INjustice in Albania

(This email went out Nov 18. It appears that something in the way I worded the message caused it to get picked up by a lot of spam filters and so I'm posting it here so people have a way of getting the message.)

We have been asking you to pray for David Brown. Please continue to do that, especially as tomorrow (Wednesday, November 19) the court will be giving their final decision for his guilt or innocence (and perhaps sentencing).

We have also asked you to be in prayer for our teammate, Dr. Guy Eshelman, who testified in defense of David Brown and, in turn, was recently charged with failure to report a child abuse. (As you'll read below, he had been told that it was already reported.) Up until this point our only action point has been prayer—which is HUGE! Thank you for all who have written encouraging emails and are praying. Now we are being asked to do something more.

Evangelical missionaries in Albania work together under a single umbrella organization called the AEP. The administrator of this organization, along with Dr. Guy and his lawyer, has written the following explanation and a call to action. The gist is that along with continued prayer, we are being asked to write to our senators/congressmen as well as the general prosecutor and Prime Minister in Albania.

Feel free to forward this to those who you think would pray and act. (Please do not forward after Dec 31, 2008, without checking with us for an up-to-date status)

Thank you for your help!

Melodye

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From: aep-members@yahoogroups.com [mailto:aep-members@yahoogroups.com] On Behalf Of AEP Reception
Sent: Tuesday, November 18, 2008 1:46 PM
To: aep-members@yahoogroups.com
Cc: aep-community@yahoogroups.com
Subject: [aep-members] Please Pray (and ACT) for Dr. Guy Eshelman!
Importance: High

To: All Members and Friends of AEP

RE: Pray (and ACT!) for Dr Guy Eshelman

Last August Dr Guy Eshelman testified from medical records of the ABC Medical Clinic in favor of David Brown, who has been charged with child abuse. At the trial it came out that the abuse had been reported to the wrong authorities. Now Dr Guy himself has been charged with failure to report child abuse that occurred in 2004, when he was studying the Albanian language four days a week, while working one day a week at the ABC Medical Clinic.

He personally saw NONE of the children. He had been told that the crime had been reported, and he believed the people who told him. In fact, the crime had been reported to international authorities, since the perpetrators had fled the country.

Dr Guy is an American family practice physician who left a successful practice in the United States to help train Albanian physicians in clinical care of patients, as well as to treat some patients himself. The way he has been treated is shameful.

There are several important facts to recognize:

1. Apparently someone in the prosecutor’s office leaked the information to the press because on November 1, 2008, two weeks BEFORE they even interviewed Dr Guy, Gazeta Shqiptare, a newspaper here, published an article entitled “Pedophilia, The American of the Clinic Charged.” The article details state as a fact that Dr Guy Eshelman “hid the sexual abuse.” The article states that it is “confirmed by official charges” and that the prosecutor “still has not informed him,” but that he will be charged for “failure to report a crime… in the coming week.”

2. In the United States and most western countries, it is considered prosecutorial misconduct to feed the prosecutor’s case to the press… Supplying confidential pretrial information can prejudice the judge and/or jury, and it is unethical. However unfair it is, it is common here. We need to complain to the General Prosecutor, who oversees all of the other prosecutors.

3. In this case the situation is even worse, because the article accuses Dr Guy of actively hiding the situation… very damaging to his reputation. It was no only published in Albania, but he received copies of related articles from Paris and Rome. There are other statements concerning the contents of documents that are simply fabrications and have no basis in fact at all, but are very condemning to Dr Guy.

4. November 14, 2008, Dr Guy was interviewed by the prosecutor and simultaneously charged with the crime. Fortunately, he was not jailed,

5. It seems clear that there are political or personal motives behind this prosecution… if there were not, the prosecutor could have interviewed him to try to determine the facts… Guy was not present when the abused children were brought in to the medical office, and saw none of the children personally… He only heard from medical staff at his clinic that there were several cases of apparent child abuse and that it had been reported to international police.

Since this case appears to be politically and/or personally motivated, it is crucial that we act. Now is the time to help Dr Guy! Here is what we need to do:

1. PLEASE PRAY for Dr Guy, his wife Carolyn, and their four children.

2. Write a letter or email to all of your supporters asking for prayer for Dr Guy. Emails are a help, but letters will be much more persuasive.

3. Ask them to write a letter complaining of the treatment of Dr Guy, particularly leaking information to the newspapers before even interviewing him to find out the full facts.

4. Ask them to DISMISS all charges against Dr Guy, and to EXONERATE him from wrongdoing.

5. Ask them to ask their congressmen and senators to write letters complaining of this shameful and unethical treatment of an American. Again, emails may help, but letters are much better!

6. Send the letter (or email) to (and yes, we have been assured these addresses will work):

Ina Rama, General Prosecutor
Rr. Qemal Stafa
Tirana, Albania
admin@pp.gov.al

Send copies to :

Prime Minister Prof. Dr. Sali Berisha
Bulevardi “Deshmoret e Kombit”
Nr. 1,100
Tirana, Albania
kryeministri@km.gov.al

Ambassador John L. Withers
United States Embassy
Rruga e Elbasani No. 103
Tirana, Albania

On behalf of Dr Eshelman, I want to thank you all! If you have any questions, please feel to write, phone or email me. We will try to keep you informed through regular updates as we gain more information.

Sincerely yours,

Austin

Austin McCaskill, JD, DMin
Administrator, Albanian Encouragement Project

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