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.
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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….
Sex-abuse journalism raises ‘strange question’
Nov. 9, 2012
“Did I recognize that child sex abuse existed and was a serious problem? reporters would ask. A strange question, that. The discussion of no other crime would require such a disclaimer. Journalists who have written about false murder charges are seldom asked to provide reassurance that they know murder is a bad thing, and it really happens.”
– From “No Crueler Tyrannies: Accusations, False Witness and Other Terrors of Our Times” by Dorothy Rabinowitz (2003)
Child sex-abuse workshops work their mischief, no matter where
Feb. 16, 2018
“Eighteen years ago this month, Peter Ellis left prison. He ought never to have been there in the first place.
“[In 1993] Ellis was convicted of child abuse at the Christchurch Civic Crèche. It remains one of New Zealand’s most controversial cases, and one [New Zealand’s] proposed Criminal Cases Review Commission would do well to address.
“If all the allegations were to be believed, Ellis was involved in making children dance naked while some were placed in an oven or suspended in a cage. Others were buried alive, and one child was forced to kill another. One unfortunate lad was turned into a frog and a cat. Needless to say the evidence for these events was not strong…”
– From “Peter Ellis martyr to deranged prejudice” by Jarrod Gilbert in the New Zealand Herald (Feb. 8)
The first allegations against Peter Ellis occurred shortly after a nearby Ritual Abuse Workshop. What a coincidence – the first allegations against Bob Kelly occurred shortly after a
nearby day-care sex abuse seminar….
Johnny Small freed, now deserves pardon of innocence
Sept. 14, 2016
“[Chris] Mumma said she intends to request a pardon for [Johnny] Small from Gov. Pat McCrory. In order for Small to be compensated for the years he spent in prison, he has to be exonerated of the charges on the grounds that he did not commit the crime. Under North Carolina law, the Industrial Commission can award exonerees $50,000 for each year spent in prison up to a maximum of $750,000. Exonerees also are eligible for job training and college tuition….”
– From “Johnny Small’s freedom makes some question if investigator should be charged” by F.T. Norton in the Wilmington Star-News (Sept. 9)
Let’s hope McCrory responds more willingly and humanely than he did in finally pardoning Henry McCollum and Leon Brown.
Case closed, Governor – no reinvestigation needed!
‘Motive behind these sexual acts is never revealed….’
Jan. 12, 2016
“There are strong similarities between the confessions taken from accused witches in early modern Europe, the testimony of Satanic ritual abuse taken by modern therapists, and accounts of alien abduction given under hypnosis.
“In each of these narratives, a subject describes horrible sexual transgressions performed on them at the hand of a mysterious other: the thorny penis of the Devil, the bizarre anal insertions of Satanists, and the mysterious probing of aliens.
“The motive behind these sexual acts is never revealed and the existence of the perpetrators is usually in doubt….”
– From “Carnal Knowledge: The Epistemology of Sexual Trauma in Witches’ Sabbaths, Satanic Ritual Abuse, and Alien Abduction Narratives” (abstract) by Joseph Laycock in Preternature: Critical and Historical Studies on the Preternatural (2012)
Did prosecutors and therapists even attempt to ascribe any cause or context to the “bizarre anal insertions” common to the day-care allegations? Candles, Magic Markers, burning flower stems?
Did they think such shocking behavior had appeared full blown out of nowhere? On the list of known sexual perversions exactly which box – or boxes! – would they check?