Rascals case in brief
In the beginning, in 1989, more than 90 children at the Little Rascals Day Care Center in Edenton, North Carolina, accused a total of 20 adults with 429 instances of sexual abuse over a three-year period. It may have all begun with one parent’s complaint about punishment given her child.
Among the alleged perpetrators: the sheriff and mayor. But prosecutors would charge only Robin Byrum, Darlene Harris, Elizabeth “Betsy” Kelly, Robert “Bob” Kelly, Willard Scott Privott, Shelley Stone and Dawn Wilson – the Edenton 7.
Along with sodomy and beatings, allegations included a baby killed with a handgun, a child being hung upside down from a tree and being set on fire and countless other fantastic incidents involving spaceships, hot air balloons, pirate ships and trained sharks.
By the time prosecutors dropped the last charges in 1997, Little Rascals had become North Carolina’s longest and most costly criminal trial. Prosecutors kept defendants jailed in hopes at least one would turn against their supposed co-conspirators. Remarkably, none did. Another shameful record: Five defendants had to wait longer to face their accusers in court than anyone else in North Carolina history.
Between 1991 and 1997, Ofra Bikel produced three extraordinary episodes on the Little Rascals case for the PBS series “Frontline.” Although “Innocence Lost” did not deter prosecutors, it exposed their tactics and fostered nationwide skepticism and dismay.
With each passing year, the absurdity of the Little Rascals charges has become more obvious. But no admission of error has ever come from prosecutors, police, interviewers or parents. This site is devoted to the issues raised by this case.
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Little Rascals Day Care Case
This Facebook page is an offshoot of littlerascalsdaycarecase.org, which addresses the wrongful prosecution of the Edenton Seven and other such victims.
Meanwhile in Edenton....
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Allies for our cause!
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The courts have a long history of capriciously pulling the rug out from under Junior's appeals, but maybe this time....
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Today’s random selection from the Little Rascals Day Care archives….
Day-care teachers ‘as helpless as a clay pigeon’
Aug. 28, 2013
“It’s not by chance that day care centers are the sites of magical molestation, and not public schools with their powerful lobbies and unions…. Those primary and secondary school teachers’ organizations provide protection and security for their members, much as the AMA protects doctors and the ABA protects lawyers.
“It’s only you – a day care teacher – who has no protection at all. If hysterical parents gang up and attack you, you are as helpless as a clay pigeon in a shooting gallery.”
– From “Magical Child Molestation Trials: Edenton’s Children Accuse” by Margaret Leong (1993)
Press decides to let Sir Edward Heath rest in peace
April 6, 2017
“Beginning with the McMartin preschool case in 1984… much of the media accepted without question fantastic claims brought by police, parents and prosecutors. But by the early 1990s when the courts began tossing out convictions based on recovered memories, coached testimony, and magical thinking, the media backed away….
“Two stories in the U.S. and British press have resurrected SRA: Pizzagate and abuse claims lodged against deceased British Prime Minister Edward Heath. However, this time round these stories are being treated with skepticism ….
“Abuse is a serious enough crime without having the false and inflammatory adjective of ‘satanic’ appended to it. I am glad to see The Sun and Mail on Sunday are treating this aspect of the claims as being ridiculous….”
– From “Satanic Ritual Abuse Is Back In The News, But Now Met With Skepticism” by George Conger at the Media Project (March 30)
Child sex-abuse workshops work their mischief, no matter where
Feb. 16, 2018
“Eighteen years ago this month, Peter Ellis left prison. He ought never to have been there in the first place.
“[In 1993] Ellis was convicted of child abuse at the Christchurch Civic Crèche. It remains one of New Zealand’s most controversial cases, and one [New Zealand’s] proposed Criminal Cases Review Commission would do well to address.
“If all the allegations were to be believed, Ellis was involved in making children dance naked while some were placed in an oven or suspended in a cage. Others were buried alive, and one child was forced to kill another. One unfortunate lad was turned into a frog and a cat. Needless to say the evidence for these events was not strong…”
– From “Peter Ellis martyr to deranged prejudice” by Jarrod Gilbert in the New Zealand Herald (Feb. 8)
The first allegations against Peter Ellis occurred shortly after a nearby Ritual Abuse Workshop. What a coincidence – the first allegations against Bob Kelly occurred shortly after a
nearby day-care sex abuse seminar….
When the people we trust can’t be trusted
Jan. 25, 2017
“Why is there such a cultural bias toward stories of abuse – and especially toward grotesque and absurd tales, even when there is no reliable evidence that any crime occurred in the first place?
“The very people we count on to protect our society – prosecutors, police, social workers, jurors, even parents – are eliciting fantasies from children that express our worst collective fears. ….
“The libel that our society has imposed on child-care workers is a kind of projection of guilt for the damage that we ourselves have done, as parents and as a society. We have given our children to strangers to rear, and it makes us uneasy and fearful. Is it any wonder we have a bad conscience?…. ”
– From “Child-care Demons” by Lawrence Wright in The New Yorker (Oct. 3, 1994)