Aug. 15, 2012

The North Carolina Supreme Court won’t release its next batch of opinions until August 24, but its recent decision on a 2009 child sex abuse case could augur well for Junior Chandler.

On June 14 the court upheld the North Carolina Court of Appeals’ overturning of Patrick Loren Towe’s conviction in Surry County. Here’s the crucial part of the opinion:

“Under the North Carolina Rules of Evidence, a qualified expert may testify as to her opinion in her field of expertise if the testimony will assist the jury in understanding the evidence. An expert may not, however, testify as to the witness’s credibility or state that she believes the defendant is guilty.

“In sexual abuse cases involving child victims, an expert may not testify that sexual abuse has occurred without physical evidence supporting her opinion. An expert may not testify that the child has been ‘sexually abused’ if the testimony is based solely on the interview with the child-victim.”

In Patrick Towe’s case, only one expert witness so testified – in Junior Chandler’s it was six.

Without such a parade of “expert vouching,” Junior surely would have spent the past 25 years back home in Madison County instead of behind bars. How can the North Carolina Supreme Court now fail to acknowledge this?

Jan. 2, 2016

“The CIA’s use of its enhanced interrogation techniques was not an effective means of acquiring intelligence… and on several occasions produced inaccurate information….

“Despite declaring the program a ‘success,’ there was no evidence of any independent evaluation concluding that it was effective, only internal assessments by CIA officials and contractors with a financial interest in the program.

“The CIA rarely reprimanded or held personnel accountable for serious and significant violations, inappropriate activities, and systemic and individual management failures….”

– From “20 Key Findings from CIA Torture Report” in Congressional Quarterly News (Dec. 9, 2014)

Sound familiar? Too little prudence, too much hubris?

Yes, the Pentagon’s recent recognition of the American Psychological Association’s disavowal of practices at Guantanamo brings to mind a different kind of “enhanced interrogation” – no waterboarding, but just as corrupt.

The Little Rascals prosecution’s well-paid and single-minded therapists seem to have recognized no ethical barriers in extracting phony claims from the children they interrogated so relentlessly. And neither prosecutors nor therapists were ever held accountable.

May 27, 2013

Recent revelations about billionaire David Koch’s influence on the airing of an unflattering PBS documentary bring to mind how UNC-TV showed similar deference to the accusing parents in the Little Rascals case.

Although a roundtable arranged by New York station WNET to follow the Koch-critical “Park Avenue” excluded filmmaker Alex Gibney, that discussion at least offered viewers a range of viewpoints about income inequality.

By contrast, in 1993 UNC-TV director Tom Howe said he agreed with parents that “Innocence Lost: The Verdict” was unbalanced and barred defense attorney Mike Spivey from participating in the discussion afterward. (I requested a copy of the program, but the station said it was unable to find one.)

In 1997, UNC-TV gave prosecutor Nancy Lamb and parent Susan Small time on “North Carolina NOW” to discuss the decision to drop the last charges in Little Rascals. “Both responded with long, rather unfocused answers,” Current magazine observed, “and the interview concluded without a single follow-up question….”

Aug. 10, 2014

A final (perhaps) thought on Professor Sylvia Gillotte, after rereading this passage from our exchange of emails about her belief in “satanic ritual abuse”:

“The thing is, Mr. Powell, you can’t do this journey without a willingness to look into the darker side of humanity. You must be willing to challenge every previously held notion that you may have about the world and how it operates. You must push past your comfort zone and look beyond the veneer and the facade to what lies beneath the surface and within the bowels of the human psyche. You must be courageous enough to swim against the tide long enough to reach still water, where you can actually study dissociative trauma and even mind control in conjunction with ritual trauma allegations. Only then will you begin to see these allegations in their true light….”

Why do I continue to resist Professor Gillotte’s call to “challenge every previously held notion… about the world and how it operates”? Is it passivity? Timidity? Lack of imagination? Or is it simply a stubborn bias for fact over faith?