PETERBOROUGH – Relatives of a 12-year-old girl who was kidnapped and sexually abused last week say they still have no answers as to what exactly happened that night.
"All I know, I've heard from the news, and this is about my own kid," the girl's mother said outside provincial court this morning, where Stanley Tippett, the man accused of assaulting the child, appeared briefly.
Tippett was initially charged with abduction and sexual assault. Today, the Crown also charged him with sexual interference, dangerous driving, evading police, breach of parole, and breach of recognizance. He is scheduled to make his next court appear by videoconference on Monday.
Neither the victim nor her family can be identified.
Speaking for the first time since the Aug. 6 attack, the victim’s family members broke into tears as they described the girl's battered body and fragile state of mind, and attempted to set the record straight about the circumstances surrounding the tragedy.
"She's covered in scrapes, scabs and bruises. Her face got it worst," said her 32-year-old mother, who has spent the past week home from work taking care of her daughter. "She actually doesn't remember a lot, and I'm glad she doesn't."
Police say the girl was abducted when she left a birthday party with friends, and then driven west to Clarington, where she was assaulted in a schoolyard. She was reported missing around 1:30 a.m. by her grandmother, with whom she was supposed to spend the night.
Tippett was arrested later that morning.
It's unclear whether the child was lured into the van that took her to Clarington. Her family members say they have heard conflicting reports from witnesses, but are forbidden from contacting friends who were with her at the time.
They say they have also been told not to talk about the attack with the girl, and must shield her from any information or news reports that could skew her memories.
The girl's mother said people questioned her parenting skills since the attack, and blamed her for letting her daughter out so late.
"There's all this stuff on the Internet saying 'What kind of mother...' -- it makes me angry," she said. "I didn't give permission for her to go (to the birthday party)."
She described her daughter as "a good kid" who always respected her 10 p.m. curfew and called if she was running late.
When the girl didn't show up at 10 p.m. that night, the grandmother said she called her cellphone, but got no answer. At 12:45 a.m., a friend called to say the girl was missing, sending the grandmother to search for her in the streets and hospital. She later called the police to report the girl missing.
For the past week, the family has sat in court to watch Tippett appear, often sitting metres away from the man's wife, five children, mother and mistress.
"It's rude," the girl’s grandmother said of the Tippett clan's outspokenness. "They say they're victims, but what kind of victims are they?"
