Victim Impact Statements

Jamie Forbes - September 30, 2022

Warning: the following content describes sexual abuse and the impact it has had on other’s lives. Some may find it upsetting.

Last Friday, I sat in a courtroom with the man who sexually abused me. It was the first time since I graduated from high school - more than 37 years - that I had seen him in person. This was the culmination of a 5-year criminal case against Rey Buono, the teacher who repeatedly raped me when I was in 9th grade.

What follows are three Victim Impact Statements. These are letters written by survivors to the judge to describe the impact that the crime being discussed had on them. I share these Impact Statements because they each illustrate a different perspective. They are powerful stories that I hope promote conversation and understanding.

There is so much discomfort that people feel when talking about sex. It’s even more challenging to talk about sexual abuse. Talking about sex and sexual abuse, over time, can reduce the discomfort, and it certainly helps to reduce the shame for survivors. Talking about it helps kids understand the issue; it helps build a vocabulary and trust with adults. Most importantly, talking about sex and sexual abuse is the best way to protect the people we love.

It is in this context that I share with you what I, along with two others who were also abused by Rey Buono, said in court. Each statement is different, and together they provide poignant and moving insight into how the abuse affected each of us and many, many others who still suffer in silence.

My Impact Statement

It has been more than 40 years since Rey Buono repeatedly raped me, and not a day goes by that some aspect of his sexual, physical and emotionally abusive behavior doesn’t haunt me. The first time he laid his hands on me, I was terrified. I didn’t know what I had done to make him think I would want that. It rocked me to the core because it made me question so much in my life I thought I knew about myself.

When Rey touched me that first time, he stole my childhood. When he invited me to his apartment, suggesting he could help me prepare for my history test, where he raped me the first time, he stole my voice. When he did it again and again, he shattered my ability to love and trust myself.

I have spent my life since then trying to reclaim what Rey Buono stole from me, trying to scrub the shame that seeped into every thought as I tried to process who I was. Before he stole my childhood and my voice and burdened me with a shame that suffocated me, I looked to older adults to help me understand life and how to navigate it. After he repeatedly raped me, I didn’t trust adults to care for me. I avoided people in positions of authority. In fact, I actively passed up opportunities to become a leader because leaders, to me, were not trustworthy.

When I most needed mentors in my life, I shied away from finding them because Rey showed me they were dangerous.

If it weren’t for my friends, I am sure I would have spiraled into a darker place. They prevented that. In school they were my protection, my solace, my reassurance that I wasn’t as damaged as I felt inside because of what he did to me. My friendships fortified and protected me against the shame and self-doubt that he forced on me. While I have made a lot of progress, I still carry those feelings with me every day because of what he did.

Telling people that Rey raped me has been an important part of my healing. When I posted on Facebook that I was one of the many people he abused, I was overwhelmed by the outpouring of support. I was also struck by the number of other people who reached out to me who he had abused. I heard their stories. Most of them were tragically familiar to me. Still others were much worse and left survivors addicted, homeless and suicidal.

Hearing from some of the others he raped gave me some comfort, knowing I wasn’t alone in my experience. Every time I think about what he did to me and to so many others, I taste the bile of disgust and revulsion. Today I am here, able to read this statement with anger fueled not just by the devastation he caused in my life but also by the wake of pain and suffering for the unnamed others who are unable to stand and speak with me today about what he did to them. I share my words today in solidarity with them and because it is impossible for me to separate what he did to me from what he did to so many others.

When Rey Buono raped me, he turned me into a self-doubting shame machine. At a time I should have been thriving, all I could see of myself was a vulnerable kid who didn’t have much to offer the world. I have spent the majority of my life rewiring the connections in my brain so I no longer have to listen to a constant litany of critical voices. But they still creep in from time to time, and I blame him for that.

I am a firm believer in the mind-body connection. Scientists have concluded that child sex abuse survivors are 49% more likely to get cancer than those who were not abused. Is it also his fault, therefore, that I developed a particularly aggressive form of prostate cancer when I was 46? I have been living with cancer for nearly 10 years. While I’m still ALIVE, I have Stage 4 cancer, which has spread to my bones.

It’s incurable.

If Rey had anything to do with my cancer, then he not only stole my youth, but he quite likely also stole my ability to watch my daughters become adults and have their own families. Rey has stolen my ability to nurture and love my wife as we grow old together. He has stolen experiences and emotions that I will never have. I can absorb the impacts that his actions had on me, but it’s nearly intolerable for me to imagine the tremendous impact Rey continues to have on my family.

I wish Rey Buono were going to jail with the other criminals who are unfit to live in society. It’s where he belongs. But instead I have to settle for knowing that his admission to repeatedly raping me is as good as an admission to stealing so many other childhoods. Rey’s admission of guilt means he’s no longer fighting against the truth. And that means I don’t have to fight for justice any more. It means I’ll have more strength to fight cancer instead and hope that I’ll be able to enjoy more time with my wife and get to watch my daughters raise their own families.

I will walk out of here with my head held high. And Rey is incredibly lucky that he gets to walk out of here with his hands free instead of into a jail cell. I hope in whatever years he has remaining, he will spend the majority of it being someone who doesn’t hurt people, motivated by the knowledge that he has a lot of deep and widespread pain to make up for.

Important Note - For the sake of clarity - particularly to those I know personally - I want to assure you that, while what I wrote about my cancer is true, I have every intention of eradicating it from my body. While I’ve had cancer in my bones for the past 3 years, it has not grown since it was detected there. My treatments are working. And while current medical protocols have been unable to cure metastatic prostate cancer, I fully believe in the power of the body to heal. I have already defied the medical survivability statistics. With this court case resolved, I will have more energy to focus on making my body inhospitable to cancer. And I plan to do just that.

Beau Ryan’s Impact Statement

It was some 48 years ago, when as a young, physically and emotionally immature boy, I was molested and raped for the first of many times by Rey Buono. Rey was the “floor master” in my dorm and in an ideal position to get me into his apartment and abuse me. In doing so, he destroyed my adolescence and almost my life. The shame and confusion I felt was immense and unbearable.

At that age, I should have been taken care of, not taken advantage of. After barely graduating from Milton, my life went on a downward spiral of drugs and self destruction……ultimately ending up with me living on the streets strung out on heroin. Thankfully, at some point, I was able to decide that I wanted to live, not die or go to jail.

My life and my relationships have all been tainted by my rage at what Rey did to me all those years ago. I have spent countless years in therapy trying to let go of some of these feelings. The things that I wish I could have said back then: get your hands off me, stop that, leave me alone, are things that haunt me to this day. I wish I could speak directly to Rey and tell him exactly what I think of him and what he did to me. I wish I could show the court my 1977 yearbook in which a picture of Rey sitting on the grass leaning against a tree was inscribed by him to me: “the pleasure was all mine”. I wish I could let out all the anger, rage and pain on him. Because that is what I am feeling standing here. I am just lucky to have an amazing and eternally supportive wife and family.

I would like to thank the court for the opportunity to make this statement. I would also like to thank Lisa Beattie and Kristin Collins for advocating for me to have this chance. It means the world to me and something I never thought possible. One of the most difficult things, in the last 6 years especially, has been the feelings of helplessness. Due to the unfortunate timing of the statutes of limitations at the time, I could not bring charges against Rey now. Since he was extradited, I have hoped that I might get a chance to testify at his trial. I have done my best to support Jamie and the DA’s office……but that really didn’t and wasn’t going to help me resolve my conflict and frustration. In some small way this does.

It is my firm conviction that I am only one of potentially dozens or even hundreds of victims of Rey’s, not just here in the US, but overseas. I believe that he belongs in prison for the rest of his life. It’s unfortunate that only recently have enough of these cases come to light that the laws and statutes are changing. This plea is a gift…….it does not compare to the extreme damage that he has caused. However, I do take some solace from the fact that he will have to suffer some consequences of his actions and not be able to walk free and continue his destruction.

David Saltonstall’s Impact Statement

Your Honor,

My name is David Saltonstall, and Rey Buono abused me for five years of my life, starting when I was a child of 13.

I have not spoken these words publicly until today, but let me be crystal clear: Rey Buono’s pattern of abuse over many years robbed scores of children of their innocence, including mine. He has said over the years that he never touched anyone without their consent, which is as cynical as it is offensive. The concept of consent has no meaning for a child, who has no capacity to give it. There is only fear and innocence at that age – fear of disappointing someone who you thought was a trusted mentor, fear of being found out, and innocence surrounding the physical abuse that is suddenly, inexplicably, being forced upon you.

While much has been established about Buono’s years of abuse at Milton Academy, I want to make clear that there remains another mostly silent group of children that Buono abused in his typically calculated way. I was not a student at Milton Academy. I was a young person from another school who joined one of the bike tours he led in the summer. In that way, my story is exactly like Jamie Forbes’ – days of biking, the introduction of alcohol by Buono at night, and then a pairing up into tents that for Buono became the perfect, predatory trap. It is where I was abused for the first time, and I feel confident in telling the court that there are many other “bike kids” who like me had no connection to Milton but remain scarred and alive. Some may have no idea this proceeding is happening today because they have no formal connection to Milton, so as a survivor I stand for them as well in giving voice to Buono’s predations.

I am grateful that with today’s proceeding, Rey Buono’s webs have all come undone. All his cowardice and running have been overtaken by the bravery of those who refused to let justice be deferred any longer. I know in my heart that in confessing to some small subset of charges today, he is confessing to all in the eyes of his many victims. I hope the sounds of their anguish will ring in his ears every hour of every day, like the rattle of his father’s old key chain, and haunt him for the rest of his days.

Sincerely, David Saltonstall

Final Reflection

I didn’t know either of these men before I returned to Milton Academy in 2016 to tell them about being sexually abused by Rey Buono. While shame kept us apart for more than 30 years and prevented us from creating community through our shared experience, this shared experience, as tragic as it is, has brought us together. I salute Beau and David and send strength and light out to all survivors who feel unable to push beyond shame to find healing and community. May you someday find comfort in sharing your story with others so that you, too, may feel the power of community and the promise of healing through storytelling.

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Silenced While Seeking Justice

By Jamie Forbes, CEO and Survivor

I set out to write a series of blog posts about my experience as a survivor of sexual abuse. As I began the process, the words and the topics to write about poured out of me. I realized there was a lot I wanted to cover as I began to pull apart the different aspects of my abuse. I made a list that included how the abuse kept me small and prevented me from taking risks; why I decided to return to Milton Academy to report my abuse after 31 years; my process and what it felt like to participate in the school’s investigation; why I chose to declare publicly that I was one of the unnamed people in the Investigation findings; why I decided to respond to some press inquiries and not others; what made me decide to press charges against the man who abused me and my experience of the subsequent legal process: these were all topics that others agreed would have value to readers.

I wrote my first post, and it felt good to release. And the second one spilled out of me 3 months later. And then Boston Magazine published my story. Writing has always been a way for me to process my own experiences. And the possibility of sharing these details to help others is what helped me overcome the nearly crippling fear about going back to the school that betrayed me and hoping things would be different this time. Things were different when I returned. And identifying the power that he took from me when he abused me and sharing it in a public way has enabled me to reclaim that power. This reclaiming has been a critical part of my healing.

And then I stopped writing the series.

I had so much more to write. I had a long list of topics to cover, but something was in the way. I can point to lots of reasons that kept me from writing more on the topic. The most obvious is that I was busy. But that was too easy an answer, and it wasn’t the whole story.

What I realized is that fear has blocked me from writing more. It’s not fear of what you might think though. I am not afraid about what people will think of me. While shame is still a deeply ingrained aspect from my abuse, what has kept me from writing more is the fear that what I write will be used against me in court. Every word I write and have written about my abuse will be dissected. Every triumph over the pain will be used to show that the damage to me wasn’t that bad. Any revelation or explanation of healing will be evidence that whatever harm I have claimed could not have been as traumatic as the prosecution is claiming.

I imagine myself sitting on the witness stand and having to defend out of context quotations; I anticipate being asked just how well I remember incidents that happened more than 4 decades ago, especially when alcohol was involved. Trauma does strange things to memory. The criminal justice system has little tolerance for trauma’s impact on the brain, especially when there is also no physical evidence.

Thirty-seven years after I left the school where my abuser walked the halls, I am currently grinding through the court system seeking justice - and consequences for the man who abused me. He fled overseas after being fired for admitting he had abused another student. He went to Thailand and Malaysia, where he continued to teach until a court in Massachusetts indicted him for what he did to me. It took 8 months to get the indictment. It took another year and a half to get him extradited from Southeast Asia. And it has taken another 3 years to argue through endless motions and appeals. There is still no court date on the horizon. The case may be dismissed before it even gets to trial. But if the case does go to trial, I know that every statement, everything I have written will be pulled apart for inconsistencies, for evidence that my memory (indeed that I) am unreliable and should not be believed. This is not only my fear. It is the fear that everyone who has been victimized has to consider if they report abuse: being told that it didn’t happen, that what they’re saying can’t be true. Too often that stops them, and I understand it.

I have a lot to say about the impact and what I have learned from being sexually victimized as a young teen. And writing about the experience has been a powerful salve for the wounds that still fester. So I am left to write about not being able to write - about being afraid of what I say because I know everything will be challenged with the objective of discrediting me. In fact, my choice to start Learning Courage has already been used in court as evidence that this organization is merely an opportunity to profit from my experience.

Seeking justice has been a long grind, and the outcome remains uncertain. And yet the criminal process favors those who remain silent. Seeking justice means submitting yourself to further victimization because it’s built into the process. Part of my healing has come from expressing and sharing my experience. And doing that also puts the case at risk. These elements are all reasons that prevent people from reporting abuse and pressing charges.

And they are at the heart of what has kept me from writing.

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A Survivor's Journey - The Impact of Abuse

I recognize that it’s impossible to separate how much my life - the way I act and think - would be different if I hadn’t been sexually abused. Being sexually abused changed me in both profound and small ways. I believe that the abuse magnified existing, latent and emerging impulses and thoughts. I don’t believe it’s useful or even possible to identify how different I would be if I had not been abused. But I do think it’s important to acknowledge what consequences feel directly tied to the abuse I sustained. My objective in writing this, after all, is to provide perspective rather than definitive connections. And much of what I describe here are common reactions to sexual abuse. My experience is therefore not unique at all. Rather it is all too common. Above all, I write this with the intention to help others understand. I hope you will read it with that in mind.

What follows, therefore, is a brief list of ways I believe the abuse impacted me, both during high school and the years that followed.

The Chorus of Critics - This is what I call the unproductive voices in my head that grew in volume and confidence during high school. They ganged up on me, preventing me from focusing in school, on the sports field and even during social interactions. You’re not good enough. What makes you think you can do that? You know you will fail! Voices of doubt are part of the human condition. For most adolescents, they come and go. Mine just sat on my shoulder and yelled at a volume that drowned out a lot of what was going on around me. To say this was a distraction is an understatement in the extreme. I was berated incessantly. If things were going OK, the critics told me things were about to go south any second. If I was doing something poorly or received a bad grade, they jumped up and down and screamed. You see? We told you this would happen! Why do you even bother?

Over time and with lots of therapy, I began to recognize the power that the Chorus had over me and how damaging they were - and also the reason they existed. They were part of my protective shell. Today I’m more practiced at talking back to them, thanking them for protecting me from being disappointed or hurt. I try to recognize when they are helpful. The vast majority of time, though, they hold me back. Thankfully, they hold less sway with me today than they did earlier in my life when I couldn’t separate them from the truth.

Shame - The Chorus of Critics are fueled by shame. They have a voracious appetite for it. They have an encyclopedic memory of my behavior and thoughts, and they used this evidence to remind me that I wasn’t worthy, wasn’t good enough, that someone else was more deserving. While I knew intellectually that the abuse was not my fault, this shame guided my behavior. It created this self-sabotaging doom loop that prevented me from committing to anything wholeheartedly. If I didn’t succeed, I could always tell myself that at least I hadn’t really given it everything I had. This played out in the classroom and on the sports field primarily, but it was a pervasive mindset that informed the calculation for many decisions. As with the Chorus of Critics, I began to see how detrimental this mindset was for me - particularly in my professional life. Knowing something is bad for you is important. Changing the well-worn grooves on this vinyl record took years.

While I would sing with passion and emotion in front of my bedroom mirror in my high school days, I held back in front of my band mates. I did a semester program with the National Outdoor Leadership School (NOLS) my fall semester of my first year of college. When my trip leader suggested I consider taking the Instructor’s Course, I was flattered and terrified. I could never be that much of a leader, I told myself. I never applied.

I thought I had processed the abuse over the years, much of that in therapy sessions but also with close friends and family. What I realized, however, was even recently, as I wrote my first blog post, some of the words that came out of my head and onto the page were still laden with guilt. Seeing the words and phrases on the page gave me an opportunity to recognize the shame that still infiltrated my words. Once I could see it, I was able to re-think and then re-write the details, using words that were more appropriate for the power differential and conflict that the abuse created within me.

Self-Doubt / Lack of Confidence - The manifestation of the Chorus of Critics and the shame was a crippling lack of confidence. If I wasn’t worth my parents or the school leadership sticking up for me, for protecting me, I certainly wasn’t going to do it on my own. I was, in my own mind, only at the school because of my family history and because my mother worked in the development office at the school. Why else would the school have admitted me? Any merits I thought I could contribute and might even be recognized for were invisible at Milton.

Substance Use- I started using weed in 7th grade. That was early compared to many of my peers. I had friends who were 1 and 2 years ahead of me in school, so I was exposed at a younger age than most of my classmates. And after the bike trip, when the leader abused me, being high was my preferred state. It was my escape. I got high during school, and I often got high after finishing my homework at night. I drank too, although I didn’t like the feeling of being out of control. And with a family history of alcoholism, I was always wary of drinking too much.

The allure of being high led me to experiment with other substances. I suppose the Chorus of Critics helped me as I experimented because I often found myself caught up in the cacophony of their droning reminders of my weaknesses and vulnerabilities. I believe that my fear of becoming an alcoholic combined with the Chorus of Critics playing such a loud soundtrack actually prevented me from going down the rabbit hole of addiction - an all too-common result of sexaul abuse. Cannabis, though, was always a reliable escape.

Aversion to Leadership - I neither trusted nor wanted to be a leader. Leaders had failed me at Milton. The leader of the bike trip failed me by abusing me. The Head of school failed me and others by not holding my abuser accountable, enabling him to abuse an untold number of other students until he was finally fired for abusing another student five years after the school knew of my abuse.

The pinnacle of my leadership was when my small group expedition on NOLS voted me to lead them. This was a three-day trek through Utah’s Canyonlands National Park. There were no roads where we were heading. We just had a destination and a time we needed to be there. While leading this type of group was comfortable to me, when it came to more formalized institutions, I steered clear. Not only did I not trust leaders, I wasn’t good enough in my own thinking. I didn’t deserve to be a leader. Avoiding leadership is, in business vernacular, a career limiting move. I tried to muscle through my early career with this internal conflict playing in the background. I worked in positions that weren’t a good fit for my aptitudes. And after nearly 20 years in large corporate jobs, I left that world behind. This freed me up to create my own comfort with leadership, but that sentiment still lingers: a holdover from mistrusting leaders.

Need to be liked - The one area that I actually felt successful was in friendships. I valued friendships more than anything. While this is still true today, I am less likely to do or say things to others that I think they want or I believe will make them like me. In high school, my need to be liked was nearly pathological. I feared people disliking me. This wasn’t true for teachers, but maybe that’s because I was abused by one.

For me, having friends and being likable was my only ammunition against the Chorus of Critics. The only time I could prove them wrong was in my friendships. At least people like me. I can make friends easily. And the longer I know them, the more I can be myself. What a great feeling. I didn’t have to work as hard with my childhood friends. I knew they were with me, but with others I always had lingering insecure thoughts that I was one stupid move away from being cast out. The Chorus of Critics knew this fear, and they reminded me often.

Adult Life - I have written here mostly about the impact of my abuse that I carried with me through high school. The reality is that these impacts don’t just disappear over time. It’s not like an external wound that you can care for with salves and bandages. These internal wounds stay with you. Sometimes they deepen over time while other times they fade in the hold they have over you. But they don’t typically get better over time without mental health support.

For some, even seeking mental health support is stigmatized, seen as a weakness or disloyalty to one’s family. I am lucky that I knew therapy would be important for me. And I’m lucky that I could afford it. And yet even with the work I have done over the past 40 years, I carry these scars with me. Many are not so lucky. They don’t or can’t afford to seek therapy. For some, the pain becomes too difficult to bear. Suicide and substance abuse are very common results among victims of sexual assault. In a 2001 study in Australia, “young people who had experienced child sexual abuse had a suicide rate that was 10.7 to 13.0 times the national Australian rates.” And in a 2001 National Institutes of Health study, 72% of participants with substance abuse reported past sexual abuse.

For me, recovery and healing is ongoing.

I am lucky. Many victims of abuse become swallowed by the shame. They often turn to substances to relieve the pain, to escape from it. For others, the dark specter of depression is a constant visitor. Many turn to suicide, unable to bear the weight of their pain. Unable to see a way out.

Intervention - ideally early intervention - and support from family and friends is essential for healing. There is a way out.

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If you are in crisis or you think you may have an emergency, call your doctor or 911 immediately. If you're having suicidal thoughts, call 1-800-273-TALK (8255) to talk to a skilled, trained counselor at a crisis center in your area at any time (National Suicide Prevention Lifeline). If you are located outside the United States, call your local emergency line immediately.

The Board's Role in a Sexual Misconduct Investigation

By Lisa Donohue, Board President, Milton Academy

In 2016, my second year as board chair at Milton Academy (MA), we launched a sexual misconduct investigation. There was no manual to guide us through that journey. There was no resource to answer our questions and help ensure that we were taking the right approach. And there wasn’t a resource about what to expect and, more important, how to deal with the unexpected. Through the process, however, I learned that the board and the board chair play a critical role in ensuring realistic goals are established and achieved.

The board’s role is one of governance—upholding the mission and serving as fiduciaries of the school, thinking long range and strategically. This is distinctly different than the head’s and administrators’ responsibilities of handling the day-to-day operations. However, in times of crisis, the board and the administration may work more symbiotically, and the board and board chair may assume a more direct role. This ensures that boards understand the details of the situation, can accurately assess and authorize necessary resources, and provide informed guidance to the head and administration and respond nimbly to changing circumstances.

The board’s role is complex, as it combines compassion with fiduciary responsibilities. One cannot overshadow the other but must be linked in driving the best response. Fiduciary responsibilities are a board’s natural remit, and while extending compassion is a less obvious task, listening to those reporting harm and understanding their experiences is critical. It may appear counterintuitive that being compassionate is the best way to protect the interests of the institution, but this has been my experience, and I believe it is morally necessary and fiscally appropriate.

CRITICAL BOARD WORK

Adopt a survivor/victim first approach. There are both victims and survivors of sexual abuse. “Victim” is often used when someone has recently experienced sexual abuse, while “survivor” is used for someone who has gone through recovery. Either way, understand that each experience is unique and will personally relate to one of these terms. Follow their lead. Each survivor reconciles their experiences differently. At times, there will be tension between compassion and fiduciary responsibilities. Having a north star in this approach can help guide resolution of that tension. It is important to lead with helping those who have suffered harm.

Don’t let fear drive your decisions. Particularly at the start, when a survivor first comes forward with stories of harm, the full landscape is usually unclear with much unknown. Fear often drives short term, risk-averse decision-making that can be detrimental to those reporting harm and can prevent learning that can drive needed change for the future. Don’t look to defend or explain the harm that happened. Instead, seek to understand so that you can ensure such harmful situations can’t happen again and that you can better fashion restorative measures.

Ensure there is board chair–head of school alignment. While it might seem obvious, it is absolutely critical that the board chair and head of school are aligned from the start on process, resources, and communication. The head must operate with the support of the board and board chair and conversely must leverage the board and board chair in decision-making and resource allocation.

Listen. It is important for survivors who are able to come forward to be heard, to be listened to in a way that makes them comfortable. It may be one-on-one or in a small group setting; it may be on campus or at a neutral location. The key is to let the survivor guide school leaders so that they feel comfortable and are able to share their story. Not everyone will be able to come forward, and that’s OK. But those who do need to be validated and commended for their courage. It is often difficult to listen to details of the misconduct and abuse, but it is so important for the survivor’s journey.

Empathize. If you haven’t experienced sexual misconduct directly, you can’t begin to know what a survivor is going through—and it is not authentic to imply you do. But you can and need to be highly empathetic. Listen, acknowledge their pain, and, as necessary, apologize. The validation demonstrates and reinforces your survivor-centered approach.

Form a committee with internal and external resources. One of the first action steps should be the formation of a committee with both internal and external resources and professionals. The board chair should work closely with the head of school to determine the specific composition of the committee, which generally should include expertise in sexual misconduct investigations, communications and crisis management, survivor advocacy, and legal guidance and representation. There are many different firms with expertise in these areas that is specific to secondary schools. It is critical in the situation assessment and decisionmaking processes to take into account the perspectives and advice in these different areas.

Bring in experienced legal counsel. Having appropriate legal counsel is critical, not only in handling legal claims, potential lawsuits, and settlements, but also in the construction of the investigation. While many schools have legal counsel on retainer, it is wise to consider hiring additional counsel with expertise in key areas, such as settlements, mediation, and litigation of sexual misconduct and abuse. As with other external resources, there are law firms with expertise in this area.

Provide support services. Offer professional help and access to survivor advocates to both the survivors and the institution’s community. This can include therapists or psychiatrists who have expertise dealing with sexual misconduct and abuse trauma. While some survivors will be well down their journey in dealing with abuse, others are just beginning and need expert help.

Understand the importance of communication. The right communication, including frequency, tone, and transparency, is critical for all the key audiences, including survivors, alumni, current students and parents, faculty, and other community members. The board’s role here lies in reviewing communication in advance, providing feedback, and being knowledgeable and accessible for any stakeholders who may reach out.

Conduct an investigation. As allegations are brought forward, it is critical to conduct an appropriate investigation, leveraging an experienced and reputable investigation firm. While difficult, it is important to understand the breadth and depth of any incidences and the failures of the past. A healing journey for the survivors first and foremost, but also for the institution, can only begin with this deep understanding. The work starts with finding the right firm with expertise in handling school investigations. Clarify with the investigation firm that you want them to remain independent in their work. From there, it is critical to think through additional parameters of an investigation. This includes everything from how to solicit responses, how to maintain confidentiality and legal privilege, whether to release a summary of the report or release the entire report, and the implications of any or all of these parameters on future legal proceedings. Last, it is important to recognize that the report can also have an impact or potentially play a role in a survivor’s journey. Boards may encounter accusations that are not corroborated or that are false. It is important that the investigation and investigator is able to corroborate allegations and that the requirements for corroboration are outlined at the start. False accusations, while incredibly rare, can have significant consequences for the accused.

Maintain or build a close partnership with local authorities. It is critical to have strong working relationships with all the appropriate local authorities, including local police detectives, the Department of Child and Family Services, and the district attorney’s office, to name a few. Most likely the board itself will not have direct relationships with these authorities, but it should ensure that the institutional leadership is working in partnership with these groups for the safety of all children.

Hold insurance companies accountable. Insurance policies past and present need to be reviewed, particularly the insurance policy in place during sexual misconduct and abuse incidences. In older cases, an insurance “archeologist” may be needed to uncover the insurer and the policy applying at the time. Read all the fine print. Coverage becomes important for budgeting, legal assessments, and potential settlements of claims. Generally speaking, insurance companies will look to avoid paying out a claim or a settlement. Part of their avoidance strategy is to draw out discussions and be slow to respond. As such, it is best to engage the insurance companies at the start of the process and be very clear on application of the insurance policy and appropriate riders. Finally, the board should not shy away from being aggressive with any insurance company that is avoiding its contractual obligations. If you have difficulties with an insurer, consider engaging attorneys with a specialty in insurance coverage disputes.

Update current reporting policies and procedures. While not directly responsible in its governance role, the board should ensure that the school’s administration applies learnings from every aspect of the process to update all current reporting policies and procedures. That includes working with the head and also with the director of human resources and the head of student life. It is critical to ensure an appropriate and safe environment for incidences to be reported and acted on. Policies and procedures should be updated as situations and learning warrant as well as on an annual basis.

LEADING THE WAY

At Milton, we didn’t have a playbook, but we learned along the way; we remained agile and made adjustments, and we listened to experts. We held steadfast to our survivor-centric approach. Since the investigation at Milton, we became founding members of an organization, Learning Courage, that helps school leaders reduce and respond to sexual misconduct in their schools. Learning Courage’s mantra of compassion, integrity, and clarity highlight what must be foundational to any board of trustees’ response to sexual misconduct and abuse allegations and an ensuing investigation.

LISA DONOHUE, a 1983 graduate of Milton Academy in Milton, Massachusetts, is in her sixth year as board president and 12th year as a trustee at the school.

This article originally appeared in the Spring 2021 issue of Independent School Magazine.

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A Survivor's Journey

Please Note: This post contains graphic details of sexual assault. If this type of content is upsetting to you or may be unhealthy for you to read, please don’t. You will still benefit from picking up in future posts on this topic.

What I write here is based on my experience. It is also informed by conversations with many other survivors of sexual abuse - both men and women. My words may resonate strongly for some and less (or not at all) for others. Regardless, my objective in sharing them is to create a deeper understanding of the complexity of sexual abuse by bringing you to some of the complicated moments, tough decisions, actions that made a difference, things that made me feel vulnerable and things that made me feel deeply connected.

Making a public declaration that I had been abused in the 1980s as a student was terrifying. And yet it has also been one of the most meaningful and profound things I have done in my life. It has changed me in positive ways that I’ll share. And it has exposed an inner strength that I intuitively felt I had but had never used. It also brought up old, painful memories and left me wondering if I was doing the right thing more times than I can remember.

I won’t try to cover the full experience in one blog post. There’s too much to discuss. Instead I will address different aspects of my experience as a survivor in different posts. Some of the topics I’ll cover include:

Impact of my abuse
My healing journey
Deciding to disclose my abuse
Participating in the Investigation
Becoming a public survivor
Pressing Charges
Learning from other survivors
Dealing with Indictment and extradition
Setting expectations for an outcome in the case

While you are not likely to enjoy reading what I’ve written, I hope that it is instructive and useful for you, regardless of your experience or knowledge of sexual abuse. I also hope that it provides some measure of comfort for others who have been sexually assaulted. Even though our stories will differ, the feeling of shame is common to abuse survivors. Disclosing these details is also intended to demystify aspects of the survivor experience. Hopefully it will even support healing, even if just to decrease a feeling of isolation for those who have experienced this pain.

Pause. Take a deep breath. It’s 1981. Welcome to my early teens.

I was sexually abused when I was 13 years old, the summer before and during my freshman year at Milton Academy, an independent school in Milton, Massachusetts. I grew up in Milton and had a family connection to the school on both sides of my family that went back over 100 years. This connection was a source of both pride and expectation - mostly self-imposed. It felt like a foregone conclusion that I would also attend the school.

Academics at Milton were rigorous compared to my public elementary school, and I realized quickly that I’d need to work really hard. One thing that made the transition into Milton easy for me was that I had three cousins already enrolled who were also close friends. It was with two of those cousins, Doug and Will, that I decided to go on an adventure biking through the countryside of northern Italy, which was led by a teacher from school, Rey Buono.

Rey was in his mid-30s. He had thinning wavy salt and pepper hair and a mustache. He had this strange habit of smoking only the first half of the cigarette and putting the rest out. There was this nervous energy about him that was foreign to me. His heels rarely touched the ground as he walked. I had heard stories about Rey and how he let kids drink and smoke on the trip and sometimes in his on-campus apartment. My teenage brain registered that as Wow! How cool!. There were rumors that Rey was gay and that he made sexual advances towards male students. Again, my teenage brain: I am going with my buddies. Together we are practically invincible!

On the trip, we mostly stayed in campgrounds. In the larger cities, we stayed in small inns. Rey had a system for randomly assigning sleeping arrangements. In the campgrounds, that meant someone was always sharing a tent with Rey. And in the pensione, the rooms usually had multiple beds. Sometimes they were twins and other times they were double beds. The lottery for sleeping assignments worked in my favor, and I never shared a tent or bed with Rey - until one of our final evenings of the trip.

We were in a pensione in Venice, and my bed assignment was in a room with two twin beds and a double bed. Somehow I ended up assigned to the double bed with Rey. I was uncomfortable with the sleeping arrangements but also relieved that there were two others from the trip sleeping in the other beds. After dinner, Will and Doug and I headed off to drink rum and Cokes by the side of one of the canals. I hoped we would be out long enough to find everyone asleep when we got back to the room. That’s not what happened. I delayed getting into bed. At some point in the night, I remember feeling Rey’s hands on my back. I froze. What is happening? His hands continued moving around my body and ultimately rested on my penis, which he began to massage. I was terrified and confused. What did I do to make him think I wanted this? Why is my body responding to his touch? I smelled cigarettes and wine on his breath. I don’t want this! Is anyone else awake? How do I make this stop?

I turned over so he couldn’t touch me, and he just kept pushing his hands underneath me. I got out of bed and went to the bathroom, trying to figure out what to do and hoping that he would fall asleep. When I got back into bed, Rey touched me again. Just stop! Can’t you tell that I don’t want this to happen? Why are you doing this? Does my erection mean that I have somehow suppressed homosexual feelings until now, and his touch somehow awakened awareness of my true sexuality? Doug and Will are here with me! I have to let them know what Rey did.

After breakfast the next day, I pulled Doug and Will aside. What a relief to have close friends with me to trust with my horror and shame. I wasn’t sure how they would respond, but I knew I had to tell them. There’s nothing we can do about this, but I have to tell them. They will believe me. I need someone to believe me. When Doug heard, he became really angry and told me that he was going to confront Rey. Yes! But what if he denies it? What if he blames me for touching him? I felt an overwhelming sense of being cared for and that Doug’s conversation would prevent this from happening to me again. And I felt fear for how Rey would react. What if he gets mad at me?

My parents raised me to follow rules and respect adults, so Doug’s advocacy was powerful, and unlike anything I had ever experienced in my life. It was an incredible act of courage to confront Rey. Here was a teen calling out an adult for inappropriate behavior. I would never have had the courage to do what Doug did for me. At a time when I felt unable to advocate for myself beyond telling my friends what happened, Doug stepped in and seemed to know exactly what to do. He spoke for me when I didn’t know how. It was a huge relief.

“Rey, you fucked up,” Doug told him. There was no denial. “I’m really sorry,” he admitted. “That won’t happen again.”

The night I returned home, my mom sat on my bed and cried as she told me that she and my father were separating. My parents were not emotionally expressive, so seeing her cry really hit me hard. How could I possibly add to her sadness by telling her what Rey did to me. My world felt fractured. Two horrible life experiences collided at the same time. At least I could share one of them with friends and classmates. Being molested, on the other hand, didn’t feel quite as socially acceptable to discuss as my parent’s separation. Besides, I had told my buddies, and everything was going to be OK. Rey wouldn’t dare try that again after Doug’s confrontation. I wanted so much to believe that it was an isolated incident. And not telling my mother also meant I didn’t have to deal with the questions she might ask.

But not telling my mom also meant that she believed everything was terrific about the bike trip and that Rey was a great guy. I gave her no reason to believe otherwise. So in a cruel twist that was based in love, she asked administrators at Milton if Rey could be my academic advisor. She felt like he knew me and might be a better support than someone else at the school during the early days of my parents’ separation. Oh no! What do I do now? I felt so stuck when she told me. She was trying to do the right thing for me, actually sticking her head out on my behalf, which wasn’t a common behavior for her at the time. I forget whether I wrestled with saying anything to my mom about Rey becoming my advisor. I knew it would be a challenging year academically, and maybe I wanted to believe that what happened in Italy wouldn’t happen at school. Now I have to pretend this is fine with me. She had no idea that I didn’t like the idea. I’m so stuck.

The first evidence that the abuse would continue came before school even started. My mother invited Rey to join us for a weekend on Cape Cod. Looking back, I know how wildly inappropriate this was. What a blurring of boundaries! I don’t recall any discussion with her about inviting him. At this point, I was trying so desperately to make it look like everything was just fine with me. I had a girlfriend; I had plenty of friends; I was co-captain of the JV lacrosse team. I can’t let anyone know that anything is wrong. One of the nights Rey was with us on the Cape, we were hanging out in my room listening to music. It was a small room, with not much space for more than a couple twin beds, so that’s where we sat. After a while, he put his hand on my thigh and then moved his hand toward my crotch. I remember feeling a sense of anger and inner strength. I moved his hand and told him, “no.” This is my space. You are on my turf. I was in a home I loved where I spent my childhood summers. I was strong and centered enough to say no and asked him to stop during that visit.

There are a lot of details I don’t recall about that year. And there are others I remember very well. Rey was present throughout that year not just because he was my advisor but also because he directed the freshman play. I loved acting and had looked forward to the play, hoping I’d get a decent role, but I now had this added challenge of being directed by Rey. When he cast me in a lead role, I worried whether it was my acting ability or if Rey had some other motive.

To say that I struggled academically at Milton is putting it mildly. I know now that my learning style was not suited for learning by reading and memorizing details. All I knew then was that my grades were barely passing despite the 3-4 hours of work I put in each night on homework. At some point in the fall, Rey offered to help me prepare for a history test in a class that had been difficult for me. Did I ask for his help or tell him I was struggling? As my advisor, he knew how I was doing. Come to my apartment on campus, he offered. I can help you prepare. I was scared I might fail and felt I didn’t have another option. And by then, I was so deep into the deception of pretending that everything was just fine, so I suspect I felt I had no choice.

Like many things in my life from 35 years ago, I don’t remember much about these study sessions. But each one ended with him giving me a blow job. I was really into girls and never before had thoughts that I might be gay. But what does it mean if I keep going to his apartment? I felt ashamed. Unlike when I was in Italy, I didn’t feel like I could tell friends. How can I stop this? Why do I keep ending up here when I hate it? Will I make it through Milton? What would my friends and family think if they found out? Why can’t I make it stop?

These were all questions that came up while I drifted off to sleep. They followed me on my way to school. They sat next to me in every class. They haunted me on the lacrosse field. The shame congealed and settled into my veins. I am a bad person. I am not smart. I am an imposter in every aspect of my life. I am only here because of my family legacy. I don’t deserve to be here. I can’t leave. I have to make it. I can’t stay. I have to get out.

I was so unhappy that I began to imagine the possibility of killing myself. I didn’t really want to die, but I didn’t want to live either. I hinted at some of my thoughts to Doug one day as we sat in his room listening to and analyzing the lyrics of Pink Floyd’s album, Dark Side of the Moon. “You raise the blade; you make the change; you rearrange me ‘till I’m sane.” This was about suicide, I reasoned. “Jamie,” Doug said, “this is actually about a lobotomy.” It was written about Syd Barrett, one of the founders of the group who fell into extreme mental illness during the band’s rise to fame.

Doug was a huge Pink Floyd fan and avid reader. I always admired this about Doug. He’s an incredibly smart guy. Being friends with him made me feel a bit less like a fake. At least I’m smart enough that Doug seems to enjoy hanging with me. The conversation about the Pink Floyd lyrics gave Doug yet another clue that I was really struggling. A couple of days later, he asked me for permission to tell his mother what happened on the bike trip.

Yes! Please! This is how to make Rey stop! But what if people find out that I’ve been going to Rey’s apartment? Then everyone at school will think I enjoyed what he is doing to me! Maybe they already think I’m gay, and I’m the only one who never considered it. While I was ashamed of what might come out about my behavior, what was more important to me was that this might lead to the abuse stopping. I gave Doug permission to speak with his mother.

Doug’s mother, Sue, was always someone I felt comfortable speaking with so it felt OK to me that she know. I also knew her to be righteous and unafraid to speak her mind. I had personal experience with this. These things made me feel more at ease.

Sue pulled me aside within a day or two and asked me if what Doug had told her was true. We sat in her red station wagon outside my house, and she asked me if she could share this information with my mom. I don’t have any memory of discussing with my mom the details of the abuse or what would happen next. Sue offered to write and then send a letter to the administration at Milton, telling them that Rey had sexually abused me. She sent the letter.

And then nobody at school asked me about the bike trip or whether anything had happened afterward.

There was silence!

What a relief! But what is happening? What do they know? What are they doing? They must know everything. How do they know without speaking with me? Who is telling them about what happened? Someone must be. I’m so relieved this is over. Is it over?

At least Rey was no longer my advisor, and the abuse was over.

But there was no discussion. Nobody from the school asked me any questions. The only thing I remember hearing about what was happening was that Rey would be prohibited from doing more bike trips. I was so relieved that no other kids would ever have to experience what happened to me on the trip.

I never questioned why Rey was still at the school. What was most important to me was that the abuse stopped. I could try to pretend everything was OK. I can do this. But everything wasn’t OK. I don’t know how to do this. I’m not sure I want to do this. The shame ate at me. It tore at my self-confidence and consumed my sense of worthiness. Friends were my only solace. I threw myself into singing in a rock band, playing lacrosse, and I smoked a lot of pot. Friends continued to like me even when I struggled to like myself. I surrounded myself with them as much as possible. My friends, I believe, literally saved me. Just don’t take away my friends.

Peers continued to be a major source of comfort to me through the rest of my years at Milton. They made me feel less like a fraud. There was safety in numbers. We had each other’s back. When others failed to protect me, friends were always there. With close friends and family, I became open about what Rey had done to me. Even though I wasn’t strong enough to stop Rey in Italy, I told friends. And they helped me stop it. They don’t need to know there is more to the story. Tenacity, fear, hard work, close friendships and some luck, I managed to stay at Milton.

On a beautiful day in June of 1985, my two grandfathers, graduates themselves, presented me with my diploma. I still felt like damaged goods, unworthy of their pride, but I made it.

The abuse stopped. But it didn’t go away.

The next in this series of blog posts will focus on the impact of the abuse in my life after high school. If you'd like to receive updates on future blog posts, you can register for them by clicking here.

Note that this is obviously not a ‘victim statement’ or testimony of any kind – I have already done that under oath and I’m quite glad to have it behind me – but rather my own story in human terms as I experienced it. Particularly as to my own scattered teenage thoughts, which I have rendered here in italics, I’ve written what I felt as I remember it now (I did not keep a contemporaneous journal at the time), and not anything that I would wish to have taken verbatim as fact.