Oct. 24, 2014

“As Middlesex County (Mass.) district attorney, (Martha) Coakley defended the convictions of Fells Acres day-care center operator Violet Amirault and her two children, Gerald Amirault and Cheryl Amirault LeFave. The Amiraults are now widely recognized as victims of the mass national hysteria in the 1980s over supposed child sexual abuse in day care centers….

“In 2000, as the case against the Amiraults had all but collapsed, Coakley opposed the 5-0 decision by the Massachusetts Governor’s Board of Pardons and Paroles to commute Gerald Amirault’s sentence. To this day, Gerald lives with an ankle bracelet and strict probationary conditions, despite a growing number of people who recognize not only that he committed no crime, but that no crime was committed….”

– From “When Prosecutors Seek Higher Office, Questions Often Remain” by defense attorney Harvey Silverglate at Forbes (Oct. 22)

“Coakley… refuses to acknowledge what any rational person should know, that once again (after the Salem witch trials) Massachusetts had indulged in irrational hysteria. Just what we need, a governor who can’t admit she made a mistake….”

– From “Struggling to find the truth behind all the political rhetoric” by Barbara Anderson  in the Eagle-Tribune of North Andover, Mass. (Oct. 19)

At the same time voters in Massachusetts will be be deciding whether to elect Martha Coakley governor, those in the First Judicial District of North Carolina will be deciding whether to elect fellow “satanic ritual abuse” prosecutor Nancy Lamb district attorney. Lamb may share with Coakley not only the inability to “admit she made a mistake,” but also the appetite for higher office.

Oct. 16, 2014

“A 38-year-old man from Statesville has been accused of molesting children as young as 3 years old at the day care where he worked in the 1990s….

“Police said a girl came to them in 1999 and said (Joshua Maurice) Young had molested her at the day care between 1994 and 1995, when she was 3 years old. The alleged assaults happened in a part of the building away from the other children….

“The Statesville Police Department investigated then, according to Capt. David Onley… but no charges were filed….

“In June of this year, another alleged victim came forward, Onley said. This one said she was molested by Young at the day care between 1995 and 1997. The earliest incidents happened when she was 3, she said.

“ ‘We had a female tell us exactly the same story – same place, same details as (the first) one,’ Onley said. ‘It gave validity to that (first) one. And then we had to go track down that first victim.’ ”

– From “Day care worker accused of sexually assaulting 3-year-olds in 1990s” by Cleve R. Wootson Jr. in the Charlotte Observer (Oct. 15)

Is Joshua Maurice Young guilty as charged? I have no idea. But given the history of day-care sex abuse prosecutions, the case against him certainly warrants a skepticism by police not indicated in this account.

Oct. 4, 2014

Among those journalists who fell for the “satanic ritual abuse” storyline, none fell harder than Civia Tamarkin.

She not only stage-managed an embarrassingly credulous episode of “Nightline,” but also testified earnestly at a Believe the Children convention alongside Little Rascals prosecutor H. P. Williams Jr. and supposed ritual-abuse survivor Laura Buchanan (““ was told that a surveillance device would be inserted into my brain….”).

In 1993 Tamarkin delivered a lengthy address on “Investigative Issues in Ritual Abuse Cases” to the Fifth Eastern Regional Conference on Abuse and Multiple Personality in Alexandria, Va.

Like Ross Cheit two decades later, she had no trouble detailing numerous flaws in the prosecution of McMartin and other ritual abuse cases but inevitably came up frustrated in her search for a smoking gun or two.  Most striking, after recounting all her journalistic fault-finding, was her unquestioning gratitude to SRA snake-oil theoreticians Roland Summit and Bennett Braun for “(taking) the time to teach me what they could.”

Prior to her affiliation with Believe the Children, Tamarkin had reported commendably for Time, People and the Chicago Sun-Times and had coauthored a book with Chicago educator Marva Collins.

More recently, she has directed a documentary on the aftermath of a soldier’s death in Iraq….

So what happened in the 1990s? How did an experienced reporter lose her skepticism in the face of “ritual abuse” claims?

I’ve asked Tamarkin what she was thinking then – and what she believes today – but haven’t received a response.

Sept. 29, 2014

“Duke law professor Theresa Newman has three boxes full of files about Andrew Chandler Jr.’s case: details about the bizarre allegations, the expert testimony that would not be admissible today and the multiple appeals….”

– From “Duke law clinic to review 1987 conviction” in the Asheville Citizen-Times (Sept. 27)

Thanks to reporter Romando Dixson for providing a thorough recap of the Chandler case, pegged to the recently expressed interest of the Duke Law School Wrongful Convictions Clinic.

Publication in the Asheville paper is especially welcome for Junior’s friends, family and other supporters in nearby Madison County, who likely haven’t seen the case mentioned in print since his conviction in 1987.

Sept. 23, 2014

The Duke Law School Wrongful Convictions Clinic was a crucial ally of defense attorney Sean Devereux in the recent exoneration of Michael Alan Parker, whose “satanic ritual abuse” conviction bears many fundamental similarities to Junior Chandler’s.

Now, co-director Theresa Newman tells me the clinic “is reviewing the case file to determine if we can help Mr. Chandler prove his innocence.

“We are at the VERY early stages of our review, so we do not have a good sense of things yet and cannot even estimate a timeline for the review.  The file is large and the case is complicated, so the review will take some time.

“That said, we are mindful of how long Mr. Chandler has been imprisoned and, to the extent possible, will try to conduct the review without undue delay.”

Even given Ms. Newman’s cautious caveats, this review must be seen as opening new possibilities for Junior Chandler.

As many doors as the legal system has slammed in Junior’s face, there has always seemed to be one more. Thank you, Wrongful Convictions Clinic.

Sept. 17, 2014

I’m doubly intrigued by this recent letter to the editor of the Elizabeth City Advance.

First, that an electioneering party official – in Edenton! – would cite the Little Rascals prosecution as an “infamous” example of Nancy Lamb’s failures.

Second, that 10 days after publication not a single correspondent has taken to the pages of the Advance to challenge the point!

Will no one today step forward to justify the state’s longest and costliest trial? To swear continuing allegiance to the credo of “Believe the Children”? To once again praise unreservedly the eight-year crusade Nancy Lamb waged against Bob Kelly?

It’s almost enough to make me think rationality has reclaimed the public mind in Edenton. If so, it took its own sweet time.

Sept. 12, 2014

Edenton has been the scene of many historic events – the Edenton Tea Party, the escape of Harriet Jacobs, etc. – but surely nothing happened there in the entire 20th Century more significant than the Little Rascals Day Care case.

So why is the case not even mentioned on Edenton’s Wikipedia page?

On Sept. 28, 2013, a rogue editor abruptly removed a passage similar to this one:

“Edenton achieved international notoriety for the Little Rascals Day Care sexual abuse trial, the subject of journalist Ofra Bikel’s award-winning trilogy of documentaries….”

Wikipedia entries are intentionally easy to edit, but the process leaves fingerprints.
The person whose name is attached to the Little Rascals deletion turns out to be an innkeeper in Edenton. He ended our exchange with “I did not remove anything or post anything on that site…. must have been my competitor from across the street.”

I have restored the deleted passage – let’s hope it proves innkeeper-proof.

Sept. 4, 2014

“The evidence you heard today in my opinion negates the evidence presented at trial…. Based upon this new evidence, the state does not have a case to prosecute….”

– Johnson Britt, Robeson County (N.C.) district attorney, acceding to release of two defendants cleared by DNA testing after serving almost 31 years each for the rape and murder of a 11-year-old girl

“You find a cigarette, you say it has (a different suspect’s) DNA on it, but so what? It’s just a cigarette, and absent some direct connection to the actual killing, what have you got? Do you have exoneration? I don’t think so….

“It’s a tragic day for justice in Robeson County…. Apparently the district attorney just threw up his hands and capitulated.” More here.

– Now-retired DA Joe Freeman Britt (no relation to Johnson Britt), acknowledging not an iota of doubt – “None. None.” – that the two men he prosecuted in 1984 were guilty as charged

Hats off to Johnson Britt for breaking the prosecutorial code of arrogance (although that’s always easier when the mistake happened on a predecessor’s watch).

And what is there to say about Joe Freeman Britt, the coldblooded “deadliest prosecutor in America”?

What I wish I could say is that his willfully blind resistance to exoneration is rare. But of course it isn’t.