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

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.

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Today’s random selection from the Little Rascals Day Care archives….


 

Charles Manson set stage for fear of hippies, then of witches

Fisher

Dec. 5, 2017

“The Manson Family’s ritualistic murders in 1969 triggered the ini4al stages of na4onal cult hysteria….

“Manson made hippies scary for awhile, but I don’t think it’s a coincidence that ’70s horror movies featuring hooded devil covens, witches and the occult emerged shortly after he was convicted. Manson and his apostles triggered a frenzy pertaining to cults that would reach ridiculous new heights in the ‘80s with the ‘satanic ritual abuse’ allegations, which inspired their own exploitation movies as well….”

— From “How Exploitation Movies Exploited Charles Manson and Hippie Hysteria
by Kieran Fisher at “Film School Rejects” (Nov. 25)

 

LRDCC20

Working ‘seven days a week’ in wrong direction

Sept. 14, 2012

“Judith Steltzner Abbott of Camden has become a moving force for the well-being of sexually abused children and their families across the state. Her presentations on child sexual abuse have become a part of nursing programs and hospital emergency room staff training and have been presented to law enforcement agencies, social services systems and members of the judiciary.

“When litigation developed from allegations of child sexual abuse at a day care center in a nearby area, Abbott worked seven days a week to provide counseling, guidance and support for children and parents….”

– From Judy Abbott’s citation as winner of the 1992 Distinguished Women of North Carolina Award, Public Service category, sponsored by the North Carolina Council for Women

Not only did the prosecution’s lead therapist avoid penalty for misdiagnosing 17 Little Rascals children, but also she became “a moving  force…. across the state” in spreading her toxic mythology – and was honored for it!

Does the North Carolina Council for Women have a process for withdrawing its awards?

Calling all members of ‘secretive organizations’….

Aug. 12, 2013

“To maintain their belief in networks of satanic ritual abuse, the people involved in (the 16th Annual Ritual Abuse, Secretive Organizations and Mind Control Conference, to be held in Windsor Locks, Conn.) have built up a labyrinth of contorted mental passageways….

“According to the organizers…  when people recant their belief that they were the victims of satanic ritual abuse, the recanting is itself evidence of satanic ritual abuse. They assert that satanic cults insert neurological programs into the minds of their victims. Among these programs, they say, is one that makes therapists who push their patients to talk about ‘repressed memories’ of satanic ritual abuse look stupid….

“Standard academic conferences are open to anyone interested, so that ideas can be challenged. That’s not how things work at the Ritual Abuse, Secretive Organizations and Mind Control Conference, which excludes members of “unsympathetic organizations” or “secret organizations.”

“How exactly would a conference exclude members of secret organizations?… The instant a member of a secret organization was revealed as a member of a secret organization, the secret organization wouldn’t be a secret any longer, and the person accused of being a member would then become eligible to attend.

“Are there any members of secret organizations that would be willing to attend the Ritual Abuse, Secretive Organizations and Mind Control Conference, and report back to me what happens there?

“Wait… don’t tell me. That would just ruin the plan. Do it in secret.”

– Adapted from “How Can A Conference Exclude Member Of Secret Organizations?” by F.G. Fitzer at Irregular Times (July 2, 2013)

Not surprisingly, the weekend conference was a project of S.M.A.R.T., and the top-billed speaker was Judy “Twenty-two Faces” Byington.

How to demonize ‘quite ordinary women’

Sept. 28, 2012

As mentioned last week, the preponderance of women among the Edenton Seven was one of many curiosities that apparently failed to burden the prosecution with second thoughts.

Mary DeYoung addresses the issue in “The Day Care Ritual Abuse Moral Panic” (2004):

“By the 1980s… research studies consistently found that child sexual abuse by women was a statistical rarity….To accuse (female day-care workers of ritual abuse), child-savers had the daunting challenge of fashioning folk devils out of quite ordinary women engaged in traditional women’s work, and then persuading the public that evil had lurked unnoticed for so long behind such homely facades…..

“The answer was simple: belief trumps gender. Women who are satanists do what no other women even imagine….”