George Morris on the SS list

[skydy]

@arnikalm

This is for Gainer. Apologies if you’ve already answered this. If the trainer is a registered sex offender, it is illegal to be in a position where he/she supervises children or minors. Regardless whether the trainer is a member of USEF. Hoping that you have reported this person. Even anonymously.

I don’t think it is as simple as that. Whether a sex offender is allowed around children depends upon their legal situation does it not? If they are done with probation and parole I don’t believe anyone can prevent it. They may be a registered sex offender and be fairly free except for having to report a change of address.

People fought long and hard to make the sex offender list available to the public and the Safe Sport banned list is now available as well. It is very disappointing that parents don’t check the list and keep their children away from Navarro et al.

I agree that it would be a good thing , if you live in the area where sex offenders are training and coaching minors, that you speak up, with a print out of the safe sport banned list or the sex offender registry in hand.

[NoSuchPerson]

@no.stirrups

My concern for GM is that it’s entirely possible that when he did whatever he did he may have had no reason to consider it a crime. It may not have been considered “wrong.” If that were the case, then I would be concerned about judging him by today’s standards.

I don’t buy this for multiple reasons. First and foremost, if GM and society in general didn’t understand that having a 13/14/15 year old boy as a sex partner was wrong, then why wasn’t he open about the relationships? Why didn’t the boys freely share the fact of their relationships? Why would GM and the boys involved keep their secrets for all these years?

Second, by all accounts, at least one of the victims was 13 when he became a GM protege. How could anyone think having sex with a 13 or 14 year old boy isn’t wrong? This is, as many people have pointed out repeatedly, not something that was ever viewed as acceptable, even “back then.”

It’s a shame about the young man you describe. I suspect that he has had a rough life, which led to him ending up in the situation he was in. I also suspect the disinterest you report had less to do with people thinking the situation was acceptable and more to do with people who had just thrown their hands in the air and given up on the boy because of his troubled behavior - which circles us back around to the suspicion that the boy has had a tough life.

[vineyridge]

I happen to be in favor or repression. Society couldn’t exist without it. Children would be safe if their abusers repressed their drives that cause the abuse.

[Gainer]

@arnikalm

This is for Gainer. Apologies if you’ve already answered this. If the trainer is a registered sex offender, it is illegal to be in a position where he/she supervises children or minors. Regardless whether the trainer is a member of USEF. Hoping that you have reported this person. Even anonymously.

I answered several pages back that “he was reported to SafeSport and found Permanently Ineligible but he’s working with kids.”

[Denali6298]

@vineyridge

I happen to be in favor or repression. Society couldn’t exist without it. Children would be safe if their abusers repressed their drives that cause the abuse.

Well yes child molesters should repress their drives. I however am not a big fan of repression when it comes to healthy adult relationships.

[mvp]

@fordtraktor Thanks for taking the time to educate me about the life-history of the Sherman Anti-Trust act. I’m used to the usual disagreements about strict- vs. loose-constructionists with documents like the Constitution. But I know jack about that with respect to the Sherman Act since it was built get a job done in the Gilded Age economy! Interesting that it has been stretched out and around in lots of ways to be seen to apply to lots of commerce and economic situations. I appreciate your taking the time to explain what I didn’t know about all that.

[downen]

@Dressurfrau

https://www.jennyrsusser.com/we-are-missing-the-point-here/?fbclid=IwAR22vI9d21UKpn0lbzPe8ueKTGQsEZ-K4bb6EZe1GcVq99ay8qfQ0M5aB70

This is an excellent article. If you have not read it, I suggest you do.

[Peggy]

@HLMom

I think your post is quite insightful in regard to what conduct people hid, versus what conduct they flaunted in public.

But your reference to being propositioned by male professors and the college academic code actually shows just how much things have actually changed. Until very recently, relationships between professors and students were NOT prohibited at the vast majority of colleges. Here’s an article and relevant quote:

https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2018/05/24/academe-sees-new-wave-faculty-student-relationship-restrictions-era-me-too

Richards co-wrote a 2014 study of 55 institutions’ student-faculty dating policies saying that consensual relationships were viewed in previous generations as "private matters” and ignored by administrators, except where harassment was alleged. Fear of legal liability and increasing acknowledgement of academic power structures changed that, leading institutions to adopt a mix of policies regarding these relationships. That mix led to subsequent “confusion” about community norms, however, according to the study.

At the time, within Richards’s sample, only Yale University banned undergraduate-faculty dating

Interesting. As long as I’ve been teaching, including as s TA in grad school starting in 1977, it was understood that relationships between someone in authority and the person over whom they had authority were not supposed to happen. Not sure about official academic regulations, but part of TA training was don’t date your students. Or at least wait until they’re not in your class.

Not saying tbat that this means such relationships didn’t happen.

[dannyboy]

Just a note to say that we contacted Stubben about their sponsorship of River Chase Farm. They indicated that they had had multiple calls about it and had pulled out of the relationship.

I did note that the RC website still lists Stubben as a sponsor as of this afternoon, but they (RC) have pulled all mention of Tom Novarro’s name from it. Hopefully, the other sponsors will re-think as well.

[fordtraktor]

@mvp

@fordtraktor Thanks for taking the time to educate me about the life-history of the Sherman Anti-Trust act. I’m used to the usual disagreements about strict- vs. loose-constructionists with documents like the Constitution. But I know jack about that with respect to the Sherman Act since it was built get a job done in the Gilded Age economy! Interesting that it has been stretched out and around in lots of ways to be seen to apply to lots of commerce and economic situations. I appreciate your taking the time to explain what I didn’t know about all that.

My pleasure, your question was a very good and thoughtful one. I spent five years as an antitrust lawyer, it isn’t something I would expect a layman to be familiar with in detail.

The problem with a lot of legal tactics is that they don’t make much sense until you really dig down into them. Antitrust statutes are rife with this. The Robinson-Patman Act, another antitrust statute, prohibits “price discrimination.” We all know that there are many good reasons why prices can be different for an item (like bulk purchasing, dated materials, transport costs, etc.) but on its face, the RPA completely prohibits all that. Courts have basically decided to ignore that aspect of the statute completely, with a few small exceptions too irrelevant to worry about. Antitrust is a weird, weird area of law! I always loved it as a lawyer because it really allows you to be creative thinking up solutions to problems, but the reality is that isn’t good when it comes to being fair to the people and corporations subject to it.

[skydy]

@dannyboy

Just a note to say that we contacted Stubben about their sponsorship of River Chase Farm. They indicated that they had had multiple calls about it and had pulled out of the relationship.

I did note that the RC website still lists Stubben as a sponsor as of this afternoon, but they (RC) have pulled all mention of Tom Novarro’s name from it. Hopefully, the other sponsors will re-think as well.

Is this the farm where Navarro trains? Does he own the farm or is the farm owner employing him?

[Virginia_Horse_Mom]

@dannyboy

Just a note to say that we contacted Stubben about their sponsorship of River Chase Farm. They indicated that they had had multiple calls about it and had pulled out of the relationship.

I did note that the RC website still lists Stubben as a sponsor as of this afternoon, but they (RC) have pulled all mention of Tom Novarro’s name from it. Hopefully, the other sponsors will re-think as well.

Oh good. I have been debating posting about this as well. I have now heard the local Stubben rep has left River Chase, but I didn’t have solid enough first hand info to say anything too definitive about whether that involved actually terminating sponsorship, etc.

Apparently George Mason’s equestrian team is no longer affiliated with River Chase either.

I know it came up on the RG thread… but did anyone ever get clarity regarding the IEA team that Navarro started at River Chase? Is that officially done as well, or just coached by someone else somehow or other? It seems like IEA should align with and uphold Safe Sport bans…

[Denali6298]

@fordtraktor

My pleasure, your question was a very good and thoughtful one. I spent five years as an antitrust lawyer, it isn’t something I would expect a layman to be familiar with in detail.

The problem with a lot of legal tactics is that they don’t make much sense until you really dig down into them. Antitrust statutes are rife with this. The Robinson-Patman Act, another antitrust statute, prohibits “price discrimination.” We all know that there are many good reasons why prices can be different for an item (like bulk purchasing, dated materials, transport costs, etc.) but on its face, the RPA completely prohibits all that. Courts have basically decided to ignore that aspect of the statute completely, with a few small exceptions too irrelevant to worry about. Antitrust is a weird, weird area of law! I always loved it as a lawyer because it really allows you to be creative thinking up solutions to problems, but the reality is that isn’t good when it comes to being fair to the people and corporations subject to it.

I want to respond this post to explain myself. I understood what you have been saying. Having worked for and educated by attorneys who handle these cases and appellate cases all the way up to the SCOTUS is why I was rude. If ones only responses to these threads are akin to a legal exercise one sounds like Bonnie Nevin to me. I apologize but still think the legal backbends would have been better in its own thread.

[Virginia_Horse_Mom]

@skydy

Is this the farm where Navarro trains? Does he own the farm?

Yes. He is listed as an “owner” of River Chase on the website… but apparently only leases the physical farm and is more of a business owner only.

Apparently the business he has been running for a while is not doing as well as it used to. I guess the Safe Sport decision has lead folks to question multiple aspects of that farm and program.

[skydy]

I suppose it doesn’t matter.(my question). If he owns the farm people must be aware of his status as a sex offender and if he trains there, the owners are surely aware of it.

[sixteenhands]

@arnikalm

This is for Gainer. Apologies if you’ve already answered this. If the trainer is a registered sex offender, it is illegal to be in a position where he/she supervises children or minors. Regardless whether the trainer is a member of USEF. Hoping that you have reported this person. Even anonymously.
ETA: that I meant reported to law enforcement or Child Protective services, not to USEF.

@Gainer ’s reply to me:

Oh honey, he was reported and found permanently ineligible but he’s still at it. I question how much SafeSport really does for the average person. I doubt most people new to the sport would know to check out SafeSport. But silly me, I would expect parents to check out who they’re leaving their children with.

@Gainer- I’m not your honey.

[Denali6298]

@Virginia Horse Mom

Yes. He is listed as an “owner” of River Chase on the website… but apparently only leases the physical farm and is more of a business owner only.

Apparently the business he has been running for a while is not doing as well as it used to. I guess the Safe Sport decision has lead folks to question multiple aspects of that farm and program.

More like the list made people aware

[skydy]

@Virginia Horse Mom

Yes. He is listed as an “owner” of River Chase on the website… but apparently only leases the physical farm and is more of a business owner only.

Apparently the business he has been running for a while is not doing as well as it used to. I guess the Safe Sport decision has lead folks to question multiple aspects of that farm and program.

That is good to know. As long as people are aware that Mr. Navarro is a sex offender. Forewarned…

[Soaponarope]

@poltroon

The idea that only kids with irresponsible or inattentive parents are molested or raped is not only dead wrong, it’s also a factor in why these crimes don’t get reported.

They can happen to ANYBODY. Just like anyone can have money stolen. Don’t fool yourself into thinking you and your family are safe based upon your superior virtue.

I think this is absolutely true. I also think that the sport is set up in ways that may make children and parents vulnerable to a predator. It’s not just the case of a distracted or naïve parent. The ambitious parent can be outright seduced by predatory trainers. They see blue ribbons and big eq titles in the child’s future, maybe an NCAA team opportunity or even a grand prix career. As in football, they are over the moon when their kid is “chosen” or praised by a BNT. Their egos are stroked by the kid’s new status and the kid is elated, of course. An ambitious parent may be willing to hand their kid over to go on the circuit with the trainer. And what kid wouldn’t want to live and breathe horse shows vs. go to school five days a week? They are not thinking this might be grooming. I’ve seen parents absolutely falling all over themselves when their kids received favors (gifts, jobs) which in hindsight seem very suspicious. I recall seeing one parent at shows bubbling over with pride, even calling the trainer “Boss.” I thought it was a bit embarrassing at the time, but now I see it as very foolish indeed. I am not blaming the parents, I am blaming the abuser for abusing. But we need to be aware that the day in day out practices, like the isolated camp location US gymnastics uses, facilitate the vulnerability of children as well as their success as athletes. It’s really something to think about. Before Safe Sport there were no checks and balances in place. Initially, I thought that the new texting and other policies were overkill. I don’t anymore.

[CindyCRNA]

@ohmyheck , thank you so much for your story and my condolences to you for the loss of your brother. Your story really struck a nerve. When a family’s options are financially limited, you do tend to sweep things under the rug. Unfortunately you are left with unresolved questions that will never be answered.