Don't Ask, Don't Tell, Part 2; Decades After He Molested Students in Nearby Prospect Park, Edgar Friedrichs Jr. Continued His Crimes in West Virginia.

Summary

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A deputy took the pen, and [Edgar Friedrichs Jr.] dictated his version of events. He said he had woken up in the middle of the night for a smoke, and smelled vomit. (According to court records, Friedrichs' original statement to paramedics was that he'd woken up because he heard the boy vomiting.) He turned on the light to see throw-up all over [Jeremy Bell]'s bed. He tried to take the boy's pulse, but he wasn't breathing. He shook him and slapped his face. After trying to resuscitate him, he woke up [Mikey] and sent him out to call for help.

According to [Garland Burke]'s report, around 4 o'clock that afternoon Friedrichs' daughter and son-in-law, who had gone to Friedrichs' home to check on him, called 911. Friedrichs had tried to kill himself.

[Scott VanMeter] read through the detective's affidavits from Prospect Park. Then the sergeant, who has since been promoted to captain, examined [Dan Barber]'s meticulous notes from [Keith Bowen]'s and Jeremy Bell's former elementary schools. "Barber said that pedophiles don't quit [hurting children]," said VanMeter. "He obviously did a thorough job, and I had no reason not to trust him."

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Don't Ask, Don't Tell, Part 2; Decades After He Molested Students in Nearby Prospect Park, Edgar Friedrichs Jr. Continued His Crimes in West Virginia.

By the end of March 2001 private investigator Dan Barber thought he'd gathered almost enough evidence to convince the West Virginia state police to investigate Edgar Friedrichs for child molestation.

He'd spent the past year going back in time, to Prospect Park Elementary School in Delaware County, where Friedrichs taught for the first nine years of his career. From countless interviews he figured out which kids had spent time at Friedrichs' home, or were observed in his car, or were considered teacher's pets. He and apprentice Kristen Kuharik used the phone book and school yearbooks to find names and addresses.

Finally he and Kuharik approached the former "golden boys," as Barber called them. When the difficult sessions were complete, he had what he'd come for: stories from grown men who said they'd been sexually violated by their former fifth-grade teacher and "safety instructor" Edgar Friedrichs.

Barber was that much closer to making good on his promise to the family of a 12-year-old West Virginia boy who had died in Friedrichs' fishing cabin in 1997. Evidence gathered at the scene indicated foul play, but four years had gone by with no arrest.

Barber didn't promise he could get Friedrichs indic...

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