Following the Club’s refusal to help, and their challenge that I prove what happened, I set out to prove the crime. With just a little information, I then contacted the Boys Club and offered to undertake a cooperative investigation with them, which they also refused.
January 28, 1997
Dear Mrs. Moseley:
On September 16, 1996, I sent you a plea for help based upon my discovery that I had been raped by two counselors when l attended the Stay-At-Home camp at the Charlestown clubhouse. You responded to my appeal with a request for evidence to substantiate my allegations. In the short time since, I have achieved considerable headway in my efforts to obtain that evidence.
I have found one of my rapists, and he is living on the South Shore. I have not yet confronted him, however, because I wish to record the confrontation and I have not made those arrangements. When I do, I am confident that he will lead me to the other monster who was involved in this crime because it is unlikely that he will willingly bear the blame by himself.
In addition, I have obtained the names of five counselors who were employed at the Charlestown Boys’ Club during the same two-week session that I was there, and I have begun to look for them. One of these counselors coached this individual in a sport, and I am hopeful, if he is a good man, that he will tell all he knows about this individual when I tell him what happened. But if he doesn’t, I have obtained the names and photographs of all (sic) the whole team, and I am resolved to find them as well.
Most importantly, I have obtained the names of forty-six boys who attended the camp with me. Insofar as there were only 65 campers (in five groups of thirteen each), I have identified more than half of them. Several of them are exactly my age, which means we were all in the same group and participated in the same activities at the same time. If you recall the contents of my letter, I told you that other campers had been subjected to the same brutal treatment that I received. Many of these individuals continue to reside in Charlestown. In February, I will begin interviewing them, and I am confident that I will find at least one or two who can corroborate my allegations.
Lastly, I have begun to investigate the background of my rapist. He was eighteen years old and a member of the Boys’ Club when he committed this heinous crime. I have also identified and located both his siblings and other people who grew up with him on the same affluent suburban street, and I have discovered that he was dangerously delinquent. I suspect that his parents sent him to the Boys’ Club for rehabilitation. If that was the case, it makes no sense that he would have been made a counselor and given unsupervised custody of much younger children, as he was. I suspect that therein lies the error from which so much pain and misery resulted. But there is much still to be discovered.
My investigation has been very successful, and it is very satisfying to see the pieces of this puzzle come together. One of the pieces that puzzled me the most was the peculiar method of torture that these men inflicted upon us. Where, for instance, did they get the idea to make us sing songs for them? In the early ’60s, WBZ created a show called Community Opticians (later to be called Community Auditions) for the express purpose of showcasing the Boys’ Club. On Thursdays, which was one of the two days in the week that we did not go on field trips, we were encouraged to audition for the show by individually singing songs before an audience of fellow members in the Game Room. That’s where they got the idea.
Soon, I will have irrefutable evidence that these two men raped me — as they did.
As I have told you, my deepest and only wish is to confront the demons that this assault left in me so that I may finally put them to rest and begin a life free of the pain and terror that I have endured for more than three decades. I think it is entirely right and fitting that the Boys’ Club should help me in my efforts to do this. I believe your organization has an ironclad moral obligation to lend me assistance, and I do not accept any argument that this obligation is diminished by anything.
I am writing you now to respectfully ask that you declare your intent in this matter.
If I prove my allegations, do you intend to help me — or not? In your response, you were ambiguous on this point. On the one hand, you seemed to offer me reconsideration in light of substantial evidence. But, in the next sentence, you state unequivocally that you do not have the funds to assist me.
I put this question to you as a matter of concern to both of us.
I would appreciate a timely response.
Sincerely,
[signed]
James Chester
Follow Up
The Boys Club never responded to this offer of proof, but they requested a meeting with me.