COLUMBUS, Ohio — Ohio violence prevention advocates worry that teens who have been sexually abused would have to get parental consent to get emergency and temporary mental health services under proposed legislation.
Some of the most heinous crimes have the most vulnerable victims.
"I've responded to child sexual abuse victims at 2 a.m. in the hospital," Emily Gemar, with the Ohio Alliance to End Sexual Violence, said. "I've held their hand throughout the night."
Thousands of kids in Ohio are sexually abused per year, she said. State data shows the majority of all reported sexual assaults happened to children under 18.
But many cases go unreported, Gemar said.
"It takes some time to build trust with that counselor, that mental health provider, to allow for a setting where somebody feel

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