Parte 4

Group's beginnings
baca
Bikers Against Child Abuse is an international non-profit with an annual budget
of $200,000 and more than 160 chapters in 36 states and five countries.
But it started with just one frightened 8-year-old boy in a therapist's office i
n Utah.
John Paul Lilly is a licensed clinical social worker and play therapist and a pr
ofessor at Brigham Young University. In 1995, he was working with that 8-year-ol
d boy, who was so afraid that he wouldn't leave his house, even though it was Ju
ly and the other neighborhood kids were outside playing.
The boy would do well in therapy, but then his abusers would show up at his hous
e at night, or leave a note on his bike, warning him that they were watching. Th
e boy stayed terrified, and Lilly stayed frustrated.
Lilly knew how the boy felt. He also had been abused when he was young. When he
was 8, living in a tough Los Angeles neighborhood, he was befriended by some bik
ers who gave him a road name: Chief.
"They became my family," Lilly says. "I just never felt more secure than when I
was with them."
So it was instinctual, years later, for Lilly the therapist to turn to bikers he
knew in the area for help with his small, scared patient.
"Bikers have a soft spot for kids," says Lilly, 54, who has been riding since he
was a teenager. "I couldn't quote you a figure, but I know that a lot of bikers
had been abused as kids.
"When they see a chance to step in and release some of their own demons, they ha
ve no problem standing up for a child. It was just such a natural fit."
Twenty-seven motorcycles carrying about 40 bikers lined up for that first ride.
By that afternoon, the boy was outside riding his bike, wearing a vest with a Ha
rley-Davidson patch on it.
In Utah over the past 16 years, bikers have helped about 1,200 children. BACA's
work has been cited in numerous academic and scholarly journals, including Play
Therapy. Lilly does speaking gigs at child-welfare conferences across the countr
y and is speaking at the International Play Therapy Conference in Cleveland this
October. He even got an invitation to the White House in 2005 from first lady L
aura Bush as part of the "Helping America's Youth" initiative. (The first lady a
llowed him to wear his biker vest, T-shirt, Levi's and boots instead of a suit a
nd tie.)
Here in Arizona, Pipes started the Maricopa County chapter of BACA in 2006 and r
eceived an official charter in 2007. The Pima County chapter got its start in 20
10. Together, about 30 members juggle about 25 active cases, with about 100 chil
dren on their rolls.
The bikers must be tough, not only to protect the kids but to be able to stomach
knowing what their young charges may have been through. An 8-year-old beaten by
Mom; a 6-year-old molested by his mother's boyfriend. A girl, 10, raped. They a
re trained by a licensed mental-health professional affiliated with the chapter.

Each biker must be fingerprinted and undergo a thorough criminal-background che

ck, the same one required for state child-welfare workers and law-enforcement of
ficers, before they can join the group.
They are bikers, not Boy Scouts, so if the background check turns up an arrest o
r a stint behind bars, they can still be in the group. The crime just can't invo
lve children, domestic violence or something comparable. They visit children onl
y with permission and only in pairs, so no one is ever alone with a child.
Lilly says BACA has been watched closely for a long time, both by law enforcemen
t, who want to make sure they stay on the right side of the law, and by motorcyc
le clubs, who want to make sure they don't become extensions of the police in bi
ker circles.
Indeed, BACA members walk in two worlds. They all have jobs - in this group are
an architect, a social worker, a college student, a law-enforcement officer, a p
aralegal, mechanics, business owners, parents and grandparents. They go only by
their road names in their BACA lives; if you were to ask one what another's actu
al name is, he or she likely wouldn't have any idea. Road names are part of bike
r culture, but they serve a different purpose here: By never using a biker's or
child's given name, it is less likely that an abuser could attack a biker in ret
ribution or follow a biker to find a victim who has moved. (The Republic and azc
entral.com have chosen to abide by the BACA rule.)
"We don't hide our intentions. We're straight up out there. We're very clear tha
t if you come against this child, and you get hurt in that process, that's your
problem," Lilly says.
Because BACA's members go by their road names and operate across the world, it i
s impossible to know whether there have been any physical confrontations between
them and abusers, or any mishaps on motorcycles, though Lilly says there haven'
t been.
"We don't hunt anybody down. We're just who we are. We don't become somebody els
e."
But anyone who wants to get to one of their kids has to get through them first.
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kers-against-child-abuse-make-abuse-victims-feel-safe.html?page=4#ixzz2mY1xJMos
Parte 5
Called into action
baca
Rembrandt's phone rang at 3:15p.m. on a Saturday. He was on his way home from hi
s grandson's karate tournament, about 5 miles from his Mesa home.
It was Sassy. A BACA kid was in trouble.
Her road name is Music, and she's 10. She belonged to a BACA chapter in another
state but is now living in Arizona with her grandmother. That makes her Sassy's
and Rembrandt's kid now.
Her abuser is in jail, but his family members had tracked the girl down in Arizo
na and were banging on the grandmother's front door, demanding that she turn the
girl over to them, shouting up at the second-floor window where the child was h
uddled in her bedroom. Her grandmother called BACA and then dialed 911.

The bikers know the drill well. Rembrandt called those who live closest to him Rock, Uno and Fat Daddy. He stopped to change out of his grandpa clothes - shor
ts, T-shirt and sandals - and put on his biker garb - jeans, boots, leather vest
, holster and handgun.
The bikers carry weapons on stakeouts only when there is a threat against a chil
d and they feel that as citizens they also could be threatened. Otherwise, Rembr
andt says, they do not wear weapons around children. He says most of the bikers
are licensed to carry concealed weapons.
Rembrandt stuffed water bottles into his saddle bags and jumped on his 2000 purp
le-and-orange Indian Chief.
By 3:40 p.m., the four men were on their way to Music, the rumble of their bikes
announcing their arrival. Music's grandmother rushed outside when she heard the
m, hugging Rembrandt and giving him a piece of notebook paper with a description
of the people and their license-plate number.
Sheriff's deputies had been there, she said, and had escorted the people out of
the neighborhood. But it is a public street, and law-enforcement officers just d
on't have the manpower to stay for long. She feared that once the deputies left,
the people would be back.
She was right. But when they did return later that evening, they saw something d
ifferent: four big bikers, all wearing shades even in the dimming light, their m
otorcycles backed into the mouth of the driveway.
Rock had something resembling a cannon strapped to his leg; Rembrandt wore his g
un on his hip.
To someone trying to mess with a little girl, a group of large, strong bikers se
nds a certain message, Rembrandt says. "It just has a different feel than a cop,
" he says. More unpredictable, maybe.
"Cops are actually handcuffed by specific rules and laws that we are not. A cop
has to work within a framework," Rembrandt says. "You can flip off a cop. You do
n't want to flip off Rock." Just knowing that a biker doesn't have to follow rul
es or honor boundaries can intimidate a person trying to make trouble.
That night, Music's grandmother pitched a small tent in her granddaughter's bedr
oom, right under the window, so the little girl could look out the window whenev
er she wanted to see the bikers at the end of the driveway.
Bikers guarded the house in shifts for the next 2 1/2 days. Some rode two hours
from Tucson, kept watch for eight hours and then rode home again.
They talked in low voices, and once Music was asleep, the red embers of their ci
garettes glowed in the dark.
Rembrandt got involved with BACA four years ago, dragged into it, really, by his
wife, Nytro.
"She's the kid lover. I'm not a real kumbaya kind of guy. It's just not in my pe
rsonality," Rembrandt says.
But Nytro wanted to get involved, and Rembrandt was her ride. If he was going to
be around, he had to undergo a background check anyway - "I still had no intent
ion of joining" - but then he went on a ride to bring a child into the group.

He watched a scared little girl transform before his eyes. She came out from beh
ind her mother, raised her eyes to look at the bikers and, eventually, gave a sm
ile.
"That's it. I was done," he says. "You can't experience that and not get involve
d." Yeah, yeah, he knows. It's a little kumbaya. He's now vice president of the
local chapter and is the primary for two children in addition to Music.
The next day, the family members who were after Music came back again, but in a
different car. They looked but didn't stop.
"Overall, it was fairly uneventful," Rembrandt says. "The people were all full o
f muster when it was a grandmother and a child. They changed their minds when th
ey saw us there."
"I would have loved to have been able to introduce ourselves," he adds in mock d
isappointment.
The bikers aren't looking for trouble. They are there so the kids don't feel so
alone, or so powerless. Pipes recalls going to court with an 8-year-old boy, and
how tiny he looked on the witness stand, his feet dangling a foot off the floor
.
"It's scary enough for an adult to go to court," he says. "We're not going to le
t one of our little wounded kids go alone."
In court that day, the judge asked the boy, "Are you afraid?" No, the boy said.
Pipes says the judge seemed surprised, and asked, "Why not?"
The boy glanced at Pipes and the other bikers sitting in the front row, two more
standing on each side of the courtroom door, and told the judge, "Because my fr
iends are scarier than he is."
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kers-against-child-abuse-make-abuse-victims-feel-safe.html?page=5#ixzz2mY2Dg34P

Parte 6
Funding their mission
baca
Although the biker image is good for intimidating the kind of people who hurt ki
ds, it can be off-putting for potential donors.
The group is a 501(c)(3) non-profit and relies on donations and grants - includi
ng one for $5,000 from The Arizona Republic and 12 News' Season for Sharing camp
aign - for its annual budget, which ranges from about $5,000 to $12,000 a year,
depending on the kids' needs.
Since each biker pays for his or her own gas, maintenance and food or drink, and
since there is no rented office space or cubicles or receptionist, one might th
ink that money would go a long way. The expenses they do have, however, add up q
uickly: $2.75 to $5.50 for T-shirts they give the kids, $20 each for BACA blanke
ts, $4 for a do-rag printed with BACA's logo. To cover a child's denim vest with
patches that cost $6.50 to $12 each can easily total $50.
And there are bigger expenses, too. The bikers also pay for different things tha

t help kids heal, such as therapy, karate lessons, horse-riding camp and punchin
g bags.
Sometimes they end up spending their own money, like the time five of them each
kicked in $100 to take a teenage girl who had been sexually abused to get some n
ew clothes and to have her hair and nails done.
So Pipes speaks to anyone who will listen - church groups, social-service agenci
es, rotary clubs. And BACA bikers go to events like festivals and art walks, han
ding out brochures and answering questions.
At a recent Saturday morning meeting of the men's club at Our Lady of Perpetual
Help Church in Mesa, a dozen bikers sat in the metal folding chairs scattered am
ong the tables set with paper place mats.
At the microphone, Pipes begins, "I know you were all hoping for a good-looking
speaker, but I'm afraid you got me," and gets a laugh.
He explains what BACA does and how children are referred to them by child-welfar
e agencies, therapists and police. He explains, "Our mission is very narrowly fo
cused; we empower children not to be afraid of the world in which they live.
"... We don't apologize for being bikers. We are bikers first," Pipes says, thou
gh they are not affiliated with any motorcycle clubs. "We ride a lot of the same
streets they ride, but we have a different path."
The kids become part of their biker family, and Pipes explains: "When you're a p
art of our family, we don't run, and we don't hide."
It's tough talk. But then Pipes' words shift to talk about the kids, and even a
tough, aging biker can't hide how he feels.
"To see the life that was beaten out of them return is amazing. To see that tran
sformation, to give them a chance at a normal childhood again ..." he pauses, sw
allows hard, and then says, "It's why we do this."
There is silence, and then applause.
"This is wonderful, just wonderful," says Rita Belle, pulling her checkbook out
of her purse. Ed Tynan has his checkbook out, too: "I never in a million years w
ould have guessed you guys existed."
Another man grasps Pipes' arm with one hand and hands him a $20 bill with the ot
her and says simply, "God bless you."
That's the kind of reaction the bikers garner, for the most part.
Michelle Morley, a judge in the 5th Judicial Circuit in Sumter County, Florida,
has been involved in four cases with BACA in four years.
"You see kids who are so withdrawn and depressed and no sense of self-esteem, an
d then BACA gets involved, and they come back to life," Morley says.
"You have to think that every time they hear motorcycles, they think of their fr
iends in BACA, even if it isn't them. They must think, 'I have these guys and ga
ls looking out for me.'"
She tells of a case in a neighboring county where prosecutors were worried that
the 8-year-old victim would be too afraid to testify against her abuser.

But on the stand, the girl, nicknamed "Cheetah" by the bikers, sat on the lap of
a BACA member, a woman whose road name is Lamb Chop, pointed at that man charge
d with molesting her, and said, "That's him."
In one case, the defense attorney did protest that the child victim likely would
not have testified without the bikers there, Morley says, and that probably was
true. Often children are too young or too afraid to testify and without other w
itnesses, cases can be dismissed.
By the way, Morley adds, the defendant was convicted in that case.
Last month, Maricopa County Attorney Bill Montgomery met with Pipes and Sassy an
d was impressed with their work. He says he plans to look for opportunities to u
se the group to help young victims.
One of his attorneys, Michelle Arino, successfully prosecuted a child-abuse case
in 2009, in which the bikers escorted the 5-year-old victim, Sporty, and his 9year-old brother, Skater Boy, to court twice.
"(Sporty) was a different kid when the bikers were around," Arino says. "He was
much more happy, he was much more confident."
Sporty testified holding a stuffed bear wearing a tiny BACA shirt, a handful of
bikers sitting where he could see them.
"They were there so he could have his voice heard," Arino says, "and he did."
Read more: http://www.azcentral.com/news/azliving/articles/2012/07/13/20120713bi
kers-against-child-abuse-make-abuse-victims-feel-safe.html?page=6#ixzz2mY2JaGqy

Parte 7
Earning the patch
baca
Every year on the third Saturday of May, bikers in BACA chapters everywhere hold
100-mile awareness rides. In Arizona, each member had to raise at least $100 in
pledges or wear a dress on the ride.
Which explains why this year, Dom wore a sundress with spaghetti straps for the
ride from Mesa to Payson, his black chest hair curling over the low-cut neckline
, the bright yellow fabric bringing out the flames in his tattoo.
(His friends told him their checks were in the mail.)
At the campground, Pipes gathered the bikers in a circle under the pine trees. T
here are two levels of BACA members - support members and patched members. Being
a support member comes first, and you work your way to becoming a patched membe
r by attending monthly meetings, going on child rides, attending court hearings
and participating in other BACA events for at least a year. The chapter's board
of directors must unanimously agree that a support member is worthy of moving up
.
And when a biker makes the grade - which takes an average of 18 months in Arizon
a - he or she earns the ultimate patch, the one with a BACA logo large enough to
cover the back of their vest from shoulder blade to shoulder blade.
Today, three members are receiving patches. Pipes starts with D'Animal.

"This brother has proven himself. We call him. He's there. He's ridden in some r
eal crappy stuff - cold, rain, hail - to get to a child," he says.
Tree, the biker who Rhythm thought would make a good basketball player, had been
a patched member in Utah. He moved here in March and already has proven himself
a valuable member, turning up for every ride and stakeout.
"You deserve it, brother," Rembrandt calls out.
Then Pipes calls for Tool, who clearly is surprised - and touched. He presses hi
s thumb and forefinger to his eyes.
"This man has given us a lot," Pipes says, clapping him on the shoulder.
"I'm proud to have you guys as brothers," Pipes says, shaking each of their hand
s. "Thank you. Thank you. Thank you."
Nytro calls out, "I have a needle and thread for each of you!"
Actually, someone has brought a sewing machine, and with an extension cord stret
ched to an outlet in the restroom, D'Animal spends the next three hours attachin
g the new patches.
Staying through the dark hours
The first time the bikers went to meet Rhythm, Sassy unfurled a thick black blan
ket with the group's logo on it, a clenched fist with the initials "B.A.C.A." ta
ttooed on the fingers, and a skull and crossbones.
Rhythm thought it was cool. But before they gave it to her, Pipes explained, the
y had to fill it with love. He rolled the blanket into a ball and squeezed it, a
nd then passed it to Nytro, who hugged it tight, her eyes closed.
As the blanket passed from biker to biker, and Rhythm watched it go, Pipes told
her: "When you think this blanket is out of love, you call us, and we will come
and fill it back up."
Two weeks later, a call from the girl's therapist brings them back, not because
the blanket is empty, but because Rhythm still is having nightmares.
Sassy and the girl text every day, back and forth. Rhythm carries a coin with th
e BACA logo on it with her always, turning it in her palm, running her fingers a
long its edges. But when she sleeps, her mind is vulnerable to the memories of w
hat happened. She is torn out of her slumber, terrified and calling out for her
parents.
"We can tell her she is safe and fine," her mother says, but then her voice trai
ls off. Because Rhythm knows that's not always true.
So Rembrandt and Tool pull up to the little girl's house at 8 p.m., park their m
otorcycles in the driveway and knock on the door. Sometimes a stakeout is to cal
m fear and build trust.
"I told her that we were going to stay there for the night, so she would know th
at there was no way anyone was going to get past us to hurt her," Rembrandt says
.
Rhythm came outside a few times to make sure the men were all right, or maybe to
check that they were still there. Before she went to bed, she brought out an ic

e-cream sandwich for Rembrandt, a popsicle for Tool and a big bowl of popcorn fo
r them to share.
The men talked low in the dark until 2 a.m., when the sound of more motorcycles
rattled the quiet street. Mo Money and Bigg Dogg pulled up, ready to take the ne
xt shift.
When Rhythm woke up, she looked out the window and called to her mother, "Mom, t
hey're still here!"
"The whole backbone of what BACA does is showing up," Rembrandt says. "We show u
p when we say we are going to show up, and we do what we say we are going to do.
"We said we were going to stay, and we stayed."
Just before 8 a.m., the sun up and already hot, the front door opens and Rhythm
carries two glasses of orange juice out to Mo Money and Bigg Dogg, where they si
t on the front porch in the shade.
Smiling, she tells them she slept, the entire night, with not one nightmare, nes
tled under the blanket the bikers filled with love.
A few days later, the nightmares will return.
The bikers will as well.
About this story:
Reporter Karina Bland spent several months with members of Bikers Against Child
Abuse (BACA) with the permission of the families involved as they rode their mot
orcycles to work with the children under their care and to raise awareness of th
eir non-profit organization.
Because the children involved are victims of abuse, The Republic is not identify
ing them or their families.
BACA policy is that its members use only road names in their work with children,
making it less likely that an abuser could trace one of them back to a child. (
Recognizable photographs do not have the same potential to be traced, and theref
ore are not considered a concern.) By never using a biker's or child's given nam
e, it is less likely that an abuser could attack a biker in retribution or follo
w a biker to find a victim who has moved.
While The Republic knows the full names and identities of the bikers, it is hono
ring the organization's policy.
Reach Karina Bland at karina.bland@arizonarepublic.com
or 602-444-8614.