In a Thursday story headlined “Suicide deaths by Kansas sex offenders leaves survivors without trials or justice, advocates say,” the Kansas Reflector writes that “A child sex abuse survivor and advocate thinks it’s ‘more than a coincidence’ that three men accused of child sex crimes died by suicide in December. Survivors of the three men are now left without the possibility of seeing their alleged abusers held accountable for their crimes, said Kim Bergman, a survivor of child sex abuse who has advocated for changes in state policy at the Statehouse in Topeka.”

“Survivors are coming forward sooner. Perpetrators are actually having to deal with the ramifications of what they do,” said Bergman. “Child sex crimes are all about power. When they’ve been arrested, they’ve lost the power, and I think sometimes their way of taking that back is putting their destiny in their own hands,” all of which rings sincere irrespective of the black comedy of it.

Only one of the three scumbags was in a county jail when he committed suicide, the other two self-canceled in their homes while out on bond, so where this might’ve been about a call to legislate stricter procedures for sex offender suspects in custody it’s just Bergman complaining that they avoided the justice by killing themselves before trial. Not sure what anyone was supposed to have done about that for the two who offed themselves at home before they could be tried. Bergman did not go any further than saying law enforcement should “be aware of this trend and be looking for signs” that a sex offender is eyeing that exit. Now, nobody should ever have any reason to question the feelings of victims of sexual abuse, and yet this is just a pretty unique absurdity, like she’s worried that her work advocating for fellow survivors is going too well because these fucking animals were pretty obviously guilty if they self-corrected their vile sicknesses.