Dec. 23, 2011

“Many appalling results of the recovered-memory movement of the 1970s and ’80s arose from … unexamined views of memory – occurrences like the false accusations of employees of children’s care centers… Such fantasies have often been encouraged as reliable memories by doctrinaire therapists and have sometimes resulted in prison sentences and ruined lives for innocent fathers, mothers, kin, teachers and devoted caretakers.

“The documentary films made by Ofra Bikel … are meticulous and frightening accounts of such fantasies and their overwhelming power in the hands of the cruelest, most self-deluded and most easily panicked among us.”

– From “Ardent Spirits” by the late Reynolds Price (2009)

March 13, 2016

“Fran and Dan Keller have been released from a Texas prison after 21 years, yet still have little freedom of movement or circumstance, or even quality of life. Their 1992 conviction on multiple counts of ‘sexual assault of a minor’ – in the now notorious Fran’s Day Care case – has effectively been overturned by a 2015 Court of Criminal Appeals ruling ‘granting relief’ to the Kellers on a single question of retracted medical testimony. But the ruling was not accompanied by actual exoneration from the allegedly heinous crimes.

“Only a single appeals court judge – Cheryl Johnson – was willing to admit no crime had in fact occurred. ‘This was a witch hunt from the beginning,’ wrote Johnson, in her opinion concurring with the opaque ruling of the full court. Johnson would have granted relief on all the Kellers’ claims, and would have acknowledged that the entire prosecution had been an egregious folly.

“The limited ruling, while welcome in itself, left the Kellers in a legal limbo – permanently accused but not cleared…. required to somehow further demonstrate their innocence – of crimes that never happened….”

– From “Learning From Our Mistakes” by Michael King in the Austin Chronicle (March 11) (cached)

So who thwarts the hapless Kellers? Yes, yet another prosecutor who sets the bar for exoneration stratospherically high. Although District Attorney Rosemary Lehmberg (here’s why her name rings a bell) supported their release, she now finds herself unable to “find a path to innocence” without the deal-sealing exculpation of DNA evidence. Those darn imaginary criminals sure do clean up after themselves….

July 26, 2013

Rereading appellate defender Mark Montgomery’s thunderously compelling brief on behalf of Bob Kelly always delivers something I had either passed over earlier or forgotten. This time it was that

“(Jimmy) and Nancy Smith also declined to have their son Judson evaluated by one of the four therapists who saw the other children. By the time of trial, both Mr. and Ms. Smith had been accused by several children as having participated in the abuse. (One of the child-witnesses) said of Nancy Smith, ‘She’s Miss Betsy’s sister, so she must be mean.’ ”

The Smiths’ close call highlights once again the terrible randomness of the Little Rascals prosecutors’ accusation process.

How challenging the prosecutors’ decision-making must have been: Which child-witness had been adequately manipulated, and which couldn’t be counted on to earnestly describe the sharks, the butcher knives and the dead babies? Which innocent adult was vulnerable, and which might strike jurors as just too unlikely a serial ritual-abuser?

Nancy Smith (Barrow) recalls today that “I had NO idea I had been accused until working with (defense attorneys) Mike Spivey and Jeff Miller for Bob’s trial.  I happened to read some notes from police interviews and saw my name more than once….

“No member of my family – mother, father, Laura, Leslie, or Judson – was ever interviewed by police or prosecutors.  Jimmy and I talked with Brenda Toppin one afternoon in her office.  She only wanted to know about the state of Bob and Betsy’s marriage.”

Feb. 4, 2013

Junior Chandler, writing from Avery-Mitchell Correctional Center, January 23, 2013:

“All of the high profile and high publicity cases in the last 20 years –  nearly every one of those people are home…. Except for me and I am still in prison…. April 15, 2013, will be 26 years.

“I know it’s extremely hard to get help to prove my innocence when there isn’t a crime committed to begin with.

“It doesn’t look like I got any help from Gov. Perdue when she left office, as I haven’t heard from anyone, nor has my time (sentence) changed any. All I was asking was time served or my time to be run concurrent instead of back to back, as my record on the street before and my record in here should mean something….

“But I guess it don’t matter – as I’ve seen people continually be in trouble (but) make honor grade and get out and then come right back in prison!

“Well, I’ll close for now. Maybe someone will be able to help get the truth out!”

Junior’s hopes for release now lie with North Carolina Prisoner Legal Services, which is deciding whether to take on his case.