“The documentary is only a work in progress; but, on the evidence of his contribution to a conference in New York last week, Christopher Gavagan’s story – for he is the filmmaker with the guts and courage to delve into his own past – should make for a harrowing tale. It should also serve as a lesson, not just to other young sportsmen with their eyes on pursuing the dream of sporting excellence, but to many families and to society at large.
Gavagan’s story is an American one, but it could be from anywhere.””

“There’s usually not one warning sign that is going to set off alarm bells. But if there is a confluence of factors, they (parents) should be concerned. If there’s an adult coach who spends more time with children than he does with adults, who wants to be with your child more than you do and creates access and one-on-one opportunities to do so, that’s a major warning sign. If a coach is always volunteering to give your child a ride to and from practice or giving him gifts or taking him out for meals or texting him, that’s a major warning sign.

Parents have to trust their instincts. They have to take the time to educate their children to know what is and what is not acceptable behavior, and to know they have a safe place where they can report abuse.”

“It was the summer before high school, and Christopher Gavagan, then 13, was preparing to leave the safe familiarity of the friends he had known during his boyhood. With a plan to excel at ice hockey, he began training on inline skates, moving through his New York City neighborhood, up and down the streets until, he said, “I turned down the wrong street.”

“Over and over, you see the drive to keep it quiet, to put it “behind us” with the fewest possible people being aware of it. In many cases—particularly at schools whose pristine reputation is paramount—rather than making a successful coach go away, they have made an accuser or the accusations go away.”

“I had the idea that it was going to be this detached, journalistic film. But as I started to talk with some of the survivors who were brave enough to talk to me abut the worst moments of their lives, I was embarrassed. I felt like a fraud. I knew at that point that I had to include the story that I knew best. So, that was like a ten-year evolution from, “I’m going to tell this with made-up characters” to “Yes, this happened to me, too.”

“What I know is that somewhere, sleeping peacefully in their bed the night the verdict was handed down, the next victim of Jerry Sandusky just gets to be a child instead. No thanks to the powerful men who ran Penn State — who would have sacrificed that boy on their pigskin altar — but with all credit to those courageous young men who took the stand, who looked the devil in the face and spoke the truth in Bellefonte, PA.”