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Editor’s note: This article includes graphic language and may be disturbing for some readers.
Lost childhoods. Paralyzing hypervigilance. The burdens of distrust and guilt. Three Palo Alto sisters have been haunted for more than 30 years by the sexual abuse they endured at the hands of their former au pair.
But on June 3, sisters Bronwen, Alexandra and Michaela “Doe” at last confronted their abuser, David Shwenke Tupou, at his sentencing in Santa Clara County Hall of Justice in San Jose. (This news organization is withholding the last names of the victims at their request in order to protect their privacy.)
The sisters read their victim impact statements in court, exposing the harrowing record of how they were groomed, manipulated and forced into sexual acts for Tupou’s self-gratification from 1991 to 1995, starting when they were ages 7, 5 and 3.
Delivering these messages to their abuser, they hope and expect, will help them heal — and send a message of support to other victims of abuse who often live in fear.
“You once successfully silenced my voice. Now, I’ve earned my own voice and I will not be silenced,” eldest sister Bronwen said in court, reading from her impact statement. “You once had full control over me. Now I am in the driver’s seat. And I am using my power to tell the truth that you hid from me for years.”
“I am using my power to protect your victims from having to lay awake at night, scared that you will come after them and their children.
“I am using my power to protect the little girls you would unquestionably come after in the future, if given the chance.
“You left your dark signature on my life in permanent ink, and it can never be erased. And now I leave my permanent-ink signature on yours: The signature of my witness. This is my adult voice, telling the truth that a silenced child could not tell.”
A 30-year journey
The long journey to holding Tupou accountable for his crimes began in October 1994. One of the sisters confided to a friend, Anna, about the abuse. She told another friend, whose father, along with Anna’s father, called the police.
Tupou was charged with two counts of child molestation after police interviewed him and the three sisters.
According to a 1994 police report provided by Alexandra Doe to the Palo Alto Weekly, Tupou admitted to police that he stroked the legs and inner thighs of the girls. He said he kissed the girls on the lips. The children propositioned him, he claimed.
Tupou justified his acts to the police. Regarding Michaela Doe’s statements about his behavior, he said: “Oftentimes a single gesture of humanity can be in the mind of a child misinterpreted as maybe being a no-touch touch.”
Bronwen Doe, reading her impact statement, rejected his justifications.
“Tupou’s strategic grooming process gave him the power to sexually abuse and dominate us with the skill of a hardened career pedophile,” she said.
But Tupou also created an environment of secrecy and isolation. He allowed the children to watch TV when they weren’t supposed to and to stay up late, counter to their parents’ instructions, Bronwen Doe added.
“He gave us candy when we weren’t supposed to have it. Each time, he insisted that this special treatment was our secret. He threatened that if we told his secrets, he wouldn’t be able to give us these privileges anymore,” she said.
The small, innocent secrets began to morph to cover his transgressions, such as when he occasionally smoked or drank.
“He would sternly warn us not to tell our mother. He was intentionally conditioning us to never, ever tell,” she said.
‘You once successfully silenced my voice. Now, I’ve earned my own voice and I will not be silenced.’
Bronwen Doe, in her June 3 address in court to David Tupou, who sexually abused her
Tupou normalized physical contact, constantly putting the children in his lap, tickling them and giving them massages. He wrestled with them, stuck his tongue in their ears, blew his hard warm breath into their ears, or sucked on their toes, the three women said in court and in a 2016 police report.
The massages expanded to touching all over their bodies. He forced French kissing, setting a timer. If they didn’t sustain kissing for the specified time, he made them do it all over again. He had them touch his genitals and he touched theirs, the women told police in 2016.
“He would buy Barbie dolls and place them, naked, around his back cottage in all sorts of sexual positions. Whenever we would go into his cottage, these arrangements would be all over. He would show us the Barbies’ positions, and tell us the Barbies were playing,” Bronwen Doe said in court.
Not playing his “games” resulted in punishments and threats. He hung their baby brother out of a balcony window and threatened to drop him if they didn’t submit. He denied them food that he ate in front of them, the women told police.
“I experienced a sense of paralyzed terror and helplessness. I had no control over the terrifying nightmare I knew would be waiting for me in my home every day after school,” she added.
A polarizing arrest
Tupou had worked for the Palo Alto Unified School District in 1991-1992 as a language tutor, according to previous Palo Alto Weekly articles. He volunteered in at least five Palo Alto schools in 1993-1994 including Hoover, Juana Briones, El Carmelo, Addison and Walter Hays elementary schools, mostly in kindergarten classes.
His arrest split the Palo Alto community; his defenders vociferously attacked and harassed anyone who stood up for the girls, recalled Karin Tanaka, a parent who tried to get him removed from the schools.
As a result, the Santa Clara County District Attorney’s Office was unable to go forward with the initial molestation case. Tupou was instead charged with annoying a child. The charges were dropped after he took sensitivity-training classes.
But Tupou continued preying on little girls. He was arrested in 2000 for serially sexually abusing a San Jose girl, Ashley Doe, beginning in 1997-1998 when she was 12 years old.
He pleaded “no contest” and “guilty” to 56 counts in that case. In 2001, the judge sentenced him to 63 years in state prison, calling Tupou a dangerous predator, according to court documents in the case. Ashley Doe also read an impact statement into the record at his June 3 sentencing, as did another woman who said she was abused by Tupou.
Bronwen Doe said she learned about the San Jose case in 2013 after reading a newspaper story.
“Our hearts broke for her. I, in particular, felt that I could, and should, have prevented the abuse she experienced by telling the truth to the investigator who came to my school,” she said.
In 2016, the sisters unanimously decided to ask the DA’s office to reopen the case. Having been prohibited from testifying as children, they felt they had never had the opportunity to seek justice, she said.
Tupou was also eligible for parole, the sisters discovered. Proposition 57, California’s Public Safety and Rehabilitation Act of 2016, allows granting parole to inmates who have earned credit for good behavior and who participate in in-prison programs.
He was also eligible for early release under state Penal Code section 3055, the Elderly Parole Program, which considers parole for most inmates who have reached age 50 and who have been continuously incarcerated for 20 years. Tupou is 64 and was scheduled for a parole hearing Nov. 17, 2022.
“More than anything, we wanted to facilitate the protection of Tupou’s past and future victims. We wanted to provide them with the protection that we ourselves had once desperately needed and been denied. I have participated in this case not just for myself but more than anything for my sisters and for all of Tupou’s victims, both past and future.”
Life behind bars
In the reopened case, Tupou faced 34 felonies for abusing the sisters. On March 4, on the cusp of his trial, he pleaded no contest to two counts of lewd and lascivious acts on a child under age 14 by force, violence, duress, menace or fear; and to an enhancement that would add 15 years to life to his sentence. On June 3, Superior Court Judge Javier Alcala sentenced him to 15 years to life in prison. His sentence will be served consecutively to the 63-year term he received in 2001 for serially molesting Ashley Doe. He will likely spend the rest of his life in prison.
Tupou delivered a statement at his sentencing hearing, pausing and laughing to himself before he spoke.
“I’ve been thinking about this moment for a long time. It didn’t feel real and it still doesn’t.”
He spoke positively about his three and a half years working in the sisters’ Palo Alto home, thanking the family for their warmth, love and kindness in taking him in.
He said that the sisters’ accusations of sexual assault and pedophilia reflected “compromised standards.” But he said that he is not angry at them.
“I don’t hold anything against them for compromising those standards,” he said.
He admitted that he is partially guilty but said that only those living in the house at the time he was working there can understand the extent of what he did.
Tupou said he sincerely regrets and is sorry for “broaching the line between child and adult.”
Bronwen Doe said she continues to live with debilitating levels of anxiety resulting in extremely painful shingles, nervous tics, panic attacks, difficulty breathing, chest pain, insomnia, control issues and eating disorders.
“During the years Tupou lived in my home, I was hunted as prey. I felt constantly endangered by him. I knew he was always waiting for me and my sisters in my basement or in the back cottage where he had full dominion over us, out of the sight of my parents. The impact of Tupou’s sexually predatory behavior on my mental health is a heavy weight I live with every day,” she said.
“It’s terrifying for me to trust anyone. I believe those I trust will take advantage of me, betray me and gaslight me. I have difficulty trusting others’ motives, and especially their words. I am prone to wrongly assume that people are acting out of pure selfishness, with complete disregard for others.”
But she has found a silver lining.
“With the disposition of this case, I have peace in knowing that Tupou will never be able to hurt a child again. I have found closure. While Tupou’s story will fade back into his prison cell for the rest of his life, my story continues in the light of day,” Bronwen Doe said. “Tupou’s abuse has shaped me, but doesn’t define me. Tupou took my childhood, but he no longer controls my life. I am healing. I have a wonderful, truly joyful life despite the wreckage he has caused. I am using the pain he has caused to help others.
“This trial is the first time I have been listened to and believed by someone who has power to keep me, my sisters, and other girls safe from Tupou,” she said. “I never expected to have this opportunity, and I am grateful for it.”
I am so angry that those girls endured his abuse. I worked in an Addison kindergarten where Tupou was a bilingual aide. I notified the principal and classroom teacher that his behavior with the 5 year old girls was inappropriate. I was told PAUSD approved his hiring and most of the teachers liked him. I was made out to be a paranoid parent. And in all of this- WHERE WERE THE PARENTS who hired this guy as an au pair while this behavior was going on? I have followed this story and the crimes he committed that got him locked up in the first place. Heartbreaking that the sisters have had to deal with this their entire lives. He’s a monster with a pleasant demeanor. So super creepy.
“The children propositioned him, he claimed.” He makes my blood boil. A male au pair is a red flag, and so is a male daycare worker. It’s a low paying job a lot of women wouldn’t want, yet alone men. What they want is access to your children.
Where were the parents is a good point. Perhaps they’re too trusting.
North PA mom… as a former North PA mom myself you’re not a paranoid parent. You’re right on the money and the school refused to listen. My heart breaks for these young ladies.
This is a horrible story.
Was this man an au pair? An au pair is a foreign national who is sponsored by the Department of State to come to the United States and live with a host family for one, possibly two years. After the au pair’s program year has ended, the au pair would be required to go back to their home country. This man stayed and worked here, which leads me to believe that he was the family’s NANNY not an au pair. If so, the author really needs to change the headline and the wording in the article.
All court documents refer to the perpetrator as au pair, not nanny.
The victim impact statement also calls him the au pair.
The Santa Clara County District Attorney’s Office dropped the ball. Justice was not rendered until much later. Who in Palo Alto would not abide by Child Protection Services? Who were the supporters of Tupou? Outrageous. These enablers did not act on behalf of the victims. They allowed for this criminal to reoffend. ‘Sensitivity training’ — no the system is broken. Those who supported this au pair cannot look in the mirror as they worked HARD to keep a perpetrator in the community.
Shame on them and on the DA’s Office for not listening to these girls. Shame on them for not following Child Protection Services to intervene and PROTECT these girls. Those who were galvanized in a frenzied mission in support of this twisted man need to be charged as accomplices. If a teacher knows of neglect or of abuse concerning his or her student then that teacher can be charged and face incarceration.
“His arrest split the Palo Alto community; his defenders vociferously attacked and harassed anyone who stood up for the girls, recalled Karin Tanaka, a parent who tried to get him removed from the schools.”
This deserves a follow up article. Is this typical with abuse cases because the perpetrator is as good at manipulating everyone so that victims won’t be believed if they tell (the horrific Larry Nassar and Sandusky cases come to mind)? And/or is there a local cultural problem that plays into or makes this worse? The way this is described as playing out in schools here feels all too familiar.
Speaking to the issue of being attacked, maligned, retaliated against, and gaslit not just by administrators but also parents/teachers over actions in far less controversial circumstances that quite literally have no downside but only benefits for kids in our schools, and knowing many others with similar experiences, I am left wondering if there is something about the local culture that amplifies the harassment of people who try to do the right thing in these situations?
I am thinking of situations where involved parents terrorized others for threatening the local “brand”. Or administrators created a toxic environment to get the upper hand, such as slandering parents, in situations administrators didn’t want to take responsibility for, that left lasting damage to both affected children and families.
I wonder if there has been any follow up with those who harassed Tanaka and others who tried to get this molester removed from our schools, to try to understand their behavior? Did they feel any remorse, or can anything be learned about what they did so that whistleblowers and beneficial change agents—and just plain helpful parent volunteers—can be enabled rather than made pariahs in the future?
Because the harassment of those who tried to remove this criminal from our schools is as key to this perpetrator being able to harm others as anything else.
It’s quite understandable that a sexual predator can deceive his child victims through stories, bribes, coercion, etc.
It is truly alarming that ADULTS can be so easily duped by a predator like Tupou, to the point where they attack others who DO see the signs. And it wasn’t just illustrious Palo Alto parents being hoodwinked. The Justice system sent this monster to… wait for it… “sensitivity training”!!! Truly pathetic.
Was it just plain stupidity, or was there something else at stake?
“His arrest split the Palo Alto community; his defenders vociferously attacked and harassed anyone who stood up for the girls, recalled Karin Tanaka, a parent who tried to get him removed from the schools.
As a result, the Santa Clara County District Attorney’s Office was unable to go forward with the initial molestation case. Tupou was instead charged with annoying a child. The charges were dropped after he took sensitivity-training classes.
But Tupou continued preying on little girls.”
Not much has changed in this county. One of my children has confirmed being sexually abused. The others showed strong signs of the same.
Because a prominent attorney is involved, no one cares enough to stop it.
They don’t even care that an abuser is left to volunteer at several schools and at a church nursery.
My heart goes out to the victim/survivors in this–and EVERY–case of child sexual abuse.
What many comments miss is that, by 1994, there was a tremendous backlash against assertions of child sexual abuse. Allegations by victims were increasingly suspected of being “suggested” or “implanted” memories, “coaching by parents”, and children were increasingly subjected to harsh cross examinations if anything got so far as a prelim or trial.
In 1991, Having reported the “neighbor from hell” because I heard signs of abuse repeatedly, and having had the PA Police keep telling me “the house was clean” and a CPS worker deny anything was wrong, I sent a documented letter to the CPS worker’s supervisor a year or so since the first “hint.”
The creep was eventually prosecuted and arrested. He pled guilty.
May that little girl have grown to be healthy woman and may police and DAs not be afraid to believe survivors. . . .