Screen Shot 2011-12-22 at 10.32.54 AMUhh

As you might have imagined, more alleged victims of Bill Conlin are coming forward. 

Wait, Kyle, you’re telling me that an always uncomfortably weird guy* who had “the look” and was accused of penetrating little girls with his fingers and touching boys in the 1970s probably had other victims over a 40-year time period?

Yes, that’s what I’m telling you.

*Once, when I was interning at Comcast SportsNet in 2004, Conlin showed up for an episode of Daily News Live wearing some sort of rabbit’s foot on his ear. The reaction from the interns and video editors in the back was “what the fuck is Conlin doing?" That seemed to be a normal response to Conlin– whether he be in-person, print or on TV.

Late yesterday, two more victims came forward. 

The details, from the Inquirer’s Nancy Phillips, whose phone is probably ringingoff the hook with interview requests… and stories of young girls losing their innocence long before nature intended: [Philly.com]

LINDA STELLA said that she was just a girl when Bill Conlin pulled her onto his lap and began "flexing his leg muscles" during a family birthday party at his house in South Jersey. She leaped off his lap and looked back. She felt confused when she saw the wet spot at the crotch of his white pants.

"I was a kid, I didn't know what it really was," Stella told the Daily News last night. "It looked like he had peed in his pants."

 

Ew…

More from Stella:

Stella said that after the birthday-party incident, she twice was at Conlin's house to see if his daughter could play, but the daughter was busy with homework.

Both times she didn't think Conlin was home because she didn't see his car. But as Stella left the bedroom of Conlin's daughter, Conlin suddenly emerged from his bedroom, gripped her by the hand and pulled her into his room, she said.

"I didn't know what to do," she said. "He didn't say a word. He just pushed me on the bed.

"He stuck his hand down my pants and he was rubbing me there and rubbing me on my breasts. I got up and I ran out."

She never returned.

When Stella got married for the first time, in 1983, she struggled to be intimate with her then-husband, she said. "I just couldn't stop crying during and after sex," she said.

 

Goddammit, Bill. Just… ugh.

Another woman: [Philly.com]

The woman who came forward Wednesday described abuse mirroring that described by the other accusers.

She said Conlin groped and fondled her as she sat in his living room watching television. And she said he assaulted her in an upstairs bedroom after inviting her to see a litter of kittens.

"It was so upsetting," said the woman, now 44 and a mother of three. She said that on two occasions, Conlin touched her genitals and put his fingers inside her.

 

Officially, that brings the count of admitted victims to six, but Phillips’ original story included a few other secondhand accusations, though it’s unclear if those were the fifth and sixth people who came forward yesterday. Either way, anything > 0 is one too many. 

All of these accounts were from the 1970s. History shows that child molesters rarely halt their actions. Let’s not be too surprised if more come forward.