Immorality and indifference destroy children’s lives (The case of Ungheni)

Terrible case in a village in the Ungheni district. A 9-year-old child was allegedly sexually and physically abused by 4 other minors. The information appeared on a social network and the General Prosecutor’s Office started a criminal case on this case.

According to the anonymous source, who made the case public online, a week ago four 6th grade boys lured a 3rd grade boy to a distant place and beat and made fun of him.

“They stole his backpack and he ran after them to get his backpack back. They lured him to a distant place and raped him, beat him severely, especially in the head area, bruised his eyes, because he did not want to do what they told him. The boy is in the 3rd grade, he studies very well, he is from a socially vulnerable family. The perpetrators are also from socially vulnerable families,” the source declared.

The source also says that the parents of the raped child did absolutely nothing: they did not go to the police and did not call an ambulance. This even in the situation when “the child walked about 2 km home, full of blood, with a swollen head and full of bruises.” Neither the villagers nor the school management did anything.

“The next day the child went to school. Why didn’t the school principal call the police, the social assistance? We have a policeman in the village, they also work in our village. The child doesn’t talk much, he hasn’t touched food for about 3 days, he just vomits. What is to be done?” asks the worried source, who is also the mother of two children.

Emil Gaitur, the head of the press service of the General Prosecutor’s Office, said, quoted by the Agora news site, that a criminal investigation had been launched into the case.

“All children must be provided with qualified psychological, pedagogical, informational assistance, in order to achieve positive changes in behavior.  And in the case of the child victim, he will be given psychological counseling, in order to rehabilitate him,” said Gaitur.

The prosecutor’s office is to send information about the suspects to the territorial and local guardianship authority for assistance and their parents could be sanctioned for minor offenses.

I am shocked how indifferently this case is treated, starting with the child’s family and ending with the society and even the press in the Republic of Moldova. We came to find out about this terrible incident from an anonymous person, a week later. Rape between minors treated so easily? If it happened in another country, the whole society would probably talk about it. How did we get into such a situation that we are only interested in what is happening in our own yard? Or do we think that our children are not in the same danger? The mother who made the case public is worried about her daughters, whom she also sends to school and cannot be sure in what condition they will return home…

I think that it is our collective indifference that generates such cases. It is true that the responsibility for education lies with the parents of the perpetrators and that the parents will have to answer directly, according to the law, for this case. Although no contravention will help this 9-year-old child, who has been affected for life. Poor child, he is a double victim. He suffered from rape and physical abuse and then from the indifference of his parents and society as a whole. If it came to this situation, it is obvious that the 4 committed other bad things that both the parents and the authorities knew about. I wonder, to what extent has work been done to help these children? I am afraid that if nothing is done, then in a few years these individuals could generate new victims and maybe even more serious ones.

It is also the role of the village church to work intensively with children in crisis, abandoned by parental care. These children, also, are victims of social irresponsibility. I believe that it is now very important for Christians to go to school to teach lessons on sexuality from a biblical perspective. Then, teach children how to use information technology correctly, because often, perpetrators are inspired by the Internet to make such abominations. Vasile Filat, the pastor of the Church of the Buna Vestire in Chisinau, has also developed a very good guide in this regard that comes to the aid of believers, it is titled “How the Christian can use information technologies.”

May the Lord help us to love our neighbor and, every time something strange happens around us, do not hesitate to get involved to the best of our ability to improve the situation and prevent such cases.

Translated by Nicoleta Vicliuc