Dec. 21, 2012

“In the accusatorial post-McMartin climate, day care providers… took measures to protect themselves from false allegations. They installed video cameras to record all of their activities, opened up private spaces to public view by taking down doors to bathrooms and closets and, fearing the act now could be misinterpreted, stopped hugging and holding their young charges.

“State legislatures… hurriedly mandated the fingerprinting and criminal records check of all current and prospective day care providers; state licensing agencies tightened regulations and by legislative fiat were given more teeth to enforce them. Yet insurance liability premiums soared, forcing many small day care centers out of business and many more, unlicensed and uninsured, to go underground.

“Heralded at the start of the (1980s) as playgrounds for children, day care centers were feared at its end as playthings of the devil.”

– From “The Devil Goes to Day Care: McMartin and the Making of a Moral Panic” by Mary De Young in the Journal of American Culture (April 1, 1997)

Second to none was North Carolina’s overreaction, highlighted by the creation of “interagency task forces.”

Jan. 24, 2014

“Powell is right (in this News & Observer column). The state should exonerate those wrongly convicted members of the Edenton Seven and the wrongly accused who were never convicted but had their lives ruined.

“The Innocence Project has freed men wrongly accused of murder or rape, but there seems to be little interest in making amends for those wrongly accused of abusing children, no matter how fantastical the accusations.”

– From “Edenton Seven: hysteria, false accusations, ruined lives” at Erstwhile Editor (Jan. 14)

“It can be hard, in calmer times, to imagine the power of a moral panic like the one in Edenton, itself part of a broader national hysteria. Lisa (Scheer) and I wrote about the case (in Elle magazine) and in our reporting found a community where rational people seemed afraid to dissent from the fantastical narrative.

“As young parents ourselves we were sympathetic to the families we met, but clearly things had gone very wrong in Chowan County.”

– From “Injustice in Edenton” by Edward Cone (Jan. 14)

And three online responses from the N&O:

 “A few months after (Bob) Kelly’s release I met him briefly. He had a job maintaining pay phones (for Glenn Lancaster), one of which was located in a pizzeria I was managing.

“I asked him if he was indeed who I thought he was and he said yes. When I told him I believed him and considered the accusations against him ridiculous on their face, he thanked me and appeared to be grateful for the moral support. What struck me was the lowly financial state he seemed to be reduced to and the humiliation he so clearly had to endure.”

– Bruce Henry

“Mr. Powell has forgotten Dorothy Rabinowitz, the Wall Street Journal journalist/commentator who received one of her numerous Pulitzer nominations for a series on the Edenton witch hunts. Those articles were some of the most powerful and insightful I have read in my life. I recall wondering why no North Carolina newspaper had the guts to stand up and condemn the witch trial hysteria and obvious travesty of justice taking place right in their own back yard.”

– James Gamble

Rabinowitz reported heroically on the ritual abuse epidemic, but she focused mostly on cases in Maplewood, N.J.; Malden, Mass., and Wenatchee, Wash., rather than in Edenton.

“I am so glad to know that you were in Edenton at that time and you know exactly what happened. Do you really think a child molester is doing to admit what they did? I don’t think so!!!

“I’m sure you will allow them to baby sit your children or grandchildren.”

– Lu Ann Lewis Barber

Actually, I’d be glad to allow that – what potential babysitter has ever been more thoroughly vetted than the Edenton Seven?

Dec. 31, 2014

“Dear Mr. Powell:

“At their meeting on December 16, the members of the North Carolina Highway Historical Marker Advisory Committee… voted unanimously not to approve a marker (in Edenton recognizing the Little Rascals Day Care case).

“Your nomination was among 17 on the agenda (only five met with approval)…. In short, the committee felt that the case was too recent – with too many people affected by it living in the area. They felt that much more time needed to pass before the subject could be judged by history and considered for a marker. One suggestion was that it might be considered 25 years after the deaths of those convicted…..”

– From a letter rejecting my application for a “history on a stick” marker for the Little Rascals case

I respect the committee’s reasoning, even though I doubt I’ll be around when it’s ready to reconsider – in what, 2075?

Oct. 11, 2015

“Satanism lacks a (Jim) Jones or (David) Koresh. Satanism has no Jonestown, no Waco, no Kool-Aid, no casual point of reference.

“This is because Satanic cults, as imagined in popular culture, do not exist.

“Still, some places across the country – West Memphis, Arkansas; Manhattan Beach, California; Edenton, North Carolina; Austin, Texas – belong to a brotherhood of cities united not by the stunned, silent grief of a tragedy like Waco’s, but by the shame of having left innocent families’ lives in ruin in the fervent pursuit of an imaginary evil….

“The ‘Satanic Panic’ of the 1980s and early ’90s was arguably even more frightening than a typical cult precisely because of this lack of a central figure or place; anybody could have been involved, and nobody was above suspicion….”

– From “Conviction of Things Not Seen: The Uniquely American Myth of Satanic Cults” by Dan Shewan at Pacific Standard (Oct. 8)