July 18, 2012

“Law enforcement officials are teaming up with social services experts to investigate and more effectively prosecute child sexual abuse in North Carolina day-care facilities….

“State Bureau of Investigation Director Charles Dunn said… the goal is to train up to 300 individuals in the state’s largest cities.

“Under the protocol, agencies in counties would establish guidelines for interagency task forces. Each task force would include an investigative unit and a resource unit.

“The typical investigative unit would include a child protective services social worker, law enforcement officer, consultant from the state day-care licensing agency and an SBI agent.

“The resource unit might include medical personnel, SBI lab experts, mental health workers and representatives of the attorney general’s and local district attorney’s offices…

“The General Assembly (this year required) SBI notification within 24 hours of any report of sexual abuse in a day-care setting. ‘The Little Rascals case really just helped to focus the public’s and the legislature’s attention,’ ” Dunn said.

– From the Associated Press, July 21, 1992

I suppose this massive response by the state could be described as closing the barn door after the horse is out – except, of course, for the absence of a horse in the first place.

Two decades have passed since all that staff training, protocol drafting and attention focusing, but apparently the state’s interagency task forces are still waiting to be activated for the next day-care ritual abuse case.

Dec. 10, 2012

I’ve been surprised – naively, I suppose – by the refusal of professional journals such as Nursing Research, Child Abuse & Neglect and Relational Child & Youth Care Practice to retract articles that supported the moral panic of ritual abuse in day cares.

The editors’ common justification is that they published no “specific errors,” such as citing the Little Rascals case by name. This seems to me a narrow and disingenuous view. These articles are wrong to the bone, as wrong as if they had been based on cold fusion or the Protocols of Zion.

Here’s what the Charlotte Observer, my former employer, had to say in 2006 about how it had contributed to the infamous Wilmington coup d’etat of 1898:

“An apology is inadequate to atone for the Observer’s role in promoting the white supremacist campaign. But an apology is due….

“We apologize to the black citizens and their descendants whose rights and interests we disregarded, and to all North Carolinians, whose trust we betrayed by our failure to fairly report the news and to stand firmly against injustice.”

Newspapers, as “the first rough draft of history,” enjoy and deserve some leeway in reaching their standards of accuracy. But the editors at the Observer (and other participating North Carolina dailies) didn’t quibble over “specific errors.” They addressed the root defect in their coverage. Is it too much to expect the same from the editors of professional journals?

Sept. 14, 2012

“Judith Steltzner Abbott of Camden has become a moving force for the well-being of sexually abused children and their families across the state. Her presentations on child sexual abuse have become a part of nursing programs and hospital emergency room staff training and have been presented to law enforcement agencies, social services systems and members of the judiciary.

“When litigation developed from allegations of child sexual abuse at a day care center in a nearby area, Abbott worked seven days a week to provide counseling, guidance and support for children and parents….”

– From Judy Abbott’s citation as winner of the 1992 Distinguished Women of North Carolina Award, Public Service category, sponsored by the North Carolina Council for Women

Not only did the prosecution’s lead therapist avoid penalty for misdiagnosing 17 Little Rascals children, but also she became “a moving  force…. across the state” in spreading her toxic mythology – and was honored for it!

Does the North Carolina Council for Women have a process for withdrawing its awards?

Jan. 18, 2013

““I am the grandmother of a Little Rascals Day Care victim, and I am greatly disturbed by many responses to ‘Innocence Lost: The Verdict.’

“Wake up out there! Do you think everything you see on television is true? The bizarre stories told by some of the children are unbelievable to the unknowing adult – being cooked in microwave ovens, going on spaceships – but by some Kelly magic, the children were brainwashed to believe them. I repeat! Wake up America.”

 – From a letter to the editor of the Chowan Herald by Frances P. Wilkins of Edenton (Aug. 26, 1993)