Mimi McCann ’13: Richard P. Smith, member of the class of 1966 and former faculty member, was indicted on by a Massachusetts grand jury with charges of sexually abusing four children at a summer camp in 1981. The Philadelphia Inquirer reported the Friday following his arrest on April 24 that Smith had also admitted to molesting an Episcopal student in 1977 as well. This confession has yet to be confirmed by authorities.
Smith taught from 1970 through 1990 at both Devon and Merion, and then served as a research associate in the development office until 1998. Smith was a fourth grade teacher at Episcopal during the time when these alleged incidents took place at Camp Good News in Sandwich, Massachusetts.
District Attorney Michael O’Keefe of the Cape and Islands district of Massachusetts said that Smith was indicted on charges including the rape of one child and the indecent assault and battery of three other children ages 11 to 15. He was arraigned in the Massachusetts Superior Court and his bail was set at $10,000. No details are yet known of the possible molestation of the EA student.
The alleged abuses that occurred at this camp were brought to light when former Massachusetts Senator Scott Brown published a memoir revealing that he had been sexually abused at a summer camp on Cape Cod in the 1970s. Brown left the camp nameless in the memoir but Camp Good News came forward shortly after and apologized. The Massachusetts police force investigated these allegations and determined nine suspects, two of which, including Smith, have been indicted. As of yet, there is no evidence connecting Smith to Brown’s molestation.
An email signed by Hamilton Clark went out to all Episcopal faculty and parents as soon as the school was made aware of the indictment. Clark wrote, “We are resolute in our overriding commitment to protect every child now and in the future. We care deeply about our past students and feel a strong obligation to assist and support any member of our community who may have been affected.”
Clark told Scholium, “the thing we care most about is having kids in a safe environment. It is sickening and scary to think that somebody who was here years ago was possibly abusing kids.” He said that he did not know Richard Smith personally, but had seen him at various school events over the years.
Prior to Smith’s confession to abusing an EA student, Clark released a statement to the Delaware County Times in which he stated that Episcopal is “working with local authorities and two attorneys who are experts in this field to determine if there was any inappropriate behavior between Mr. Smith and any of our students during his tenure at our school.”
Upon hearing the news of Smith’s admission to abusing an EA student, Clark said, “the story today that Richard Smith had in fact admitted to abusing a kid back in the seventies and then having told the school about that, that’s something that we had no sense was coming.”
Jay Crawford, the Headmaster at the time of these alleged abuses, has not yet commented. According to Clark, Crawford is on vacation at the moment and will likely comment when he returns. Clark noted that he has not yet heard from the Inquirer directly, but they have been in touch with Bill Doherty, Episcopal’s Director of Communications.
“We do whatever we can to make sure it doesn’t happen now,” said Clark, citing the necessary police clearances for EA teachers as well as the policies in place for overnight trips. “We are living in a very different world today,” he explained, “with much more oversight and accountability, and very clear procedures on how to proceed if there is any suspicion of child abuse.”