The purpose of the first interview was to talk to
Ferdinand. This interview took place at Ferdinand's
home. The interview was tape recorded, although a transcript
was never made. While conducting the interview of Ferdinand,
the boys, Johnny, Stephan with his girlfriend, and Peter, dropped
in to visit, one after the other. This made it impossible to
continue.
A second interview was arranged with Ferdinand several weeks
later. It was Sunday evening and when the interviewer (B.R.)
arrived, Johnny and Peter were present. This had not been
agreed beforehand; the boys had come in casually as before.
Ferdinand explained the purpose of the interview to the boys, and
added: "It's OK, you can tell him anything you
want." Johnny immediately began to attack the police
with vitriol. Peter, in a more restrained manner, agreed
with him. At that moment (and later by telephone with
Stephan) appointments were made to interview the boys separately
and at the home of the interviewer. The interview with
Johnny was more difficult to organize since he was still at school
during the day, so it was agreed to meet in Ferdinand's home,
during which time Ferdinand left the house at the interviewer's
request.
For the interviews, a list of questions was compiled. To
avoid bias, the boys were explicitly given the opportunity to
mention the positive as well as negative aspects of the following:
Through Ferdinand's barrister we were able to get a photocopy
of the entire police dossier, including the statements made by all
the children involved in the cases against all three
defendants. As our analysis in the Appendix
shows, the quality of the statements made by Ferdinand's
three friends stood out. After interviewing the three boys
three more interviews with Ferdinand took place. His account
of the events did not differ from the statements found in the
dossier, and did not differ from the statements made by the three
boys during our interviews.
Despite the attempt to obtain a balanced description of the
events, a remarkably black and white picture emerged. The
boys described their friendship and feelings for Ferdinand in
glowing terms. On the other hand the attitude towards the
police is unequivocally negative. The simplest explanation,
of course, is that the boys experienced their relationship with
Ferdinand and their contact with the police in these terms.
The opinions given in these interviews may reflect the truth.
However, all relationships are difficult and there arise
conflicts of interest from time to time. The
uncompromisingly positive attitude of the boys towards their adult
friend seems strange, even given that the relationship had been a
good one. Several factors might play a role here. We
see in all three cases, evidence of less than ideal family
backgrounds. It appears that Ferdinand provided an important
emotional support for the boys throughout their youth and
continues to do so. This factor alone may be sufficient to
explain their attitude.
Professor Walter Everaerd, University of Amsterdam, Department
of Psychology, suggested that the interviews may reflect the macho
image the boys wanted to give of themselves. Boys are
socialized to be tough about sexual things, making it difficult to
admit that they were abused, he argued. The claim that they
"joined in for the fun"' and that they liked the sex
with Ferdinand could be their way of protecting themselves against
the implicit charge that they had allowed themselves to be
exploited and abused. However, except for the pornography
sessions, these boys did not talk primarily about sexual
adventures, and when they talked about the pornography, all three
boys said that they had been exploited by Fred. They talked
about a long-term relationship in which they claimed to love their
adult friend. Stephan asked for the tape recorder to be
turned on again at the end of the interview in order to underscore
this point.
Boys are not socialized to claim that they love an adult
homosexual pedophile. Indeed, it may require some
considerable courage for young men, all of whom regard themselves
heterosexual, to say these things to a stranger, regardless of how
"safe" the stranger might appear to be. It is more
likely, in this case, that in spite of the image threatening
nature of the admissions, the boys felt strongly enough about
their relationship with Ferdinand to make these claims.
Professor Everaerd's explanation also does not account for why the
boys, years after the sexual relationship had come to an end in
two cases, and despite the strong social disapproval and
difficulties it has led to with the police, still visit Ferdinand
regularly.
Because the first meeting between the
interviewer and the boys took place in Ferdinand's home the boys
may have felt that they were talking to someone who was in some
way "part of the family." In fact, they did not
know exactly who the interviewer was.205
[205] In other cases, it has been very
difficult to obtain co-operation of some individuals, particularly
as a rumor preceded the interviewer that he (B.R.) was an F.B.I.
spy, an impression strengthened when he was seen to have working
contacts with some police.
This does not necessarily mean that the information was less
accurate. It may mean that the boys felt free to say what
they thought. It must be noted in this respect that the
thrust of the boys' statements was similar to those made by them
in front of the police, as was confirmed by the police dossier.
When the interviewer returned with the
transcripts, the attitude seemed to have changed somewhat.
One of the boys made it clear that he did not want to discuss the
matter any further, though he was happy to have given the
interview and was pleased with the transcript. One boy
wanted to add a paragraph to his interview and one made some minor
corrections for the sake of clarity. Requests to contact the
parents of the boys was rejected by all three, although Johnny's
mother had also supported Ferdinand during the crisis and written
to him while he was in jail.206
[206] Ferdinand provided us with some of the
letters which the boys and others had written to him while he was
in jail. They too make up an extraordinary testimonial to
the nature of the relationship that existed between them.
Another explanation for the delineation the boys made between
Ferdinand and police may have arisen from of the contrast between
their experiences. The boys' contacts with the police were,
indeed, very negative. Against this backdrop their feelings
towards Ferdinand and recollections of the good times with him,
may have become recast in an exaggerated relief. This may be
an example of how individual experiences are simplified and
codified in the process of being accommodated into individual
subjective biographies. In this process the good tends to
become very good and the bad, very bad.
These three interviews cannot be regarded as a study, for the
sample is not sufficiently large nor representative enough.
It is unfortunate that we were not able to interview the children
who had given negative statements to the police about their
relationships and experiences with Fred V. No
generalizations, therefore, can be made about the nature of
pedophile relationships, the manufacture of pornography or about
the approach of the police from this material alone.
Nevertheless, the general conclusions that could be drawn from
these three stories do not contradict the findings of other
research based on self-selected samples, such as the first study
of Theo Sandfort. Nor are the relationships described here
unlike others we have encountered. We believe that these
stories are fairly typical, not only of the contacts between men
and boys, but also of the way that boy child pornography comes
into existence.
[Articles
& Essays] [Doc. List E9]
