We had a great victory last Friday in Taunton Superior Court, as a jury believed the testimony of a man with MR/DD and convicted a demonic abuser on all three charges. This was a difficult case in which two police departments had initially refused to take a report of the crimes, and slapdash records were kept by a Rhode Island provider, LIFE, Inc. leading to the shocking situation of a direct care manager and four police officers testifying as defense witnesses in a rape trial. Another direct care and a young officer from Rhode Island were effective prosecution witnesses. But the key testimony was from this young man, still forced for his own protection to live in a high-security group home after working hard with his family to live at home. We hope and pray that further prosecutions will reunite this wonderful family.

A number of COFAR members and officers attended different parts of the trial. The family and prosecutor and investigators are very grateful for this support, and were amazed at how COFAR members not previously involved "got it" about the case right away. The issue of safety cuts across all levels of mental disability.

 This victory should encourage others to come forward, and law enforcement officials to pursue such cases.

COFAR salutes this brave and honest young victim-witness, his wonderful family, a core of deeply committed friends, their civil lawyer Judith Borges, the trial prosecutor Silvia Rudman from the office of Bristol County DA Samuel Sutter, investgators (whom we do not name here), the veteran judge, and young jury who rose to great maturity of judgement.

COFAR's press release is:

THE MASSACHUSETTS COALITION OF FAMILIES

AND ADVOCATES FOR THE RETARDED, Inc.

  Hodges Street,  Mansfield, MA 02048

  Telephone: (508) 339-3379  Fax: (508) 339-5034

  www.cofar.org

Executive Director, Colleen M. Lutkevich, colleen.lutkevich@cofar.org

Director of Communications, Mark Zanger, mzanger@comcast.net,

(cell) 617-435-3570

For Immediate Release: January 15, 2009

Buddy Smith Convicted in Rape, Stalking of

Man with Developmental Disability

7-1/2 Year Concurrent Sentences; 5 Years Probation Consecutive

              Three years and a week after a man with developmental disability and his family were unable to get Tiverton and Fall River police even to take a report about his being raped, stalked, and threatened by Buddy E. Smith of Fall River – Smith was convicted at Taunton Superior Court today on charges of Rape, Indecent Assault on a Person with Mental Retardation, and Witness Intimidation. Judge Barbara Dortch-Okara sentenced smith to 7-/12-10 years on each of the first two charges, to be served concurrently, including time served. This means that Smith will be locked up for almost seven years. Pending appeal, and because a second defendant, William Senay, of Fall River (uncle of Buddy Smith) is awaiting trial, COFAR did not comment on certain case details.

              “In order to convict, this jury had to believe that the young man with obvious intellectual disability was testifying truthfully about what had been done to him and who did it,” said COFAR Executive Director Colleen M. Lutkevich. “They saw what I saw, an unusually small man with unusual facial features and a very stiff and repetitive way of speaking. But we listened and saw something more: an incredibly brave man. This young man, like many of our family members, tends to believe what he is told by anyone. So when Buddy Smith told him ‘If you tell, I will find you and kill you. I will bash your head in,’ this witness believed that was literal truth. And still he testified. The jury saw that he was an honest man, without guile. Sometimes he didn’t pick out Buddy Smith’s picture, ‘I was afraid’ he testified about those times. There’s nothing disabled about this man’s courage or honesty. The law enforcement officials who let the case languish because they didn’t believe a jury would believe a person with intellectual disability –they were just proven wrong,” Lutkevich concluded.

              COFAR president David J. Hart, who observed most of the trial, paid tribute to the family, “This family never gave up trying to get the best for their two disabled sons. Searching out doctors and rearranging their lives around surgeries to repair the physical parts of developmental disabilities. Even separated and divorced, they both worked with the boys, and it shows. It’s just the worst luck in the world that this great family – and I include aunts and uncles on both sides, and the grandmother who came to the trial every day -- ran into this demonic sexual predator. And even with him, they did what hardly anyone could do – they overcame bias and stigma and kept this case alive all the way to a jury that stepped up,” said Hart.

COFAR Vice President Thomas J. Frain said, “This jury has made the South Coast a little safer for all of us. The defendant was an unusually determined predator, and the family are unusually great people. But the problem of abuse of vulnerable people with mental retardation is not unusual. Up to 90 percent of people with MR/DD experience sexual assault in their lifetimes. This case almost never got to trial because the records were so tangled. When you see two police departments and a state-funded service provider on the defendant’s witness list, you know a lot of people need a lot more training. When you see a case go through four different assistant district attorneys, you know it’s not getting top priority. Although it must be said that once Bristol County District Attorney Sam Sutter took a personal interest in the case last year, things started to move.

“But where you see one case like this going to court, remember that 20 more cases are still out there, because the victim-witnesses are afraid to come forward, or disbelieved when they do because of disability. We need a stronger Disabled Persons Protection Commission, the three-investigator independent agency that takes more complaints of abuse and neglect every year. We need an amended victim advocacy bill to allow orientation and assistance for disabled people to be witnesses in court. It’s a hard time fiscally, but these are small investments that can save hundreds of lives and stop thousands of cases of abuse and neglect every year. If the most vulnerable are not safe, it’s only a matter of time for the rest of us. If this family and this prosecutor and this jury hadn’t stopped this young offender, with all his demonic energy and drive, who would have been the next to wander across his path?” asked Frain.

COFAR first became involved in the case 20 months ago.