[Congressional Record Volume 140, Number 74 (Tuesday, June 14, 1994)]
[Senate]
[Page S]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Printing Office [www.gpo.gov]


[Congressional Record: June 14, 1994]
From the Congressional Record Online via GPO Access [wais.access.gpo.gov]

 
      SENATE RESOLUTION 221--RELATING TO UNITED STATES VERSUS KNOX

  Mr. ROTH (for himself, Mr. Grassley, and Mr. Heflin) submitted the 
following resolution; which was referred to the Committee on the 
Judiciary:

                              S. Res. 221

       Whereas the United States Congress has passed legislation 
     to protect children against the evils of child pornography, 
     including the Child Protection Act of 1984, and provided for 
     the enforcement of those laws;
       Whereas on November 4, 1993, the United States Senate, by a 
     vote of 100-to-0, denounced as improper the United States 
     Justice Department's new, narrow interpretation of the 
     Federal child pornography statutes as delineated by the 
     Solicitor General in the case of United States v. Knox and 
     implored the Justice Department to properly enforce the law 
     and protect our Nation's children; and
       Whereas, on June 9, 1994, the United States court of 
     appeals for the Third Circuit in the case of United States v. 
     Knox rejected the Justice Department's narrow interpretation 
     of the Federal child pornography statutes and reinstate the 
     conviction of Stephen Knox: Now, therefore, be it
       Resolved, That it is the sense of the Senate that the 
     Justice Department should accept the persuasive opinion of 
     the United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit in 
     the case of United States v. Knox and that the Justice 
     Department should vigorously oppose any effort by the 
     defendant in that case, or any other party, to overturn the 
     decision in that case.

  Mr. ROTH. Mr. President, I rise today to commend the Third Circuit 
Court of Appeals for reaffirming its earlier decision to protect 
children and for rejecting the administration's attempt to weaken 
Federal child pornography laws. Last November, the Senate by a vote of 
100 to 0, passed the Roth-Grassley amendment to the crime bill. In that 
amendment, we denounced the Justice Department's proposed new, narrow 
interpretation of the Federal child pornography statutes in the case of 
United States versus Knox. We implored the Justice Department to 
enforce the law and to protect our children. The Justice Department did 
not listen to us. Fortunately, the third circuit has stepped up where 
the Justice Department fell short. Having now heard from both the Court 
of Appeals and the Senate as to the proper interpretation of the 
Federal child pornography laws, I sincerely hope the administration 
gets the message and recognizes that we need to protect children, not 
pedophiles and pornographers.
  To underscore the importance of the third circuit's decision in this 
case, I am submitting today a sense-of-the-Senate resolution urging the 
Department of Justice to accept the third circuit's persuasive opinion 
in the Knox case and to vigorously oppose all efforts by this convicted 
child pornographer to overturn this decision. I would urge my 
colleagues to support this resolution to ensure the administration gets 
the message.
  But I want to bring to the Senate's attention another deplorable 
situation in which the U.S. State Department appears to have ignored 
that message--in the process possibly placing at least one and perhaps 
more American young people at risk. Shortly before Christmas last year, 
the United States embassy in Guatemala placed a 14 year-old American 
boy in an orphanage in Guatemala run by an American named John 
Wetterer. The embassy took this action despite knowing that Mr. 
Wetterer has been indicted by a Federal grand jury in the United States 
for sexually abusing young boys at his orphanage. U.S. Embassy 
officials took this action despite the fact that the U.S. Justice 
Department has been attempting to extradite Mr. Wetterer for the past 3 
years to face the criminal child molestation-related charges pending 
against him in New York.
  Mr. Wetterer has been indicted in New York for mail fraud and 
interstate transportation of stolen property for allegedly raising 
money for this orphanage under false pretenses. The indictment alleges, 
among other things, that Mr. Wetterer used his orphanage to ``induce, 
entice and persuade the boys to submit to his sexual activities.'' A 
Federal investigator, in a sworn affidavit, asserted that Wetterer 
``regularly molests young boys who reside at [his orphanage] and on 
whose behalf he solicits charitable contributions in the United 
States.''
  In a letter he sent out to his supporters last Christmas, Mr. 
Wetterer referred to the American boy sent to his orphanage as one of 
``two gifts'' he received from the United States Embassy in Guatemala. 
The second was a visit from U.S. Marines bearing gifts for children in 
his orphanage.
  In that same letter, Wetterer asserted that the U.S. Embassy had 
previously placed at least three other U.S. residents at his orphanage 
in the past.
  As unbelievable as this sequence of events may sound, it gets worse. 
On February 28, 1994, an American foreign service officer in Guatemala 
wrote Wetterer a ``thank you'' note on embassy stationery. This is the 
same embassy that had been involved in the efforts to either expel or 
extradite Wetterer. According to a report published in Newsday, when 
Justice Department officials asked the State Department to have the 
letter withdrawn, the U.S. Ambassador refused. Now Justice Department 
officials are concerned that these actions risk undermining the efforts 
being made by the Justice Department to apprehend and convict Wetterer.
  What is going on here? On March 9, 1994, I wrote to Secretary of 
State Christopher requesting an explanation of this situation, but I 
have yet to receive a written reply. My staff has been informed that 
the State Department has neither referred this matter to its inspector 
general for investigation nor initiated any formal investigation to 
find out how this deplorable situation occurred and to take appropriate 
disciplinary action. Whether through ignorance or arrogance, the State 
Department's actions in this case are reprehensible. I have written a 
letter to the State Department's inspector general, requesting he 
immediately initiate a complete investigation of this matter.
  What we have here is a situation wherein one hand of the U.S. 
Government has indicted Mr. Wetterer for sexually abusing children and 
is seeking his extradition, while the other hand is placing American 
children under the care of this man and writing him thank you notes. 
Just as in the Knox case, the administration is divided against itself. 
Just as the third circuit has done in the Knox case, we must ensure 
that justice is done. The administration must get the message that our 
children must be protected.
  I ask unanimous consent that my letter to the Secretary of State and 
an article appearing in Newsday be printed in the Record.
  There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in 
the Record, as follows:
                                                      U.S. Senate,


                            Committee on Governmental Affairs,

                                    Washington, DC, March 9, 1994.
     Hon. Warren M. Christopher,
     Secretary of State, U.S. Department of State, Washington, DC.
       Dear Secretary Christopher: I wish to bring to our 
     attention a matter of great concern to me.
       As you may know, a United States citizen by the name of 
     John H. Wetterer has operated an orphanage (known as ``Mi 
     Casa'') for boys in Guatemala since the late 1970s. On 
     several occasions, according to press accounts, Guatemalan 
     and U.S. authorities have alleged that Mr. Wetterer sexually 
     abused boys at his orphanage. In 1991, Mr. Wetterer was 
     indicted by a federal grand jury in the Eastern District of 
     New York for fraudulently collecting hundreds of thousands of 
     dollars to support his alleged sexual abuse of children. The 
     indictment alleges, among other things, that Mr. Wetterer 
     used Mi Casa to ``induce, entice and persuade the boys to 
     submit to his sexual activities.'' (A copy of the indictment 
     is attached for your review.) The indictment is still 
     pending.
       I was recently made aware of a letter signed by Mr. 
     Wetterer. In the letter, which I have attached for your 
     review, Mr. Wetterer states that the U.S. Embassy recently 
     brought two boys to his orphanage which he refers to as, 
     ``gifts from the U.S. Embassy.'' The letter maintains that 
     one of the boys is a U.S. citizen. If children were, in fact, 
     delivered to Mi Casa with the assistance of any U.S. Embassy 
     personnel, I find such action outrageous. While one hand of 
     the federal government has indicted Mr. Wetterer for sexually 
     abusing children, another hand may be placing children in Mr. 
     Wetterer's care.
       Please advise me whether anyone associated with the U.S. 
     Embassy in Guatemala has, in fact, placed children in the 
     care of Mr. Wetterer. If so, how many such children have been 
     so placed, when and under what circumstances?
       I trust that this matter will be given your immediate 
     attention, and I look forward to hearing from you as soon as 
     possible.
           Sincerely,
                                             William V. Roth, Jr.,
         Ranking Minority Member, Permanent Subcommittee on 
           Investigations.
                                  ____


                      [From Newsday, June 8, 1994]

                       New Twist in Wetterer Case

                         (By Robert E. Kessler)

       In what has become a major embarrassment for two federal 
     departments, the U.S. embassy in Guatemala housed a homeless 
     American boy at the orphanage run by a former Massapequa man 
     alleged to have sexually abused boys at an orphanage he runs 
     and raises money for in Guatemala.
       Justice Department officials, who are prosecuting a fraud 
     case against orphanage director John Wetterer, were 
     astonished by the State Department's action this winter and 
     concerned it may undermine their case, sources said. The 
     officials were scheduled to meet in Washington late yesterday 
     to discuss what to do next.
       ``At the very least, it looks as if one part of the United 
     States government doesn't care what another part is doing; at 
     the very worst, that one part of the United States government 
     doesn't mind some accusations of a little child 
     molestation,'' said one official involved in the situation.
       State Department officials in Guatemala declined to 
     comment. But sources said that Wetterer was the only person 
     the embassy could find in what they described as an emergency 
     to care for the 14-year-old, an American citizen, who was 
     found living on the streets of a Guatemalan slum.
       The boy stayed at Wetterer's Guatemala City orphanage, Mi 
     Casa, for two months from December to the end of February 
     before he was transferred to a foster home in Los Angeles, 
     according to several sources. Federal agents in Los Angeles 
     yesterday were seeking to locate and question the boy about 
     how Wetterer treated him, according to the sources.
       Wetterer was indicated in 1990 on mail fraud charges for 
     allegedly falsely claiming in the United States that he 
     raised money to help the more than 500 children at his 
     orphanage. Based on interviews with former orphanage 
     residents, Postal Inspector John McDermott wrote in a 
     deposition supporting the indictment that Wetterer 
     ``regularly molests young boys who reside at Mi Casa, and on 
     whose behalf he solicits charitable contributions in the 
     United States.''
       Wetterer has denied all accusations, saying residents made 
     up the stories because they wanted political asylum in the 
     United States. Guatermalan courts have refused to extradite 
     him, and Guatemalan authorities say their own investigation 
     cleared him of molestation charges.
       In a telephone interview Monday, Wetterer said that he did 
     not feel any need to vindicate himself because he had done 
     nothing wrong. But Wetterer said the situation was ``rather 
     ironic.''
       It showed that ``American embassy people down here in 
     country know more than Long Island post office'' workers, he 
     said. The investigators in the case are federal postal 
     inspectors based on Long Island.
       A high-ranking Justice Department official in Washington, 
     who did not wish to be identified or quoted directly, said 
     that the state department's actions have created a major 
     problem in any future legal actions against Wetterer since it 
     now appears that one branch of the government is, in effect, 
     undermining the Justice Department's position.
       In court papers filed in federal court on Long Island, 
     Wetterer and his supporters are using the situation both to 
     refute the charges brought against him and also to help 
     recover $70,000 that had been seized from the orphanage's 
     bank accounts in the United States. A federal magistrate in 
     Brooklyn ruled two weeks ago that the money had been raised, 
     mainly on Long Island, under false pretenses. But Wetterer's 
     supporters are appealing the ruling.
       In a letter to supporters he sent out last Christmas, 
     Wetterer referred to the boy as one of ``two gifts'' he 
     received from the United States embassy at Christmastime. The 
     second was a visit by Marines from the embassy bringing toys, 
     Wetterer wrote.
       When the Justice Department first learned in February that 
     the boy was sent to Wetterer's orphanage, a meeting was held 
     in Washington to get Justice and State Department officials 
     to act in unison, the justice official said.
       But subsequent to the meeting, the official and other law 
     enforcement officials said, the Justice Department learned 
     that an American diplomat had sent a letter thanking Wetterer 
     for his help with the boy, and also that wives of United 
     States officials in Guatemala regularly volunteer at Mi Casa.
       In the letter dated Feb. 28, foreign service officer 
     Carolyn Gorman wrote to Wetterer on embassy stationery: ``I 
     would like to thank you for accepting the American citizen 
     child . . . Thanks to your flexibility and willingness to 
     help a child in a desperate situation, [he] was able to 
     escape the dangerous environment in which he had been living 
     for the past year.''
       Justice Department officials asked the State Department to 
     have the letter withdrawn as an obvious mistake, since 
     embassy officials had been involved in an unsuccessful 
     attempt to get Wetterer extradited from Guatemala. But 
     embassy officials declined, saying that the foreign service 
     officers involved knew about Wetterer's background when they 
     placed the child with him, according to several sources 
     familiar with the situation.
       State Department officials regularly kept in touch with the 
     boy who assured them he was okay, the sources said. The 
     sources said that the State Department could not bar wives of 
     embassy officials from volunteering to help at the orphanage. 
     Reached at the embassy, Gorman declined to comment.

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