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.
On Facebook
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….
Does ‘convicting innocent people count as crime’?
Jan. 6, 2012
“Innocence Lost” aired too late to save the Edenton Seven, but its influence in deflating the nation’s ritual-abuse bubble is hard to exaggerate. Shock and outrage – and considerable ridicule of North Carolina justice – followed each of the three episodes.
Walter Goodman’s 1993 New York Times review pointed to “the likelihood that no crime was committed, unless convicting innocent people counts as a crime.”
“To say this tragic farce has resembled a hysterical witch hunt,” Phil Kloer wrote in the Atlanta Journal and Constitution in 1997, “is to demean witch hunts.”
DA Williams to jury: Don’t consider the source
Feb. 20, 2013
“Don’t focus on the question, focus on the answer.”
– District Attorney H. P. Williams, urging jurors to ignore the leading questions that therapists asked child-witnesses to elicit accusations against Bob Kelly
“Pay no attention to that man behind the curtain.”
– The Wizard of Oz
The darkness that lurks behind Darkness to Light
Jan. 16, 2012
Darkness to Light is a Charleston-based nonprofit with the goal “End Child Abuse.” Since its founding in 2000, D2L claims to have trained adults in 48 states and 10 foreign countries in how to prevent, recognize and react to child sexual abuse. Among its allies: YMCAs.
Unfortunately, D2L is less than meticulous in associating itself with other organizations. This is a letter I sent D2L officials on Dec. 5:
Darkness to Light does a disservice to the public and to your cause when you include on your list of resources the Survivorship website.
Survivorship’s board president is Neil Brick, who identifies himself as “the founder of S.M.A.R.T. (Stop Mind Control and Ritual Abuse Today) at http://ritualabuse.us. He is a survivor of ritual abuse and a survivor advocate. He works on developing supports for survivors and getting information out to the general public about ritual abuse. He runs yearly ritual abuse conferences on the east coast of the United States every year at http://ritualabuse.us/smart-conference. Links to his presentation transcripts and research papers are http://ritualabuse.us/smart/neil-brick.”
S.M.A.R.T. is perhaps the most prominent organization still insisting that numerous day-care providers in the 1980s and early 1990s subjected children to “satanic ritual abuse.” Although the day-care panic eventually waned and courts freed nearly all the unfortunate defendants, S.M.A.R.T. continues to see abuse in every one of these cases – from McMartin to Little Rascals to Fells Acres, etc.
Like Scientologists and Holocaust deniers, S.M.A.R.T. has been banned from editing Wikipedia entries. Neither should its disinformation campaign be given a platform by Darkness to Light.
Darkness to Light has yet to respond to that letter or to a Dec. 30 follow-up soliciting “a statement explaining why you continue to support this organization.” I’d be happy to publish such an explanation, but even happier to learn that D2L has cut its ties to the ritual abuse movement.
….Is APSAC finally ready to apologize to wrongfully prosecuted victims?
Oct. 22, 2016
“At APSAC’s June Colloquium, Paul J. Stern gave a presentation that clearly acknowledged your organization’s role in fostering the ‘satanic ritual abuse’ day-care panic of the 1980s and early ’90s.
“Mr. Stern, a prosecutor and longtime APSAC official, was only illuminating from the inside a reality long recognized among virtually all respected professionals and academics.
“I am writing today to request that the American Professional Society on the Abuse of Children formally renounce its advocacy of the ‘satanic ritual abuse’ myth and apologize to its victims. The ‘misguided ideas’ cited by Mr. Stern not only supported wrongful prosecutions and incarcerations, but also profoundly misled children, parents and the public.
“The reputation of APSAC will remain tainted as long as it fails to make amends for this seminal part of its history. If the International Association of Chiefs of Police can apologize for ‘the actions of the past and the role that our profession has played in society’s historical mistreatment of communities of color,’ then surely APSAC can similarly mitigate the damages caused by its own actions.”
– From a letter I sent to Dr. Janet Rosenzweig, executive director, American Professional Society on the Abuse of Children
