Community reacts to rape allegations against school founder

Friends, family say Melissa Stephens is surely innocent, while others say it is too soon to make a claim either way

By Stover E Harger III

The Times, Jun 18, 2009, Updated Oct 30, 2009 (5 Reader comments)

Melissa Stephens

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TUALATIN – Friends and family of Melissa Stephens, the 55-year-old alternative school director who was arrested June 10 on allegations of raping a 10-year-old boy five years ago, are distraught over the charges, saying they don’t believe the respected community member could ever commit such acts.

Stephens’ sister, Deborah Alysoun of Marylhurst, said the family has received “frightening” phone calls and e-mails from people angry about the news, some who have proclaimed her guilty even before a trial.

“It is very scary and it has made my family very fearful,” she said.

Arrested under child rape charges

Police arrested Stephens at her work, the youth-oriented Willow Cottage Arts and Academic Program in Tualatin (18815 S.W. Boones Ferry Road), after an investigation started on June 8 that gave detectives probable cause to take Stephens into custody. She was charged with allegedly engaging in multiple sex acts, including intercourse, with the child for about a year. Charges include first-degree rape, sodomy and sex abuse. She is out on bail and is scheduled to be arraigned June 23 at 8:30 a.m. in Washington County Circuit Court.

Stephens has stepped down as administrative director of the Willowbrook Center for Development of Human Potential, which conducts the Willowbrook Summer Arts Program at Tualatin’s Brown’s Ferry Park. The six-week camp caters to as many as 400 children every summer, ages 3 to 18. The camp will begin as scheduled on June 29, according to Board of Directors Chair Peter Thacker, but without participation of Stephens. Willow Cottage, which Stephens founded in 1993, does not run in the summer.

“While there has been a great deal of media coverage regarding Melissa Stephens, another long term Willowbrook employee, we want to assure you that ENSURING YOUR CHILD’S SAFETY has always been, and is, our top priority,” said an e-mail sent to parents by the Willowbrook board of directors.

Thacker, who is a parent with kids in the program, said Willowbrook does background screening of all its employees, including Stephens.

“The camp really has been an incredibly safe haven,” he said.

But now that these charges have been filed he worries it could hurt the innocent nature of the camp. “It makes us look very deeply at ourselves as people and as a camp.”