May 6, 2013

When last we left Junior Chandler, his former appellate defender, Mark Montgomery, had asked North Carolina Prisoner Legal Services to look into the case.

But NCPLS requires the prisoner himself to request help, and that hasn’t happened. “Like a lot of the old-timers, Junior does not think they (NCPLS) are worth much,” Montgomery says. “There was a big shake up there a few years ago, and they are now very aggressive and as effective as anybody in post-conviction cases. I am going to encourage Junior (again) to ask for their help….”

Meanwhile, he has pitched Junior’s case to Christine Mumma at the N.C. Center on Actual Innocence.

Here’s the essential “evidence of actual innocence” that Montgomery offered Mumma:

“Lathern Hensley (a.k.a. Buddy Norton) was one of the adult mentally retarded riders on Junior’s bus. He and another woman testified that Junior did stuff, and they helped. They each got probation-only plea deals. I found Hensley, but his guardian wouldn’t let me talk with him. The Actual Innocence folks (with powers granted by the state) could insist on talking with Hensley. I think he would say that he was pressured into lying on the stand.”

This is just the latest long shot in overturning Junior’s wrongful conviction, and even if the Center on Actual Innocence agrees to take the case, the process is anything but swift. As the Center’s website cautions, “We counsel patience to inmates and their families during the investigative phase as the process of gathering additional documentation; identifying, locating and interviewing witnesses; and completing many other investigative tasks can take several years.”

Nov. 14, 2011

Raymond Lawrence, then director of chaplains for Columbia Presbyterian Hospital in New York, attended Bob Kelly’s trial on several occasions and founded the Committee for Support of the Edenton Seven.

This passage is excerpted from a memoir I asked him to write for littlerascalsdaycare.org:

“One Monday morning on arriving at my office I noted a special delivery overnight package in my mail pile. Just as I walked in, my secretary buzzed me to say I had a long distance call asking whether I had opened the package. I told her to get the number and I would call back.

“Instead, the caller said he would call back. I assumed it was the kind of crank call which often comes to chaplains.

“When I finally turned to the special delivery package, I found inside cashier’s checks made out to various defendants in an amount of about $450,000.

“Finally the donor called back, but he didn’t want his name disclosed to the secretary or anyone else. He felt the case was a witch hunt, and he was in solidarity with the accused. He was a businessman who had made a fortune in the emerging computer industry. A year later he gave another $300,000.

“When I flew to Ohio to meet him, he told me he had a terminal illness, and some years later he died. He was a humble, unassuming man. I was in awe of his sensitivity and generosity.”

July 11, 2014

“….  As you might imagine, I had not had reason to think about the Little Rascals case until your email arrived.  Yes, I was very interested in the case at the time, but had no role or authority to intervene. (See governor’s 1991 response to letter writers.) The arrests and charges were highly publicized, as were the proceedings of the trial, upon which the two accused were convicted.  So, like most citizens, I felt a compulsion to follow the case, at least insofar as the news coverage.

“My recollection is that both the horrible accusations and the contrary indications of coached and imaginative testimony of the children were featured in the coverage….   Being very familiar with Arthur Miller’s brilliant drama, ‘The Crucible,’ I was aware of the possibility of childish fantasy passing as falsely condemning testimony.  From a distance, most readers probably shared the concern, ‘What if it were true?’

“I do not recall whether the defense attorneys contacted my office in an appeal for clemency in 1991-1992.  Had they done so, they would have been advised that my practice was to let the appellate courts complete their judicial review before considering clemency.  This was complete in 1995 when the NC Supreme Court declined to review the finding by the Court of Appeals of trial error, at which time there would be no cause for Governor Hunt to intervene.  I have great respect for the judgment and integrity of then Chief Justice Burleigh Mitchell, and that would settle the legal principles of the matter for me.

“I can only wonder what conclusion I might have reached had the appeal for clemency been properly before me.  My approach in such cases was to meet separately with advocates on both sides, without restricting the nature or style of what they had to say.  I would make my decision based on corroborated evidence and the trial record, without following its standards for disqualifying some evidence.  I gave attention to two main standards: (a) whether the punishment was suited to the nature of the crime, and (b) whether there was doubt as to the guilt of the person convicted….

“I believe your cause is to persuade the Governor to issue a Pardon of Innocence for Bob Kelly and Dawn Wilson.  It may be difficult to produce exculpatory evidence several decades after the events.  You did not say whether Mr. Kelly and/or Ms. Wilson wish to return to that gauntlet, considering the degree to which they have restored their lives.  If they do, it would my hope that Governor McCrory and his counsel would weigh the two guidelines cited above, although no Governor is bound in clemency matters by any precedent of his predecessors.  While it can be difficult to prove a negative, it would help your cause if there were former accusers now in their thirties who have recanted the accusations of their childhood.  Otherwise, the appellate finding of procedural error alone might not be sufficient.”

– From a letter from former Gov. Jim Martin responding to my question about his recollections of the Little Rascals Day Care case

As welcome as a gubernatorial pardon would be, my hopes for the Edenton Seven are more modest:  a “statement of innocence” from the governor or attorney general similar to that given the defendants in the Duke lacrosse case.

If only the Little Rascals prosecutors had been as familiar with “The Crucible” as was the governor….

Nov. 21, 2012

“The child abuse field has always been one that felt like there was not enough public policy attention, so the narrative reflected that: It’s at crisis proportions; it’s getting worse every year; it’s an epidemic….”

– Mark Chaffin, professor in the department of pediatrics at the University of Oklahoma Health Sciences Center

Dr. Chaffin’s observation wasn’t specific to the ritual sex abuse era, but he sure captures its ever-more-breathless conjuring of villains and victims.