Infamous Scandals

by Anne Williams

This happened, according to Grant, when he was very young, at the age of about seven or eight. Hahn is said to have picked him up from time to time in his patrol car, offering him a lift home. However, instead, Hahn regularly sexually abused him. On one occasion Hahn took the boy to his apartment, where he called West to join them. The boy was taken into the bathroom, and one by one, the men sodomised him.

  Hahn had been forcing his attentions on another young boy, Robert Galliher. Like Grant, Galliher came from a poor family and from a young age spent a good deal of time out on the streets with his friends. Hahn befriended the Galliher family, and young Robert and his brother Brett were impressed by his sports car, which was equipped with an early version of the mobile phone. Hahn regularly took the boys on outings – separately, of course – to the gym and to his apartment. He then introduced Robert to West, leaving them alone together. He claims that West forced him to engage in oral sex, threatening him if he told anybody what had happened. On some occasions the men gave Robert marijuana to smoke, although they did not partake themselves.

  Traumatizing experiences

  Sadly for both these men, who were naturally traumatized by their experiences, the crimes committed by Hahn against them did not come to light for many years. After Hahn’s suicide, the records of complaints against him were destroyed and the case was closed. It was only later that the men felt able to come forward. Up to that time they had been too frightened to make these disclosures against the mayor, fearing that his powerful position might cause them to be put in jail or otherwise punished. Both men had had a history of drug abuse and spells in jail, and therefore felt themselves in a weak position to criticise the powers that be.

  What later emerged was that there had been a huge cover-up of Hahn and West’s activities. In addition, another man, George E. Robey, who was a scout leader and a friend of the two men, was also alleged to have sexually abused boys in his care. Like Hahn, he killed himself, but there were no records to show that he was the subject of an investigation. Galliher also alleged that before West died, he visited him in prison and told him not to talk about the past. West had threatened ‘severe consequences’ if anything untoward came to light.

  Cruel and disturbing

  Until his dying day, West never admitted to the crime of having sex with under-age boys. He said that he had no idea his friend Hahn was a paedophile, and denied that there was ever any sexual abuse at the boy scout camps he ran.

  ‘I ran scout camps for five years,’ he said. ‘I had 1,300 kids a year come through the scout camp . . . and I taught a lot of kids how to swim.’ Because of his position, he was believed, and it is only now that the truth is beginning to come out.

  According to the Galliher boys’ mother, Marlene Traynor, there was never a formal investigation into either Hahn or West’s activities, even though she reported the sexual abuse of her children to the police in the 1980s. The police paid for some counselling for the children, but never followed up the claim. When Hahn committed suicide, Traynor was horrified to find that Hahn was given an official funeral. ‘He was given a bloody hero’s funeral,’ she said. ‘It’s like he died in the line of duty.’

  Today, the true story of the activities of David Hahn, Jim West and others in the boy scout camps of the 1970s and 1980s is only just beginning to emerge. But it seems clear that the allegations now coming forward point to a form of child sexual abuse that was far more cruel and disturbing than the inappropriate sexual relationships West formed through gay Internet websites in the 1990s. And, as many have pointed out, it is only when the real facts of the case are discovered that the victims who suffered so much at the hands of West and his friends can begin to rebuild their lives.

  Ted Kennedy

  Edward Moore Kennedy, brother of John F. Kennedy, is a prominent US Senator today, and at one time was a contender for president of the USA. However, a major scandal erupted in 1972, involving an accident on Chappaquiddick Island and, in the wake of the adverse publicity from this, his chances of running for the presidency were dashed.

  Brothers assassinated

  The youngest of nine children born to Joseph Kennedy and his wife Rose, Edward ‘Teddy’ Kennedy grew up in the privileged atmosphere of a prominent, wealthy Irish-American family. He attended prestigious schools and was educated at Harvard; however, in May 1951 he was expelled from the university for cheating – ironically, during an ethics exam. He later went on to study law, and during his years as a student, helped to manage his brother John’s political career.

  In 1960 John Kennedy was elected president of the United States. His younger brother Robert was appointed attorney general, and became the president’s closest advisor. Edward also became a powerful figure, and the three brothers dominated the American political landscape until John was assassinated in 1963. When Robert was assassinated in 1968, it seemed that their younger brother Edward would be a popular choice for president, and that another Kennedy in the White House would help to heal the wounds of the past. However, because of the scandal at Chappaquiddick, that was not to be.

  Married men

  The scandal involved Ted Kennedy and a young woman called Mary Jo Kopechne, who was 28 years old at the time of her death. Since graduating from college, Mary Jo had worked in Washington, initially for Senator George Smathers and then for Robert Kennedy. After the death of John Kennedy, Robert Kennedy ran for president and Mary Jo, along with other young female colleagues, worked hard on the campaign, earning the nickname, ‘the boiler room girls’. Sadly, after his assassination they had to close down the offices. As a way of thanking them for their hard work, Ted invited them all down for the weekend to Martha’s Vineyard, the playground of the elite. There, on 18 July 1969 they watched a yachting race at Edgartown, and then went on to a small party held in their honour on the island of Chappaquiddick.

  There were six girls in all: Mary Jo Kopechne, Susan Tannenbaum, Maryellen Lyons, Ann Lyons, Rosemary Keough and Esther Newburgh. Ted invited five of his male friends along to make up the party: US Attorney Paul Markham, Joe Gargan (Kennedy’s cousin, who was also his lawyer), Charles Tretter, Raymond La Rosa and John Crimmins. The men were all married, but none of their wives attended. Joe Gargan rented the cottage where the party was held, and John Crimmins supplied the drinks. As later transpired, he brought three half gallons of vodka, four fifths of scotch, two bottles of rum and two cases of beer. All this for 12 people, some of whom were not drinking.

  Car crashed over bridge

  At around 11.15 p.m., Kennedy offered to take Mary Jo Kopechne back to the ferry, which would take her to Edgartown. According to his account, he lost control on the drive back and, instead of turning left to the ferry road, he took a right turn and found himself on a road that led unexpectedly to a narrow bridge. Not knowing the way, he made a mistake and crashed the car over the side of the bridge. The car fell into the water and turned over. Kennedy then told how he had found himself in the water, and had looked around to find Mary Jo, but had been unable to see her. Fearing for his life in the strong current, he left the car where it was, and crawled out of the river. Suffering from shock and concussion, he managed to get back to the cottage, where he asked Gargan and Markham for help. The three of them went back to the river and tried to dive down into the water to open the car and get Mary Jo out, but they failed in their efforts. Then Kennedy left the scene, returned to the ferry landing and swam his way over to the mainland, where he returned to his hotel.

  It was only in the morning that he called the police. He explained the delay by saying that he had been in a state of shock, and had only come to his senses when he woke up. Kennedy also maintained that he had not been drunk at the time he was driving, although many knew that he was a heavy drinker. However, because of his powerful position, the police accepted his explanation, and he was taken to court and charged only with the offence of failing to stay at the scene and report an accident he had caused. The law called for a mandatory jail sentence for this crime, but Kennedy ma
naged to get off with a two months’ suspended sentence.

  Not surprisingly, a scandal broke out when the story came to light. Why had Kennedy been driving this young woman home by herself, late at night, taking her in the wrong direction to an isolated part of the island? Was he having an affair with her? Or worse, had he tried to get her drunk at the party and then take her out to have sex with her? Nobody knew, but the circumstances looked suspicious.

  Suffocated to death

  Then new evidence emerged. Christopher ‘Huck’ Look, a local sheriff, had come upon the car after midnight, parked near the road junction with a man and woman inside. When he appeared, the driver apparently panicked and drove the car off in the direction of the dirt road. In addition, the question was raised as to why, when the car crashed into the river, Kennedy had not sought assistance from the house owners nearby, why he had swum back to the mainland and why he had failed to report the incident until persuaded to do so by Gargan and Markham? According to Gargan’s later testimony, Kennedy had tried to cover up the accident and his part in it by suggesting that Kopechne had been in the car alone.

  The body of Kopechne was recovered, trapped in the car, by diver John Farrar. It emerged that she had suffocated, rather than drowned, to death, as she had been trapped in an air pocket. It was estimated that she could have lived for up to two hours after the accident, which indicated that had Kennedy got help earlier, she might well have lived.

  No one but Kennedy knows exactly what happened that night on Chappaquiddick, but many suspect that he valued his career more than Kopechne’s life and tried to cover up the incident. Whether or not this is true, the affair certainly cost him his chance of the presidency, although in later years he became a successful senator.

  Cecil Parkinson

  Cecil Parkinson caused a political scandal in Britain during the regime of the Thatcher government inthe 1980s, when it came to light that his former secretary Sara Keays was pregnant with his child.

  Despite his upper-class demeanour, Cecil Parkinson came from a working-class background. The son of a railway worker, he was a bright child and worked hard at school, eventually gaining a scholarship to Cambridge University. He chose to go into politics, and in 1970, he was elected as a member of parliament. He was a favourite with party leader Margaret Thatcher, and when her government came to power in 1979 he was made a junior minister. His career flourished, and two years later he became chairman of the Conservative Party and paymaster general, which meant that he was part of the Cabinet. He was also given an official title, Chancellor of the Suchy of Lancaster. After the 1983 election, he became a leading minister in the government, as Secretary of State for Trade and Industry. A tremendously successful politician, who was married with three daughters, it seemed that he had achieved everything he could wish for.

  A broken man

  However, during the same year, a huge scandal broke. For 12 years, Parkinson had been having an affair with his secretary, Sara Keays. According to Keays, the relationship had carried on because Parkinson continually promised her that he would leave his wife and marry her. According to her, he proposed marriage on at least two occasions. Eventually Ms Keays became pregnant, prompting speculation that she had done so to force the issue, which she denied. Whatever the truth of the matter, Ms Keays published a statement in The Times newspaper publicly criticising Mr Parkinson and ‘setting the record straight’ about the relationship between the two of them.

  In her statement, Keays said, ‘My baby was conceived in a long-standing, loving relationship which I allowed to continue because I believed in our eventual marriage’. She felt that it was wrong for her to remain silent in the circumstances because it would cast doubt on her reputation, and she felt that her child ought to know who its father was. She perceived it as a fundamental right for a child to know this, and many agreed with her.

  Margaret Thatcher initially supported Parkinson, but in response to the scandal he offered his resignation, which she felt advisable to accept. In a statement to the press, made through his lawyer, he admitted the affair but made no other comment. Those who knew him reported that he did not entirely accept Ms Keays’ version of the event, and was a ‘broken man’ as the result of what appeared to be the end of his political career.

  When the child, Flora, was born, a long-running, bitter dispute between Keays and Parkinson started over maintenance payments. To make matters more difficult, the child, Flora, had to undergo a major operation when she was four years old, and as a result suffered learning difficulties. She also suffers from Asperger’s syndrome, a neurobiological disorder which is characterised by difficulties in social interaction. Naturally, the press were fascinated in the very public battle between her parents, which was exacerbated by the problems that Keays now faced in bringing up her daughter. As a result, Parkinson gained a series of court orders forbidding the press to discuss Flora. These rulings were so strict that she was not allowed to appear in school photographs or perform in school plays. However, when she turned 18, the court injunction expired, and Flora then appeared in the press and on television to tell her side of the story.

  The court injunction, which had begun as an attempt to protect the child, now seemed to have emerged as an attempt to protect Parkinson. Speaking on a television documentary, Flora described how she had never met her father, saying, ‘I would like to meet my daddy, because I haven’t been given the chance to see him yet’.

  In a radio interview Keays gave vent to her feelings about the unfairness of what had happened. Flora had been born with epilepsy, and as a result had to have the right frontal lobe of her brain removed when she was four. Sara had devoted her life to looking after her daughter, educating her at home and encouraging her in sports such as trampolining, horse riding and ballet. She had also travelled the world looking for experts who could help Flora when she was diagnosed with Asperger’s syndrome, a form of autism. Yet because of the injunction, nobody knew about the struggles they were going through. Keays said, ‘What the judge effectively did was to say, it’s okay for everybody to know about all the lies that have been uttered about her mother . . . but nobody can know about Flora.’

  What especially angered Keays was that, in a very short time, the episode was forgotten and Parkinson was back in action as a career politician. By 1987 he was secretary of state for energy and two years later, transport minister. When Margaret Thatcher resigned, he resigned with her and received a title, Baron Parkinson of Carnforth. He went on a TV satire show about current affairs, and was thought to have performed well, although the injunction prevented anybody referring directly to the scandal that had taken place.

  In 1997 the leader of the Conservative Party, William Hague, made Parkinson party chairman once more. According to Keays, at this time Flora had entered secondary school and was mercilessly bullied as a result. But over the years, she had realised that the Conservative Party were even prepared to sacrifice the happiness and well-being of herself and her child in order to protect the career of one of their most illustrious members.

  The Parkinson scandal, though many Conservative politicians and supporters would prefer to forget it, remains one of the most fascinating of recent times in Britain. It brings up many serious issues to do with the responsibility of fathers to their children, as well as the rights of unmarried mothers. Today, Keays still feels that she has been badly treated, both by the establishment and by Parkinson. When news of the affair between her and Parkinson first broke in the 1980s, she was vilified by many women, who saw her as a threat to the institution of marriage.

  Although some have criticised the belligerent tone of Keays’ complaints against her former lover, it is clear that she has been a devoted mother to her daughter, who today is flourishing despite her many setbacks in life. Even Parkinson’s eldest daughter, Mary, who has a history of drug abuse and other problems, has paid tribute to her father’s former mistress, saying that she has done ‘a terrific job’.

  Strom Thurmond


  James Strom Thurmond was a high-profile American politician who at one time was governor of South Carolina, and also became a senator. In 1948 he ran for president of the United States, largely on a policy of maintaining segregation between black and white people. However, it later transpired that as a young man, he had fathered a black child by a maid working in his parents’ home. This threatened to bring down his political career, but in the end he remained in office as senator until the age of 100, becoming the oldest senator ever to do so at the time (later, his record was broken by Senator Robert C. Byrd).

  Filibuster against civil rights

  Thurmond was born on 5 December 1902 in Edgefield, South Carolina. His parents were John William Thurmond, a lawyer, and Eleanor Gertrude Strom Thurmond. He was educated at local public schools and went on to study horticulture at Clemson University. In 1923 he gained his degree and became a farmer, teacher and athletic coach. By 1929 he had risen to the position of Edgefield county superintendent of education. He then read law and became the town and county attorney of the district. His career in the judiciary prospered, and before long be became a judge, leaving for a short while to serve in the army during World War II. On his return, he ran for governor of South Carolina, and was elected in 1946. He later took office as a senator. A passionate advocate of segregation, he was the originator of the 1956 Southern Manifesto, which campaigned against the Supreme Court desegregation ruling that had been passed that year.