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….
Gun lobby knows that public outrage will subside
Dec. 18, 2012
The hands-off-my-guns community is hunkering down, as it did after Columbine, after Tucson, after Aurora, confidently waiting for the storm of outrage to pass.
Just curious: If 20 dead children aren’t enough to start the change process, how many would it take? 100? 500?
But those questions assume that SOME number, however outrageous, would at last open a tiny crack in the massive resistance of the gun lobby.
In reality, no such number exists.
– Lew Powell
Prosecutors must recognize vulnerability to cognitive flaws
Nov. 17, 2016
“It’s no secret that we humans grant far too much confidence to our opinions. But when powerful people do this, the dangers compound. Zealotry replaces fair-mindedness. The worst excesses happen when prosecutors forget they’re flawed humans, like anyone else, and that as a result they’re subject to cognitive flaws like tunnel vision, racial bias, and the desire to reduce cognitive dissonance through ‘cognitive consistency’ even at the expense of complicated, nuanced, self-contradictory, paradoxical truth….
“Cognitive bias and overconfidence touch us all. Only a conscious awareness that we might be wrong can counter unthinking heuristics, biases, and schemas that lead to imperfect conclusions….
“Wisdom counsels not the confident use of power, but the wise use of power. The first step of wisdom is recognizing how little we know….”
– From “ ‘Making a Murderer’ Attorney Highlights Our Troubling Rate of Wrongful Conviction — and Suggests a Solution” by Michael Shammas in the Huffington Post (July 12)
And the latest on the still-imprisoned Brendan Dassey.
Skepticism, accountability strengthen criminal justice system
Aug. 5, 2016
“Perhaps the virtue of these true-crime stories isn’t how they affect specific cases (indeed, without new and objective evidence that calls into question criminal convictions, it’s important – for the sake of the rule of law – to let decisions stand).
“Instead, series such as ‘Serial’ could have a positive impact on how ordinary Americans – the people who sit on juries and elect local prosecutors and judges – view criminal trials.
“Maybe we’ll be more willing to hold those running for local offices accountable for presenting fair cases and working to eliminate bias against the poor or minorities.
“Maybe we’ll be more appropriately skeptical of cases built on witness testimony alone, or question whether investigators used intimidation or unfair interrogation to get inaccurate information from witnesses….”
– From “How the ‘Serial’ podcast is challenging the criminal justice system” by Robert Gebelhoff in the Washington Post, July 6 (via the Denver Post)
Prosecutors Book Club, please take note
April 19, 2014
“Is it possible to so modify child forensic interviewing that the sorts of errors described by Ceci and Bruck are minimized?…
“The primary problem is that most prosecutors and most so-called mental health professionals do not stay current….
“How likely, for instance, is it that a copy of ‘Jeopardy in the Courtroom’ will be found on your favorite prosecutor’s desk?”
– From “A Review of a Review of ‘Jeopardy in the Courtroom’ by Stephen J. Ceci and Maggie Bruck” at falseallegations.com