June 4, 2012

“Drawing upon clinical experience and research, Faller… asserted that false allegations are quite rare and pointed out that children have little motivation for making a false accusation, but offenders have considerable motivation for persuading professionals that children are either lying, mistaken, or crazy.”

– From “Interviewing Children About Sexual Abuse: Controversies and Best Practice” by Kathleen Coulborn Faller (2007)

Yes, that Kathleen Coulborn Faller, whose stubborn belief in day-care ritual abuse was expressed four years earlier in “Understanding and Assessing Child Sexual Maltreatment.”

Although “Interviewing Children…” isn’t specific to ritual abuse cases, Dr. Faller’s casual dismissal of false allegations echoes the “Believe the Children” mantra of that era.

So much wrongheadedness she manages to pack into a single sentence:

■ “Drawing upon clinical experience and research, Faller… asserted that false allegations are quite rare… ” Here she cites not only her own anecdotal impressions, but also the profoundly misguided research conducted during the height of the abuse mania.

■ “… and pointed out that children have little motivation for making a false accusation…” In fact, children who have been coaxed, threatened and worn down have every motivation to please their interrogators.

■ “… but offenders have considerable motivation for persuading professionals that children are either lying, mistaken, or crazy.” Did it occur to Dr. Faller that offenders have not a bit more such motivation than innocent defendants?

■ ■ ■

Ritual abuse: the creationism of social science?

June 12, 2013

“We received only one call, from a gentleman in Massachusetts, and he said he felt sorry for the whole community and wished us well. It was business as usual, except for all the damn reporters.

“I don’t see why this thing has to be tried again. It’s been through the judicial system, and I just don’t know what ‘Frontline’s’ agenda is.

“The town is not divided or in turmoil or any of that stuff they’re saying about it.”

– Edenton Town Manager Anne Marie Kelly (no relation to Bob Kelly), reacting to “Innocence Lost: The Verdict” (as quoted in “Sex-case documentary stirs up Edenton again,” News & Observer, July 22, 1993)

June 15, 2014

“Andrew Junior Chandler has been unjustly incarcerated in a North Carolina prison for 27 years, charged with a crime that almost surely never happened….

“Let’s hope that Gov. Pat McCrory will review the mistaken judgment of his misnamed ‘clemency office’ and correct this stain on the reputation of North Carolina justice.”

–From “Mass hysteria of sexual, satanic ritual abuse and a miscarriage of NC justice” by Dr. Allen Frances in the Raleigh News & Observer (June 15) text cache

Dr. Frances, professor emeritus of psychiatry at Duke University, once again steps forward to take responsibility for therapy’s Dark Ages, this time in the newspaper read daily by those state officials who have refused to grant relief to Junior Chandler.

Jan. 11, 2012

“It’s worth remembering, in the 1980s we had a whole spate of false accusations of… sexual abuse of children. The McMartin Preschool, all those supposed satanic cults in day care centers, turned out to be false…. It’s worth it to remind people of that.”

– Legal analyst Jeffrey Toobin, interviewed on CNN (Nov. 15) about the Penn State case

In fact, deep distinctions separate Penn State and the “multi-victim, multi-offender” – MVMO, in the sex-crime argot – accusations typified by McMartin and Little Rascals.

Since 1995, Ontario Consultants on Religious Tolerance has investigated 40 alleged MVMOs at 24 locations around the world. Number of substantiated instances of ritual abuse: zero.

According to its research, “Any criminal acts were non-ritual abuse by a single perpetrator… Almost all the crimes with which people were charged never happened.”

Regardless, Toobin’s reminder is a welcome counterpoint to the Judge Nancy Grace school of instant verdicts.