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….
McMartin case brought emulation, not illumination
Nov. 2, 2012
“The (McMartin) episode and its conclusion were ravaged by the mass media and produced a tremendous repercussion throughout the nation – but not the one of caution, as one might have expected…. (Time magazine reported that) ‘Nationally, the attention generated by the case set off an explosion of reports claiming sexual abuse of children, increasing such reports from 6,000 in in 1976 to an estimated 350,000 in 1988.’”
– From “Witch-Children: From Salem Witch-Hunts to Modern Courtrooms” by Hans Sebald (1995)
Did prosecutors sell out for name recognition?
Nov. 12, 2012
“It is not conceivable that any of the prosecutors (in cases such as Little Rascals) believed a word of the charges responsible for ruining the lives of so many people. The cases were brought for one reason alone: to gain name recognition for the prosecutors.”
– From “The Tyranny of Good Intentions: How Prosecutors and Bureaucrats Are Trampling the Constitution in the Name of Justice” by Paul Craig Roberts and Lawrence M. Stratton (2008)
Could prosecutors really have sold their souls (not to mention their public trust) for mere “name recognition”? Or did their lust for guilty verdicts blind them to the obvious?
Most days, the latter seems more likely to me. Or perhaps a hybrid….
Indisputably, however, career benefits did attach to trumpeting from the courthouse steps that you’ve sent away Bob Kelly for 12 consecutive life sentences.
New York Times remembers McMartin case
March 12, 2014
“Really now, teachers chopped up animals, clubbed a horse to death with a baseball bat, sacrificed a baby in a church and made children drink the blood, dressed up as witches and flew in the air – and all this had been going on unnoticed for a good long while until a disturbed mother spoke up?”
– From “The Trial That Unleashed Hysteria Over Child Abuse” by Clyde Haberman in the New York Times (March 9, 2014)
Big thanks to Retro Report for its eye-reopening essay and 13-minute video recalling the seminal McMartin Preschool case. Also mentioned are Little Rascals and other “criminal cases of dubious provenance” from the moral panic.
Although the road to public exoneration for the Edenton Seven remains long and uncertain, this attention from the Times is welcome indeed.
Nancy Lamb: ‘Would you want someone like me?’
June 3, 2014
“I want all of you to ask yourselves: If you were to find yourself in the unfortunate circumstance of being the victim of a crime, who would you want representing your interest in the criminal justice system?
“Would you want someone like me, with 30 years experience as a veteran prosecutor, a person who has prosecuted every kind of criminal case there is?
“Or would you want someone like my opponent, whose entire criminal experience comes as in the role of being a criminal defense attorney, defending criminals who commit crimes against the people of the 1st District?”
– Little Rascals prosecutor Nancy Lamb, now a candidate for district attorney, comparing herself – most favorably! – with incumbent Andrew Womble
Lamb won the Democratic nomination for DA in last month’s primary and will face Republican Womble in the general election. Although her campaign website boasts that she has been “nationally recognized for her work with child abuse,” it somehow neglects to mention her star turn in one of the country’s most publicized “satanic ritual abuse” prosecutions. Fortunately, the five months between now and Nov. 4 should provide ample opportunity for her to address that issue.