When James France heard the news of the recent arrest of Frank Selas, his former scoutmaster at St. Mary's International School in Tokyo, on child sex abuse charges in the U.S., he was not shocked. Instead, he felt a mix of regret and curiosity.
"I found myself wanting to know exactly what he had done. What did he actually do to the kids?" he says. "I wanted to know because we were in close proximity to this person, and I think I wanted to know how potentially bad it could have been. It's like knowing that you were just diving in the proximity of a great white without realizing it."
Selas, aka Frank Szeles, who was a fourth-grade teacher at the Catholic boys' school from 1970 until 1972, had been on the run for 37 years when he was finally taken into custody at his home in Bonita, California, on Jan. 25.