Son Says He Was Used to Lure Others
By Ernesto Londoño
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, September 28, 2007
As Stanley Schwartz apologized to a judge in a Montgomery County courtroom yesterday for molesting three minors, his ex-wife and three of his four children sat in the front row, waiting to be heard.
When the time came, the youngest of the three siblings, all of whom are now adults, spoke first. "Pedophiles are mentally ill and cannot be cured of this disease," she said, reading from a statement. "It is our responsibility to take him off the street."
The three described Schwartz, 65, as a prolific abuser so obsessed with sexual encounters with minors that he used his children as bait to lure others to his home and on family trips.
"He was a dismissive, condescending, sexually inappropriate man who left me in harm's way when I was 6," another of his daughters said in court. She said Schwartz had walked in on a male teenage babysitter who was abusing her but did nothing to stop it.
The siblings, whose names are being withheld to protect their privacy, asked Montgomery County Circuit Court Judge Eric M. Johnson to sentence their father, a patent lawyer, to the longest term possible.
The judge imposed an 18-year prison term, a punishment far longer than recommended sentencing guidelines call for under the circumstances.
Schwartz was charged last year in three cases. He was initially arrested after a 15-year-old foreign exchange student from Kuwait told detectives that Schwartz climbed into his bed and fondled him Aug. 27, 2006.
After that case was disclosed, a female relative and a male friend of Schwartz's son told detectives that they were molested by Schwartz several years ago, when they were children. Schwartz pleaded guilty to sex abuse of a minor, third-degree sex offense and fourth-degree sex offense.
Schwartz, who has been estranged from his family for years, told the relatives in the courtroom that he regrets how much he hurt them.
"My actions have caused a lot of harm and pain to a lot of people, especially to my former wife and four children," he said. "I have no excuses for them. I could offer no excuses. My actions have had a truly devastating effect on each and every one of them because I was unable to get my horrible illness under control."
Schwartz's son told the court that his father used him as "bait" to molest children.
"The memories I have about my father are not good ones," he said. "They are associated with both abuse and manipulation. I'm not going to sit here and elaborate on every time I witnessed my father abusing children or every time he used me to bring him into contact with more children. I will just say this: It happened; it happened frequently."
Schwartz came to the attention of authorities during the early 1990s after several male basketball players at Thomas S. Wootton High School reported being molested, according to Montgomery County police detective Jordan Satinsky, who investigated the current cases. For reasons that were unclear, police did not charge him at the time. Satinsky said Schwartz, who was a volunteer coach, sometimes provided alcohol to minors before molesting them.
Schwartz said he has been receiving sex offender therapy and is now able to control his impulses. Schwartz has been disbarred in the District and will soon lose his license to practice in Virginia, his lawyer said.
"I am taking full responsibility for my abusive behavior," Schwartz said. "I am taking positive steps to make sure nothing like this happens ever again, and I recognize I have a serious sexual disorder."
But prosecutors and his children said he has made such promises in the past to get out of trouble.
When family members discovered that he had been abusing a female relative, he promised to get help, they said. The same thing occurred after he was confronted with the allegations at Wootton High.
Despite the trail of allegations, he was allowed to host foreign exchange students.
Satinsky said Schwartz hosted about 30 students at his home in recent years. Most were ages 13 to 16. The student who reported the abuse to police said Schwartz encouraged him to sleep in Schwartz's bed and to sleep in his underwear.
"American boys sleep in their underwear, not T-shirts and shorts," Schwartz told the teenager, according to police.
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