Feb. 27, 2013

“The difficulties in debunking blatant antireality are legion. You can make up any old nonsense and state it in a few seconds, but it takes much longer to show why it’s wrong and how things really are.

“This is coupled with how sticky bunk can be. Once uttered, it’s out there, bootstrapping its own reality, getting repeated by the usual suspects….”

– From “Debunking the Denial: ‘16 Years of No Global Warming’” by Phil Plait at Slate.com

brooklynda.org

Ken Thompson

Dec. 17, 2015

“Three men convicted of murder by arson for a 1980 fire in Brooklyn (were) exonerated on Wednesday….

“What carried the three men into prison was not reliable evidence of an intentionally set blaze, but rather an arson investigation that was more like shamanism than science, rooted in hunches and folklore and disconnected from the dynamics of actual fires. Like the comparisons of bite marks, hair and handwriting, it was a forensic practice that had the authority of white-coat laboratory science but virtually none of its rigor….”

– From “Between Guilt and Innocence, an Evolution in Fire Science”
by Jim Dwyer in the New York Times (Dec. 16)

Hats off to District Attorney Ken Thompson, who moved to vacate the three convictions, citing “circumstantial evidence, outdated science and the testimony of a single, wholly unreliable witness….”

Columnist Dwyer is reminded of a statue at the University of Pennsylvania Law School depicting a mythological Chinese beast believed to have the ability to tell the guilty from the innocent by butting them. Inscribed on its base: “Slow and painful has been man’s progress from magic to law.”

“Slow and painful” indeed. Ask Junior Chandler, who has been imprisoned since April 17, 1987, for committing the magical crime of “satanic ritual abuse.”

Jan. 13, 2012

For months I have been fruitlessly searching the record for a public apology from even one prominent perpetrator of the ritual-abuse day-care hoax. At last I have happened upon such a statement:

“I want to announce publicly that as a firm believer of the ‘Believe The Children’ movement of the 1980s, that started with the McMartin trials in California…. I am now convinced that I was terribly wrong… and many innocent people were convicted and went to prison as a result….”

So who was this lone heroic figure who stepped forward, confessed his mistake and acknowledged the pain it had caused? Was it a repentant prosecutor or judge? A psychologist, perhaps?

Well, no. It was Geraldo Rivera.

Of all the talk-show hosts who grabbed giddily, repeatedly and unquestioningly onto the latest claim of ritual abuse, it was Geraldo, starting in 1987, who went furthest over the top.

“Estimates are that there are over 1 million Satanists in this country…” he told viewers. “The majority of them are linked in a highly organized, very secretive network. From small towns to large cities, they have attracted police and FBI attention to their Satanic ritual child abuse, child pornography and grisly Satanic murders. The odds are that this is happening in your town.”

By Dec. 12, 1995, however, Geraldo had experienced a change of heart. That’s the night he hosted the CNBC special “Wrongly Accused and Convicted of Child Molestation.”

“He is to be commended for stating his new belief in public,” observed the invaluable religioustolerance.org.

“Unfortunately, a one-minute apology and recantation is hardly sufficient to reverse the damage done by many hours of sensational programming, grounded on misinformation.”

Dec. 3, 2012

Exoneration is in the air!

From Texas to New York – and of course here in North Carolina – more and more prosecutorial abuses are being dug up, dusted off and exposed to long-delayed doses of daylight.

If you’re keeping score, the National Registry of Exoneration has just hit quadruple digits – that’s Bob Kelly, Dawn Wilson and 998 other wrongfully convicted defendants.

So what are the prospects that the State of North Carolina will at last release a Duke-lacrosse-style statement of innocence for the Edenton Seven?

Since last summer, when my petition was kissed off by Mark Davis, general counsel to Gov. Bev Perdue, and I was advised to try Attorney General Roy Cooper, not a peep has been heard in response. It would take a greater optimist than me to believe this silence suggests ongoing thoughtful contemplation.

As the governor prepares to leave office, a valued ally of littlerascalsdaycarecase.org used his access to lobby on behalf of the defendants. But pardon applications have been torrential, he was told, and the Edenton Seven case isn’t among those Perdue is considering.

That still leaves the attorney general – or does it, Mr. Cooper?