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….
Children showed courage not to ‘remember’ abuse
Oct. 19, 2011
Writing in the Chronicle of Higher Education in 2003, social psychologist Carol Tavris noted that:
“One mother (in the Little Rascals case) told reporters that it took 10 months before her child was able to ‘reveal’ the molestation.
“No one at the time considered the idea that the child might have been remarkably courageous to persist in telling the truth for so long.”
‘I walked into FREEDOM….’
Sept. 22, 2020
A burst of sunshine in these grim times. A note arrived today from Little Rascals Day Care case exoneree Bob Kelly: “Today, 25 years ago, because of Mark Montgomery’s wonderfully written and argued brief, I walked into FREEDOM…. Thanks to him and people like you who have believed in us!”
Echoes of Little Rascals in 2014 race for DA
July 15, 2014
Here’s the big picture from the latest campaign finance reports filed with the State Board of Elections:
Individual contributions to Nancy Lamb are almost double those to incumbent Andrew Womble ($29,821.54 to $15,571.80).
More provocative, however, are the details.
It’s not surprising that Lamb’s donors include such loyal Little Rascals alumnae as parents Jane Mabry ($50) and Lynne Layton ($250) and therapist Judith Abbott ($200).
But at least one member of the prosecutorial alliance seems to have defected: Yes, that’s Lamb’s former boss, H.P. Williams Jr., pitching in $250 to her opponent’s campaign.
Prosecutors’ motto: But they’re still guilty!
Jan. 20, 2012
Although the West Memphis Three weren’t day care workers, their notorious case – most recently updated in HBO’s “Paradise Lost 3: Purgatory” – holds obvious parallels to that of the Edenton 7.
In both courtrooms voodoo justice ruled.
Most poignant to me, however, is that prosecutors in Arkansas and North Carolina shared a dedication to ensuring the defendants’ long-overdue release bore the least possible resemblance to exoneration.
In August 2011 the West Memphis Three were required to enter an Alford plea, maintaining their innocence but acknowledging that sufficient evidence existed to convict them.
On May 23, 1997, Nancy Lamb announced the decision not to challenge the overturned convictions of Bob Kelly and Dawn Wilson in order to “allow wounds to heal…. The paramount thing is not having to drag these children through this again.” Her timing seemed aimed – futilely, as it turned out – at averting the national outrage that would come four days later with the airing of the final episode of “Innocence Lost.”
Two years later, when the last charges against Kelly were dismissed, here’s how Joseph Neff of the News & Observer described the scene:
“The prosecutors in the longest, most expensive criminal case in North Carolina history picked a day when all attention was focused elsewhere to quietly throw in the towel.
“It was Sept. 15, as Hurricane Floyd churned northward toward landfall the next day, that Assistant District Attorney Nancy Lamb filed a two-page document with the Clerk of Superior Court in Edenton, dismissing eight counts of sexual abuse against Robert Kelly.”