Turkey was once again shaken by the incident of child sexual abuse in Küçükçekmece. Prof. Dr. Sevil Atasoy stated that there are missing and abduction cases all over the world and gave important warnings to families. Emphasizing that 3 out of 4 children abducted for sexual abuse are killed within the first 3 hours, Prof. Dr. Sevil Atasoy underlined that the police should be called first when the child disappears and said, "The child may be in the house, in the closet, in the basement, in the attic, etc. places. But the search in these places should start after notifying the police." Atasoy stated that the suspects were not strangers to the environment where the child was found and that the cases took place in a very narrow area and said, "One should never be comfortable saying 'My child is playing in front of the house, in the garden'."
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Prof. Dr. Sevil Atasoy, Director and Vice Rector of Üsküdar University Institute of Addiction and Forensic Sciences, gave important warnings to families.
"Turkey is not an exception when it comes to missing children. All over the world, in every country, children go missing, children are kidnapped, children leave home, children are kicked out of their homes... The number of these is not at all small," said Prof. Dr. Atasoy,
"The number of missing and runaway children mentioned in the data is just the tip of the iceberg. The numbers are much higher than the stated data."
Worst case scenario needs to be considered
Prof. Dr. Sevil Atasoy said, "It is necessary to act with the worst in mind" and continued her words as follows
"It is not a situation that results in so many deaths; but it is certain that every case should be investigated as if she was kidnapped by a stranger or a known person, sexually abused and then killed. Because there is a race against time here.
Whatever happens, call the police first!
Whatever happens, the police must be informed first. Why? If we consider the worst case scenario, it is known that three quarters of children abducted for sexual abuse are killed within three hours of the abduction. So if it is an abduction that ends in murder, half of the survivors will be killed within 48 hours of the abduction and unfortunately all of them will be killed 7 days later. In short, finding the child alive requires very fast action.
The assailant and the child meet close to where the child goes
On average, it is almost always not more than 2 hours before a family calls the police. Even after 2 hours, the police only have a short period of one hour to come up with a plan and start going door to door to find a witness. The goal is to find the first point of contact. So where is the point where the child and the attacker meet each other? This is very important. Because, although it varies depending on age, the first point of contact is very close to home, school or a place where the child goes, almost within a circle of 500 meters in diameter.
Cases take place in a very narrow area!
For this reason, it is absolutely necessary not to relax by saying that the child is playing in front of the house, playing in the garden, at school, at the bus stop or at a friend's house. When a person commits an act of sexual assault, it is usually within 1 km of the abduction point, but when he kills the victim and throws her away or covers her with brush, sticks or earth, it is 250 to 500 meters from the place where the assault took place. It is noteworthy that the incidents usually take place in a confined space, but it is too late. Like the first point of contact, the scene of the attack and the location of the body are both crime scenes.
Inform the police before you start looking for your child!
Atasoy noted that every police officer should receive training specific to child abductions,
"Once a child disappears, it can be various things. One of them is really somewhere in the house, in a closet, in the basement, in the attic, even under piles of laundry, if there is a lot of laundry... So it can be different things depending on his age, his height. It could be a barn, it could be a garage, it could be a vehicle, it could be hidden in the trunk of a car. But after informing the police, you have to look for the child in these places. The child could even be under the sofa. Of course, people are afraid of this, they are upset, they think that when the police come, they will say, 'Couldn't you look or find the child'; but the police must be specially trained and they must know how traumatized people are when such an incident happens to them." In addition, security units should take every report very seriously, determine the level of risk in the first interview, and if 24 hours have not passed, give up the cliché response of "he has run away, he will come back".
Do not hesitate to call the police!
"When a child goes missing, you think the worst. When he suddenly comes out from under the sofa, he is surprised what to do, but he should not be afraid of the police and should not hesitate," said Prof. Dr. Sevil Atasoy,
"Of course, until the police arrive, the family has to start looking for someone, the description of the child, the clothes and belongings on the child are very important. Does he/she wear glasses, does he/she have a disease or disability, does he/she have braces, a bracelet or an earring, and of course the last place where he/she was last seen is extremely important. To repeat, success in kidnappings depends to a large extent on knowing the last place of last sighting. It is vital for the police to form a large number of teams to find an eyewitness among the people who live, work, go home or go to work in that area, or to learn even a single letter of a car color or license plate.
Attackers are not strangers to the region!
Prof. Dr. Sevil Atasoy gave the following information about the general profile of attackers:
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"Assuming that he kidnapped the child for an evil purpose and then killed him so that he would not give himself away, or even to silence his cries, in such a place; in general, these people;
-Their age is between 25-30 years old,
-They are single,
-Probably living alone or with a relative,
-It seems that he was already in that area for some reason, that is, he was not a complete stranger to the place where he abducted the child.
It is a known fact that there is a high probability that he has committed a crime before, that there is a high probability that he has committed a similar crime, but not necessarily.
He works in a job that does not require much education or skill, such as construction worker, painter, salesman.
Now, it is unthinkable that this person would come 500 kilometers away, find a child somewhere and do this act to him. He is always there for some reason. He knows the environment. He knows how to get there, where to go, whether there is an abandoned building, an abandoned place, a place where he can hide.
Attackers deceive children
They need to deceive the child in some way. From 'I lost my dog, let's look for it together' to 'I don't know the way, can you give me directions', 'Your parents sent me, I'll take you somewhere'. It is even more dangerous if the child has learned his/her name, because when he/she addresses him/her by name, the child actually believes him/her. Giving money, candy, chocolates, these are very classic things that we encounter all the time... Of course, threats, intimidation, sometimes guns, sometimes knives, etc., all of these are encountered. We tell children 'Don't get into the cars of strangers'. Especially in big cities, we have to tell them not to even go near the cars of strangers. Because there are cases where the door is opened and the child is pulled inside. Therefore, it is not enough to tell them not to get into the car. If a person offers candy, chocolate, money, etc., especially if it is a stranger, it is necessary to ensure that the child gets away from there quickly and says so.
At what age should this education be given?
When you look at it, there are different age brackets and different risks, but the children who are abducted for this purpose are normal children. They are not girls with lipstick on their lips, short skirts, etc. You need to know this. Unfortunately, it is claimed that this is the case, no, there is no such thing. Very few attackers target a certain type. I mean a child for that person. Of course, it doesn't matter if it's a boy or a girl, but girls are at a very high risk."
"We live in a world where even diaper advertisements are said to have a triggering effect"
Prof. Dr. Sevil Atasoy, Director of Üsküdar University Institute of Addiction and Forensic Sciences and Vice Rector, warned about the dangers of social media use and concluded her words as follows:
"There are some age-related issues here. We know that when children are young, parents share photos of their children; but when the child grows up a little, they share their own photos. Or they start sharing photos of someone they know. All of these, of course, have different consequences. As for the little ones, we live in a world where even diaper advertisements are said to have a triggering effect. Unfortunately, it is possible for people to perceive all kinds of things, even a tree or an automobile as sexual stimuli.
"Your child's photos may be sold on websites"
Child pornography is a very common phenomenon. So photos of your child may be sold on websites and you may not even see them on the normal internet. As you know, there is now the Dark web. So somewhere there it is being served to someone as a product, but now it is important to remember that the address of the child's home can also be determined from the photograph and this will be another problem, and the child will grow up. Unfortunately, these are methods that people with patience resort to. There are also cases where the attackers somehow connect many children to them at the same time, where they correspond with them as if they were just talking to them, as if they were establishing a relationship with them, and after days, weeks or even months of communication, they convince the child to share the naked photo and then meet with them. In other words, nothing happens to children all of a sudden. Sometimes these things happen over an accumulation."
