McMartin Preschool Research Articles

Better the Devil you Know: The Myth of Harm and the Satanic Panic

The 1980s were a time of big hair, big cars, big phones, and big panics. Yet no panic has ever come close to the hysteria generated by the ‘Satanic Panic’. It was an episode which encompassed an entire decade, spilling into the 1990s as well as into further child-centric narratives of harm such as the 1980s video nasty controversy in the UK. Beginning with the McMartin preschool trial in California in 1983, the satanic panic was a fear that America, or at the very least its white suburban middle class, was under a subversive form of attack from satanic forces. In a perfect storm of disparate cultural elements, satanic panic gained momentum in the wake of the McMartin ritual abuse allegations. Not unsurprisingly, all claims were unfounded and eventually quashed, but not before the ritual abuse cases and their alleged victims were paraded in the news media. This was indeed a real-life horror story and throughout this article, by reading the panic as a Gothic tale of excess, I wish to introduce a liminal narrative composed of hysteria, lies and media sensationalism henceforth known as ‘the myth of harm’. A complex composite of various social narratives, the myth of harm functions as both a vehicle for the articulation of our fears, while simultaneously capable of mobilising and often weaponising them, especially when those fears are directed towards children.

The Cutting Edge of Forensic Interviewing

ABSTRACTThis article contextualizes new knowledge about forensically interviewing and assessing children when there are concerns about child abuse. The article references the impact of the Child Abuse Prevention and Treatment Act and the circumstance in the 1980s where investigators and clinicians had little guidance about how to interview children about alleged sexual abuse. It further speaks to the consequences of lack of interview guidelines and how videotaped interviews in the McMartin Pre-school cases served as the catalyst for the backlash against child interviewers and their interview techniques. Painful as the backlash was, it led to research and evidence-based practice in interviewing children about child sexual and other abuse. Principal among the practice innovations were forensic interview structures to be used when there is alleged child sexual and other abuse and the strong preference for one interview by a skilled interviewer, who is nevertheless a stranger to the child. Although these innovations satisfied many professionals in the child maltreatment field and critics of child interviewers, the new practices did not address a number of abiding issues: 1) how to meet the needs of children who are unable to disclose maltreatment in a single interview, 2) how to determine which children are suggestible in a forensic interview, and 3) how decisions are made about the likelihood of abuse, based upon the child’s information during the interview. The articles in this special section address these cutting-edge issues.

The Witch-Hunt Narrative: Introduction and Overview.

This article provides an overview of The Witch-Hunt Narrative, focusing on the challenges of gathering information from young children, such as those involved in sexual abuse allegations in day care. The article summarizes the research methodology of The Witch-Hunt Narrative, which involves a series of case studies. The article articulates Cheit's hypothesis, which is that the witch-hunt narrative originated in two key publications, a series of articles by two journalists, Tom Charlier and Shirley Dowling, and the book, Satan's Silence: Ritual Abuse and the Making of a Modern-Day Witch-Hunt, by Debbie Nathan and Michael Snedeker, and notes his disputes with the evidence from these two publications. Cheit deals in depth with three hotly contested day care center cases: the McMartin Pre-School case in Manhattan Beach, California, the Wee Care Day Nursery case in Maplewood, New Jersey, and the Country Walk Babysitting Service case in Dade County, Florida. The article summarizes Cheit's research and conclusions related to these three cases and also notes how forensic interview practices used in these cases would not be supported today. The article concludes with noting that despite the impressive progress in forensic interviewing of children when sexual abuse is alleged, methods for gathering information from young children remain inadequate. Moreover, there are no easy answers to the reasons for the rise and fall of allegations of sexual abuse in day care and of allegations of ritual abuse.

A Response to Articles and Commentaries on The Witch-Hunt Narrative.

The articles and comments in this issue bear out the enduring impact of The Witchhunt Narrative. There is not sufficient space to acknowledge or respond to most of this feedback. This response corrects an error that was identified by one commenter and it responds to questions raised by another commenter about my analysis of the "Concerned Scientists" brief. This response also documents how Wood, Nathan, and others have misapplied the term ritual abuse, misstated the facts of many cases, and promoted "mythical numbers" that significantly exaggerate the number of false convictions. These critics are wrong about the only three cases they discuss in detail. The McMartin Preschool case began with credible evidence of child sexual abuse that continues to be distorted by critics. The Keller case began with even stronger medical evidence that is not diminished by the dubious and incomplete "retraction" of the Emeregency Room doctor. The Fuster case involved overwhelming evidence of abuse, medical and testimonial, that continues to be distored or overlooked by critics. Those who promote the witchhunt narrative rely on selective use of evidence to reach an apparently predetermined result. That is politics and advocacy, not scholarship. This dismissive approach to children's testimony has caused documented harm to children.

American Monsters: Tabloid Media and the Satanic Panic, 1970–2000

“American Monsters” analyzes the satanic panic, an episode of national hysteria that dominated the media throughout the 1980s. It involved hundreds of accusations that devil-worshipping pedophiles were operating America's white middle-class suburban daycare centers. Communities around the country became embroiled in trials against center owners, the most publicized of which was the McMartin Preschool trial in Manhattan Beach, California, still the longest and most expensive criminal trial in the nation's history. This article explores how the panic both reflected and shaped a cultural climate dominated by the overlapping worldviews of politically active conservatives. Their ideology was incorporated into the panic and reinforced through tabloid media. Infotainment expanded dramatically in the 1980s, selling conservative-defined threats as news. The panic unfolded mostly through infotainment, lending appeal to subgenres like talk shows. In the 1990s, judges overturned the life sentences of defendants in most major cases, and several prominent journalists and lawyers condemned the phenomenon as a witch hunt. They analyzed it as a powerful delusion, or what contemporary cultural theorist Jean Baudrillard termed a “hyperreality,” in which audiences confuse the media universe for real life. Integral to the development, influence, and success of tabloid television, the panic was a manifestation of the hyperreal.

The McMartin Preschool Abuse Trial

The McMartin Preschool Abuse Trial, the longest and most expensive criminal trial in American history, should serve as a cautionary tale. When it was all over, the government had spent seven years and $15 million dollars investigating and prosecuting a case that led to no convictions. More seriously, the McMartin case left in its wake hundreds of emotionally damaged children, as well as ruined careers for members of the McMartin staff. No one paid a bigger price than Ray Buckey, one of the principal defendants in the case, who spent five years in jail awaiting trial for a crime (most people recognize today) he never committed. McMartin juror Brenda Williams said that the trial experience taught her to be more cautious: I now realize how easily something can be said and misinterpreted and blown out of proportion. Another juror, Mark Bassett, singled out experts for blame: I thought some of the expert testimony about the children told you more about the expert than the child. I mean, if the expert says children are always 100% believable and then you have a child who is not believable, either the expert is extremely biased or they've never seen anything like that child before. The McMartin trial had its origins in a call placed to police in Manhattan Beach, California by Judy Johnson, the mother of a two-and-a-half-year-old son who attended the McMartin Preschool on about ten occasions in 1983. Johnson told Detective Jane Hoag that a school aide, Ray Buckey, the 25-year-old son of the owner of the preschool, had molested her son. Despite the fact that the young boy was unable to identify Ray from photos and medical investigations of the boy showed no signs of sexual abuse, the police conducted searches of Buckey's home, confiscating such evidence as a rubber duck, a graduation robe, and Playboy magazines. Detective Hoag arrested Buckey on September 7, 1983. On March 22, 1984, a grand jury indicted Ray Buckey, Peggy Buckey (Ray's mother), Peggy Ann Buckey (Ray's sister), Virginia McMartin (founder of the preschool thirty years earlier), and three other McMartin teachers, Mary Ann Jackson, Bette Raidor, and Babette Spitler. The grand jury initially indicted the McMartin Seven on 115 counts of child sexual abuse. Two months later, and additional 93 indictment counts were added, as District Attorney Robert Philobosian pursued his strategy of hyping the McMartin case to boost his chances in an upcoming primary election. In June, bail for Peggy Buckey was set at one million dollars. Ray Buckey was held without bail. There are many lessons to be learned from the McMartin Preschool Trial. There are lessons for police and prosecutors, but there are also lessons for the media. It was pack journalism - slanted heavily toward the prosecution, providing sensational headlines day after day, almost never seriously questioning the allegations - that turned the McMartin trial into the expensive and damaging fiasco that it became.

Review of Psychology and Law: An Empirical Perspective.

NEIL BREWER and KIPLING D. WILLIAMS (Eds.) Psychology and Law: An Empirical Perspective New York: Guilford Publications, 2005, 518 pages (ISBN 1-59385-122-7, US$60.00 Hardcover) This book deals with a wide array of topics selected from the fields of developmental, social, and cognitive psychology that were chosen because of their relevance and applicability to issues in the criminal justice system. As the tide implies, forensic practices can be understood (and ultimately enhanced) by research that addresses the scientific foundation of those practices. The editors deliver exactly what they promise, namely, empirical analyses of the various procedures and assumptions within the legal system. Edited volumes, in my experience, are often uneven with respect to the scope of coverage and the quality of writing. This one is an exception. There are several excellent chapters and no weak ones. Contributors include Vrij, Loftus, Poole, Wells, Oglov, Penrod, and Kovera, all of whom are leading experts in their respective fields. Powell, Fisher, and Wright provide a thorough, upto-date review of the best practices for the successful interviewing of child witnesses. Stimulated, in part, by numerous high-profile examples of apparently false allegations of abuse in day care centres in the late 1980s (e.g., the McMartin preschool in California, the Wee Care Day Nursery in New Jersey, the Martensville case in Saskatchewan), a substantial body of research now exists on how best to elicit reliable information from child informants. Although there is substantial international consensus regarding the most appropriate interview techniques, actual forensic interviews frequently (and regrettably) are not compliant with recommended guidelines. The authors review various training programs and make recommendations about the most effective means of translating concepts into practice. Granhag and Vrij describe research on the detection of deception. In Julius Casear (Act IV), Octavius opines that that smile have in their hearts, I fear, millions of mischiefs. 'Twas ever thus, especially in the criminal justice system. Is there any means by which truth-tellers can be distinguished from liars? If so, such procedures are hugely relevant to the courtroom. The authors provide a thorough review of the range of deception-detection methods that have been explored. These include statement validity analysis, polygraph testing, and behaviour analyses. Also described are more recent alternatives to lie detection: 1) methods that combine verbal and nonverbal cues, 2) implicit lie detection, and 3) strategic disclosure of evidence. Overall, psychometrically objective markers of deception remain elusive, although the new approaches are promising. Of note is the authors' observation dial certain misconceptions enshrined in widely used police interrogation manuals are not only devoid of scientific foundation, they have the potential to contribute to miscarriages of justice. Five chapters deal with memory and its vicissitudes. Pansky, Koriat, and Goldsmith systematically review theory and research on some aspects of memory that are especially pertinent to the eyewitness domain. They emphasize the distinction between accuracy versus quantity-based orientations to the study of recall, with the former having the most obvious relevance to legal settings. They also provide extensive commentary on how understanding metacognitive control can give us additional insight into the plight of the eyewitness. Brewer and his co-authors examine research that specifically addresses eyewitness identification in the real world, with special attention to aspects of the identification test itself (e.g., lineup composition, postidentification feedback, etc.). Misinformation effects and the creation of illusory memories are described by Gerrie, Garry, and Loftus. They provide compelling evidence that some false memories are indeed memories (albeit illusory) that are for all practical intents and purposes, indistinguishable from recollections of actually experienced events. …

Suggestive interviewing in the McMartin Preschool and Kelly Michaels daycare abuse cases: A case study

In the 1980s and early 1990s the United States witnessed an outbreak of bizarre “daycare abuse” cases in which groups of young children levelled allegations of sexual and Satanic abuse against their teachers. In the present study, quantitative analyses were performed on a total of 54 interview transcripts from two highly publicised daycare cases (McMartin Preschool and Kelly Michaels) and a comparison group of child sexual abuse cases from a Child Protection Service (CPS). Confirming the impression of prior commentators, systematic analyses showed that interviews from the two daycare cases were highly suggestive. Compared with the CPS interviews, the McMartin and/or Michaels interviewers were significantly more likely to (a) introduce new suggestive information into the interview, (b) provide praise, promises, and positive reinforcement, (c) express disapproval, disbelief, or disagreement with children, (d) exert conformity pressure, and (e) invite children to pretend or speculate about supposed events. Renata Strok is now at the Pacific School of Psychology, Palo Alto, CA. Lisa D. Bellah (formerly Lisa D. Velarde) is at the Federal Medical Center, Federal Bureau of Prisons, in Fort Worth, Texas. Yolanda Martinez is at Rio Vista Rehabilitation Center in El Paso, TX. Kristin McLaurin is at Porter and Hedges law firm in Houston, TX. Sena Garven is at the US Army Leadership School in Fort Leavenworth, KS. We wish to thank the following members of Por Ninos y Familias for transcribing and scoring the interviews in this study: Damian Aguilar, Gabriela Bernal, Eunice Buendia, Jennifer Carrasco, Gustavo Correa, Diana Martinez, Linda Mollinary, Gabriel Nevarez, Lucia Ramirez, Regina White, LeeAnne Williams, Betty Urquidi, and Zandra Zamora.

What was Under the McMartin Preschool? A Review and Behavioral Analysis of the “Tunnels” Find

The McMartin Preschool child abuse case began in 1983 in Manhattan Beach, California, and was one of the most visible cases in history. Although two trials were conducted and no convictions were obtained, some individuals continue to believe that dozens of children were sexually abused at the preschool. In 1990 an archeologist was hired to determine whether tunnels had existed under the school because some of the children had alleged that some of their abuse took place in tunnels under the building. The archeologist's report was issued in 1993. It concluded that evidence of back-filled tunnels had been found. This critical analysis of the archeologist's report concludes otherwise, that what the archeologist found was actually the filled-in remains of a rural family's trash pit that pre-dated construction of the school. Regarding artifacts discovered in soil under the preschool, alternative interpretations to those of the archeologist are given. A theoretical functional analysis of the variables that may have accounted for the archeologist's evident misinterpretation is presented.

Why Children's Suggestibility Remains a Serious Concern

Amye R. Warren (*) Dorothy F. Marsil (**) I INTRODUCTION After more than two decades of continuous contemporary research on the child as a witness in legal proceedings, a great deal is known about children's eyewitness memory and suggestibility. Excellent reviews of this research are available, (1) and their summaries and conclusions will not be reiterated here. Instead, this article will focus on six areas representing some of the most intractable problems that will require further attention from scientists and practitioners alike. This list of issues is selective and somewhat idiosyncratic, but should serve to illustrate why the current understanding of children's suggestibility is far from complete. Research on each issue will be highlighted, concentrating primarily on studies published or presented in the past ten years. II Six REMAINING ISSUES A. Suggestibility is Not Limited to Preschool Children In the past ten years, research on children's capacities as witnesses has focused heavily on preschoolers, (2) who are disproportionately susceptible to suggestion. (3) The focus on preschoolers was based on both applied and theoretical grounds. For example, investigations in the McMartin Preschool case (4) and State v. Michaels (5) featured particularly problematic interviews with large numbers of very young children in day-care settings. Knowledge of cognitive development principles led child witness researchers to predict that preschoolers' relative cognitive limitations could lead to greater susceptibility to suggestive influences and, in turn, to a variety of problems for their interviewers. For example, Nancy Perry and her colleagues demonstrated that preschoolers have difficulty determining whether they really understand complex questions and frequently inaccurately answer questions that they do not understand. (6) Although the research attention devoted to preschoolers was certainly warranted, it has led to a relative neglect of the equally important population of older children. This trend, however, appears to be changing. In recent studies, researchers are increasingly including older children. (7) The findings indicate that suggestibility generally declines over the school years but that even adolescents can be significantly more suggestible than adults. (8) On the other hand, some studies demonstrate that, under certain conditions, older children and adults can be more suggestible than younger children. (9) The following sections briefly review six studies that included children older than preschoolers. Jennifer Ackil and Maria Zaragoza examined the suggestibility of first graders, third graders, fifth graders, and college students. (10) The subjects viewed a brief video and then heard an experimenter read a summary of the video that included some misleading information. (11) Either immediately afterwards or one week later, participants were given memory tests. (12) Evidence of suggestibility was found for all age groups, but first graders were more susceptible to suggestion than third and fifth graders, who were in turn more susceptible to suggestion than college students. (13) Essentially, the same pattern of age differences was found in the proportion of the suggested items that participants claimed to have actually seen in the video, as opposed to remembering from the summary. (14) Julie Robinson and Pamela Briggs also showed a film to their participants, who were four- to five-year-olds, eight- to nine-year-olds, and adults. (15) They then asked a series of questions, some of which were misleading. (16) A day later, they asked another set of questions. (17) In terms of correct answers to misleading questions, the youngest children's performance was poorer than that of eight- to nine-year-olds and adults. The latter two groups, however, did not significantly differ. (18) In contrast, when suggested answers to misleading questions were examined separately, the study showed that both age groups of children were more suggestible than adults, but that the children did not differ from one another. …

Allegations of wrongdoing: the effects of reinforcement on children's mundane and fantastic claims.

S. Garven, J. M. Wood, R. S. Malpass, and J. S. Shaw (1998) found that the interviewing techniques used in the McMartin Preschool case can induce preschool children to make false allegations of wrong doing against a classroom visitor. In this study, 2 specific components of the McMartin interviews, reinforcement and cowitness information, were examined more closely in interviews of 120 children, ages 5 to 7 years. Children who received reinforcement made 35% false allegations against a classroom visitor, compared with 12% made by controls. When questioned about "fantastic" events (e.g., being taken from school in a helicopter), children receiving reinforcement made 52% false allegations, compared with 5% made by controls. In a second interview, children repeated the allegations even when reinforcement had been discontinued. The findings indicate that reinforcement can swiftly induce children to make persistent false allegations of wrong doing.

More than suggestion: The effect of interviewing techniques from the McMartin Preschool case.

More than suggestion: The effect of interviewing techniques from the McMartin Preschool case.

More than suggestion: the effect of interviewing techniques from the McMartin Preschool case.

Child interviewing techniques derived from transcripts of the McMartin Preschool case were found to be substantially more effective than simple suggestive questions at inducing preschool children to make false allegations against a classroom visitor. Thirty-six children interviewed with McMartin techniques made 58% accusations, compared with 17% for 30 children interviewed with suggestive questions. Social influence and reinforcement appeared to be more powerful determinants of children's answers than simple suggestive questions. The SIRR model is proposed to explain how false statements may be elicited from children or adults. Categories identified in the SIRR model are suggestive questions, social influence, reinforcement, and removal from direct experience.

The Abuse of Innocence: The McMartin Preschool Trial. By Paul Eberle and Shirley Eberle. Buffalo, NY: Prometheus Books, 1993. 416 pages. Hardcover, $26.95.

(1997). The Abuse of Innocence: The McMartin Preschool Trial. By Paul Eberle and Shirley Eberle. Buffalo, NY: Prometheus Books, 1993. 416 pages. Hardcover, $26.95. Journal of Sex Education and Therapy: Vol. 22, No. 3, pp. 48-49.

The Devil Goes to Day Care: McMartin and the Making of a Moral Panic

A new type of sex crime was discovered during the 1980s-the abuse of very young children in rituals performed by robed and hooded satanists who also happened to be their day care providers. Satanic ritual abuse, as this new sex crime quickly came to be termed, appeared to be epidemic during the 1980s, and the McMartin Preschool was its first locus delicti. The cultural response to the McMartin case had all of the characteristics of what sociologists call a moral panic:1 it was widespread, volatile, hostile, and overreactive (Goode and Ben-Yehuda 156-59). From Texas to Tennessee, New Jersey to North Carolina, Maine to Michigan, hundreds of local day care centers were investigated for satanic ritual abuse and scores of day care providers, as many males as females, were arrested and put on trial. From the witness stand, their accusers, the three- and four-year-old children once entrusted to their care, accused them of sexual abuse during satanic ceremonies that included such ghastly practices as blood-drinking, cannibalism, and human sacrifices. Despite the absence of evidence corroborating the children's accounts, many of the day care providers were convicted, and to the cheers and jeers of their deeply divided communities, were sentenced to what often were draconian prison terms. In the accusatorial post-McMartin climate, day care providers, surrogate parents to this country's youngest children, took measures to protect themselves from their false allegations (Bordin 80-81). They installed video cameras to record all of their activities, opened up private spaces to public view by taking down doors to bathrooms and closets and, fearing the act now could be misinterpreted, stopped hugging and holding their young charges. State legislatures also took measures. They hurriedly passed laws that mandated the fingerprinting and criminal records check of all current and prospective day care providers; state licensing agencies tightened regulations and by legislative fiat were given more teeth to enforce them. Yet insurance liability premiums soared, forcing many small day care centers out of business and many more, unlicensed and uninsured, to go underground. Heralded at the start of the decade as playgrounds for children, day care centers were feared at its end as playthings of the devil. The aim of this present article is to analyze the moral panic about satanic day care centers that spread across this country during the 1980s. First, it examines the cultural context of the moral panic by focusing on the social forces and strains peculiar to that decade that not only gave rise to it, but that made what at first blush must appear to be the most innocuous of social institutions, the local day care center, the scene of the most horrific of sex crimes. Second, it interprets the McMartin Preschool case as the trigger that set off the moral panic, and then analyzes the roles that interest, grassroots, and professional groups played in spreading it across the country. Third, the article explains why, after nine long and bitter years, the moral panic finally ended and what moral, if any, can be derived from it. Cultural Context of the Moral Panic An insightful examination of the social change most critical to the rise of the satanic day care center moral panic during the 1980s is provided by David Bromley and Bruce Busching who examine the changing relation between what they call the convenantal sphere and the contractual sphere of social life at the beginning of that decade. The convenantal sphere is that of the family. Within it, relations are built upon mutual commitment, bonding, and emotional expressiveness, and are articulated through the logic of moral involvement and unity. The contractual sphere, in contrast, is that of the market economy where relations are based upon mutual agreement, negotiation, and exchange, and are articulated through the logic of vested interest and shrewd involvement. …

Neurotica: Freud and the Seduction Theory

1. Etymologically, the infant is an animal without language: infans, it does not speak. Or, if it speaks, it babbles, making up stories, speaking illogically and irrationally. How then could a child be taken as a qualified witness? How could we believe, for example, if he told us he had witnessed a crime or had been molested? But, on the other hand, how can we prove that he is not telling the truth? Old debate, quite insoluble. The child, like the idiot or the hypnotized person, is the unreliable witness par excellence; not because he always lies (if only!), but because without external corroboration, it is as impossible to prove he is telling the truth as it is to prove the contrary. And yet, as soon as he speaks, his speech must be judged. True or false? Since there is no real basis for a decision, the decision is bound to be a matter of belief and interpretation, and as such, perfectly arbitrary and unjustifiable. How many juries have thus been accused of letting criminals off the hook or, on the contrary, of condemning innocents? Some in the United States are outraged by the acquittal of the teachers at the McMartin Preschool, who were accused of sexually abusing the children put in their charge. Others, in Great Britain, are indignant about the Cleveland case, in which pediatricians and social workers took 121 children away from their parents on mere suspicion of sexual abuse. We are told that this is the sort of situation that confronted Sigmund Freud in his elaboration and abandonment of the so-called seduction theory. Having begun by believing his hysterics, who told him that they had been raped or seduced during their early infancy, he finally decided, in September of 1897, that these stories arose from the realm of fantasy, that they were part of the properly fantastic speech of the child within. Here is what he himself had to say about this in 1933:

Child witnesses: fragile voices in the American legal system

Children are frequently called to testify in court in criminal prosecutions, divorce and child custody hearings, dependency abuse proceedings, and other disputes. But is their testimony reliable? This book carefully assesses research on the cognitive capabilities of children as well as the emotional, social, and moral influences that might affect children's potential reliability, and it recommends reforms in American legal processes that will protect child witnesses from trauma and ensure accurate testimony. Lucy S. McGough, a specialist in family law, examines the known developmental facts on perception, memory, and reporting that affect children's ability to serve as trial witnesses. She also analyzes many actual trials, including the McMartin Pre-School prosecution in California, the Morgan-Foretich custody and visitation controversy, and the five U.S. Supreme Court child sexual abuse cases, assessing how a child witness may be more prone to memory-fade, suggestibility, or fantasy than an adult witness. McGough also examines the legal processes and rules of evidence that affect how eyewitness accounts by children are received: trial processes for evaluating the credibility of witnesses; the hearsay rule and its exceptions; the Constitution's confrontation clause; and the use and abuse of expert witnesses. And she presents a proposal for the early videotaping of a child's eyewitness account in order to minimize the most serious potential reliability risks posed by child witnesses. The product of ten years of research and investigation, this book should help remedy the failure of American law to take into account all that we now know about the fragility of children's memories.

Book Review: The Abuse of Innocence — The McMartin Preschool Trial

Book Review: The Abuse of Innocence — The McMartin Preschool Trial

Group 14: Satanic Ritual Abuse

The 1980s witnessed a growing concern that organized Satanic cults were committing atrocities across the United States. This fear was reinforced by several allegations of child abuse, of which the McMartin preschool trial was a particularly bizarre example. The California preschool was investigated and charged with several acts of child sexual abuse, supposedly related to a Satanist cult in which the McMartin family was active. The 1966 founding of the Church of Satan and other Satanist-identified groups gave some credence to reports of such “cults,” yet research reveals few if any links between public fears and actual Satanist practices. The growth of Satanic groups also coincided with the rise of fundamentalist Christianity, which saw the Moral Majority as a prominent force in American society. This project seeks to analyze the cultural factors that contributed to the “Satanic Panic,” with emphasis on how the combined efforts of the religious right, psychotherapists, law enforcement, and the media’s uncritical coverage of spurious stories all contributed to the credibility and promotion of cultural anxieties. The panic is also contextualized more broadly in the era’s newfound public awareness of child abuse and in the growth of New Religious Movements. We argue that the cultural anxieties plaguing American society’s vulnerabilities to evil forces are embodied in the moral panic surrounding Satanic ritual abuse; indeed, it appears people may have invented supernatural antagonists to rationalize a genuinely disturbing issue - child abuse - and in order to literally demonize non-Christian members of society.