tell everyone you are a faggot if you don't give me $35,000.' "
Still, Dr. Gray has continued to communicate with and befriend his accusers. Several have returned to live in the apartments in his office building.
"I don't hold grudges against these people," Dr. Gray said. "They are messed up and got manipulated by some people. They need help." [4]
And finally, on his day of reckoning, October 7, 1993, Gray claimed again that it was all a plot, but this time it was the state and the conspiracy was concocted by none other than Mary Sue Terry, George AllenGÇÖs opponent.
In a last-ditch effort to prevent the Virginia Board of Medicine from revoking his license, Roanoke psychiatrist William G. Gray yesterday accused the state of conspiring against him. The conspiracy stems, he alleged, from his treatment from 1982 to 1990 of a woman who claimed to be the lover of former Attorney General Mary Sue Terry. [6][7]
As for the California incident Dr. Gray said he and his wife opened their home as foster parents to perhaps 18 children that social services could not place. One, whom they were seeking to adopt, brought charges that Dr. Gray had molested him. Dr. Gray said that the boy made up the allegations because the boy had himself molested Dr. Gray's daughter and niece. [4]
How could anyone fail to renounce the rantings and behavior of William Gray, then grab at the moral high ground in the Foley scandals? In the end, a serial sexual predator handed George Allen his October surprise, and George Allen did not speak out. That a candidate would remain silent one time and speak out another time based on public sentiment and polls is deplorable and despicable.
Seriously, love you, too.
Virginians need Jim Webb!
And if Nell and catzmaw read this diary, I loved your comments to my last diary, but just don't know what to say.
A child psychiatrist, Dr. William Gray, described a remarkable upbringing overseas by Southern Baptist missionary parents as the basis of an uncritical empathy that led him to turn his Southwest Roanoke office building into a haven for mentally disturbed youths, the homeless, homosexual prostitutes and transvestites.
This is part of that same article
Dr. Gray said his compassion is rooted in his exotic, self-educated upbringing in the Orient with missionary parents.He said he was born in the Philippines just before his family was interned in a Japanese prison camp for four years during World War II. "My father, he was tortured to death," Dr. Gray said.
After the war, his mother returned to the United States, remarried and left for China on another mission when he was 6.
Dr. Gray said he was there during the Communist revolution. Once, he said, he ran away from his parents for several months and roamed Beijing with a pack of street urchins, begging for money around the Imperial Palace.
He said he returned to the United States at age 16 and despite his lack of a high school diploma, was invited to attend Wake Forest University, where he was graduated at age 20. He received his medical degree from the Medical College of Virginia in Richmond and took courses at Union Theological Seminary, he said.
He joined the Peace Corps, serving in the Philippines, then at a one-doctor hospital in the island-nation of Truk in the western Pacific.
Returning to the United States, he entered a psychiatric residency at Duke University before moving to San Diego where he established a child psychiatry practice. That is where his practice of personally befriending young patients first turned against him, he said.
As for being made comfortable, the same thing crossed my mind at first, but now I don't think so. If there was anything weird going on, my money is on signficant threats to Gray rather than a meaningful payoff.
This is from the Jan 15 1993 article
Dr. William Gray has agreed to quit medicine forever in Virginia in exchange for the dropping of charges that he misused his Roanoke child psychiatry practice to force sex on five young men.The deal, which allows Gray, 51, to avoid a criminal conviction and a possible life sentence, was worked out late Wednesday with Franklin County Commonwealth's Attorney Cliff Hapgood.
"I didn't cave in," Hapgood said Thursday, when the deal was made public. "This is a very unusual case. The No. 1 priority was he had to lose his license."
Gray stood to lose his license anyway as a result of pending hearings before the State Board of Medicine. The board suspended Gray's license nearly a year ago after he was charged with sexually molesting a boy in Roanoke County. That charge later was thrown out, but Gray's license has remained suspended because of numerous other allegations of sexual misconduct with patients.
...
Under the agreement, Gray admitted no wrongdoing. He agreed only that Franklin County authorities had probable cause to attempt prosecution.The agreement also provides that authorities in Franklin County and Roanoke will not prosecute Gray on any charges prior to the agreement based on complaints by any of the five young men involved in the Franklin County case. Authorities in Roanoke County would not sign the agreement, but said they do not anticipate any charges.
Franklin County sheriff's investigator Bonnie Beatty, who spent months putting together the case against Gray, said she'd have liked to see Gray convicted. But, she said, she is glad he had to give up his medical license. She said the five young men who accused Gray are relieved it's over and "want to go on with their lives."
So he managed to avoid serious jail time, but then only a week later, Jan 22, he was freaking out about someone breaking into his office? And he called the police himself.
From the Oct 8 Roanoke story
Dr. William Gray, who faced severe disciplinary action because of alleged sex crimes against young male patients, made the assertions shortly before the board permanently expelled him from the profession. He provided the board no evidence to back up his charges, but carried with him what he claimed were the patient's files.
No matter what, the whole thing reeks, and Gray had zero credibility.
Dr. William Gray, who lost his medical license following allegations that he had sexually exploited teen-age patients at his Smith Mountain Lake home, wants to regain the right to practice psychiatry in Virginia and has been trying to earn medical privileges in the Pacific Islands.Gray, who still holds a medical license in California, has tried to set up practice on at least two islands in the Pacific, most recently in the Republic of Palau in the western Pacific. His current whereabouts are unknown. Even his lawyers must call his wife when they want to contact him.
Emily Gray, who still lives at the couple's Hunting Hills home, could not be reached for comment. The house, along with Gray's Old Southwest office building, has been put up for sale. But neighbors and Gray's attorney say she continues to live there and has an unlisted number.
According to Williamson's article, documents filed in Albemarle County Circuit Court indicated that Gray appealed the Virginia Board of Medicine's decision to revoke his license.
Also there were two malpractice suites scheduled for January 1995; I don't know what the outcome was. Gray also filed an appeal on the revocation of his license, and I don't know what happened with that either.
Two have since filed malpractice suits against Gray in Roanoke; the lawsuits are scheduled to be tried in January. Some of the other boys recanted their stories last year. Gray has insisted that the accusations are part of a conspiracy hatched by a group of boys from dysfunctional families. During last year's gubernatorial campaign, he expanded the conspiracy theory to include former Attorney General Mary Sue Terry, who lost her bid for governor.The Board of Medicine filed a motion to dismiss Gray's appeal in February but has heard nothing since from Gray or his Alexandria attorney, John Grad. Assistant Attorney General Lynne Fleming said she asked Grad, who filed the appeal for Gray, to contact her to set up a briefing schedule and dates for oral arguments.
On the legal documents filed, Gray's attorneys listed a Charlottesville address, but his wife was still living in their home in Roanoke which was up for sale. Gray owned an office building in Roanoke which was also up for sale at the time of the article.
Among Gray's lawyers was one in Alexandria (John Grad) and one in Richmond (William Bayliss). They each listed Charlottesville area addresses for Gray, but one was in Charlottesville and one was in Albemarle. More strangeness from the same article:
Grad listed an Albemarle County address, where Gray owns two pieces of adjacent property. One building houses several shops, the other a Brazilian restaurant. Grad said Gray lived there when the appeal was filed in January.In a motion filed in March to transfer the malpractice suits to Charlottesville, Bayliss wrote that Gray lived in an apartment in Charlottesville and spent "much of his time" there.
Asked about that statement, Bayliss laughed and said, "You don't believe everything you read, do you?"
"I know he's not in Virginia now," Bayliss said. "He's working. And to tell you the truth, he calls me and I don't call him. ... I get a call about once a month. When I need to talk to him, I call his wife."
And it gets even crazier if that's possible. North Carolina suspended Gray's license in 1992. Why? And his California license was active, but he had another charge there brought in April 1993. It just doesn't make sense. He also had tried to get licensed in Saipan (see Tom DeLay et al) and Palau. And he told the folks in Saipan he lived in Palau.
In October, before Virginia revoked his license, Gray applied for a medical license in Saipan, a small island in the Commonwealth of Northern Mariana Islands, near Guam. A spokeswoman for that island's licensing agency said officials there learned of Gray's troubles in Virginia and planned to discuss the matter. Gray left the island before they reached a decision, she said.The spokeswoman said Gray's last known address was the Republic of Palau.
The Virginia Board of Medicine received a request in February from the Ministry of Health in Palau for information regarding the status of Gray's license. The Board faxed to Palau copies of its order revoking his license, a spokeswoman said.
Masao Ueda, the Minister of Health in Palau, said Gray applied for a job at the Palau Memorial Hospital but was turned down.
The Virginia Board also received requests for information about Gray from the licensing boards in California and North Carolina, where Gray previously held licenses, spokesman Wayne Farrar said.
The Board of Medical Examiners in North Carolina suspended Gray's license in 1992. California's licensing board still lists Gray's license as valid.
Jana Tuton, supervising deputy attorney general in Sacramento, said California is waiting for Virginia to conclude its case before it takes action. Her office brought an accusation against Gray in April 1993 but has yet to hold a hearing.
In the meantime, Gray was allowed to renew his license in California. But, Tuton said, she has a letter from Gray's attorney promising he won't practice there "until there's a final ruling in Virginia."