10y accused by 6y of sexual misconduct

[Shasplus]

Dear Doc,
My 10 year old, (well-adjusted, top-achiever, artist, writer, farmer, happy, normal) daughter has just been accused by my sister and her 6 year old son of incredibly explicit oral sexual details. He communicates some really graphic details of this act, while jumping around, playing and laughing and giving me a school lecture that this is wrong. He repeats this a couple of times in a sermon-like fashion. He then jumps around, and laughingly begs for my daughter to please visit him, and asks if I can watch him perform some act. I don't believe that this is normal behaviour for a child who has really experienced a traumatic event. My sister then said that he appears to have suddenly remembered this incident with my daughter, while watching something on TV, and he had an age-appropriate school lecture that week on sexuality.
My earlier and current observation of my nephew is that he has a type of echolalia. He has a habit of repeatedly making the same sounds, or words, or actual phrases and sermons that he has heard. He can repeat this verbatim and with the same words, tone and inflection as adults do. He uses words and phrases without understanding the meaning of them, but is rewarded by adults seeing this as a higher intelligent behaviour. He also gets stuck on an idea about my daughter and gets into uncontrollable rages that she may not want to play with him. He also has a habit of some type of maniacal laughter at the most inappropriate times. He does have developmental issues at school which my sister is not taking seriously. In fact, she does not acknowledge any problems with him.
He has been accused by a few other parents over the last couple of months, of playing sexual games with their daughters. In fact, his mum will never dress in front of him, as he gets visibly and verbally excited about seeing a woman in a state of undress, and keeps on wanting to touch body parts. He has been this way since being a toddler. His mum had confided in me that she believes he is being exposed to adult ideas at his dad's place, a few months ago, as evidenced by the childs new line of questions of a sexual nature.
His parents are divorced, and his mum had a baby last month. His dad and new girlfriend are expecting twins soon. He really feels left out, and I am wondering if this is his way of getting more attention from them.
I am not taking chances and have taken my daughter to a therapist. My daughter is not aware of this accusations of sexual abuse. After a couple of sessions, the psychologist sees my daughter as being a highly-intelligent, normal, well-adjusted happy child, with normal age-appropriate concerns and ideas. My sister is yet to take my nephew for counselling.
The wider family circle have heard of this accusation and the damage to my child's character and reputation has already been done.
Please give my your intuitive thoughts on this situation.

Many thanks

[Shasplus]

Dear All,

Thanks for your time and thoughtful responses.  A lot to think about in how to best handle this rather delicate situation.

Much appreciated in the way forward.

[RockRose]

I agree with what everyone else has said,  and want to add a few thoughts.

When you describe this,  try to keep gratitutous unflattering comments to a minimum about this boy.  It doesn't add to the believability of your side to describe him that way.

Secondly,  how does your family interpret this?  If this has "damaged her reputation" at least some of them believe it.  In general,  does the family view this mostly as you do - a boy making up stories?   Or in general do they believe him?

[SL345]

After re-reading the end of the posting, I noticed you wrote that you haven't told your daughter. Yet, you said that the wider family circle has heard of the accusations and it has damaged her reputation. If the latter is, in fact, the case, she needs to know and you need to be able to have a conversation with her about it. Taking her to a psychologist without revealing the true nature of the circumstances is problematic on a number of levels. The central problem in these kinds of situations is attempts at secrecy that serve to compound the original complaint. In my opinion, as difficult as I'm sure it will be, you need to have a heart to heart talk with your daughter and hear her side of it. You need to try to keep an open mind about what happened and hold any impressions or conclusions in abeyance until you get more information. If your sister is not open to looking at her son's needs, this will fall more onto you. If you are game to talk to her, communicate on tis list and we can try to walk you through it. Good luck.

[SL345]

Have you asked your daughter about the incident and what, exactly, has she said?

[JenandTerry]

OMG what a terrible accusation! It appears to me there is a bit of sibling rivilary going on; between you and your sister. Asthough there is a competition between whos' child is better behaved, accepted, educated etc etc.
As your daughter has recieved criticism from your sister you in return have criticised her son.
Leave the innocent children out of the equation, I believe most rational adults particuarly close family members could see the situation for what it really is.