Inquisition 21
 |
 |
|
|
| Log In
|
|
|
|
|
| Search Articles
|
|
|
|
|
| Comments
|
|
|
You don't have to,
but if you log in,
you can add comments.
|
| Page Referral
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Country by country
|
|
|
1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12
A country by country report on the progress of the sex abuse Inquisition
The Shieldfield travesty
The Shieldfield travesty
Thanks are due to UK author Richard Webster, whose website is the source of much of the information here. Our task is not to repeat or condense the excellent accounts of the Shieldfield story which have been given by Webster himself and by Bob Woffinden and Margaret Jervis, but to compare it with similar stories and look for underlying trends. Those interested in studying the Shieldfield case in depth should go to Richard’s web site.
Background
The Shieldfield story can be seen to begin in the earlier Cleveland and other scandals. Briefly, some of the key ‘experts’ that caused the Cleveland travesty were central to Shieldfield, despite their being exposed for their part in the Cleveland injustice. This should send a message to those who believe that lessons are learned always from the identification of miscarriages of justice. What Cleveland-Shieldfield demonstrates is the resilience of dedicated ideologues in regrouping and revising their doctrines after a defeat. If we can add to Margaret Jervis’s (see link above) excellent account of how this worked through satanic ritual abuse, repressed memory and pedophile rings, each replacing the previous doctrine as that doctrine was debunked, we believe that the ideologues, in some cases the same ones, have now moved their central ‘designated evil’ to the child porn moral panic.
Summary of story
On Easter Sunday, 11 April 1993, a mother reported to her local Newcastle (UK) police station that she feared that her 2½-year-old son, Stephen, had been sexually abused by Chris Lillie, worker at the local Shieldfield nursery. Her initial allegation was of touching, but even within 24 hours she changed it significantly, and as days and weeks passed she enlarged it to include Lillie’s co-worker, Dawn Reed, strangers and a hypothetical pedophile ring. The similarities even at this early stage with both the New Zealand Peter Ellis case and that of Klassen-Kvello in Canada are striking. A mother who alleged that her son made a trivial penis remark also started the New Zealand crisis, and there also female co-workers were accused, four of them arrested and put through a
depositions hearing and committed to trial before the charges against them were thrown out pre-trial.
In all three cases, once word spread to other parents, and social services and therapists became involved, a bandwagon began that was unstoppable, and in all three cases, the accused were physically attacked either by parents or self-appointed vigilantes.
Parent meetings fanned the flames of the Shieldfield nursery scare, but not as much as did the ‘experts’ who were called in and quickly suggested that this was a case of multiple abuse. The first of two girls was interviewed in July 1993, and, as in the New Zealand and Canadian cases, a key prosecution witness appears - ‘sex abuse expert’ Dr Camille Lazaro. In the case of one girl, Angie (name changed), Lazaro reported findings that were ‘diagnostic of previous penetration through the hymen by an object’. Immediately, Lillie and Reed were arrested and locked up. After repeated leading interviews, Angie finally said that she had been raped, at which point Dr Camille Lazaro re-examined her and now found a complete transection of the hymen, necessary for supporting a rape allegation.
Already the publicity was such that Reed and Lillie had to be segregated from other prisoners in their separate jails. They were bailed on 22 October, but re-arrested as they walked out of their prisons because of further evidence secured from the interviewing of children, and returned to prison.
Out of numerous children, six were chosen to testify against the pair. The final damming judgement of the case was to show that all had been pressurized and cajoled into making their often-bizarre allegations on videotape. The testimony of one of these, Angie, in whom hymen breaking had been diagnosed, was so lacking in consistency that on 14 July 1994 in the pre trial proceedings, having examined her video evidence in detail, Mr. Justice Holland concluded that the case should not even be put before a jury, and announced a not-guilty verdict.
This is really where the story begins, as there was a near-riot in the courtroom, with cries of ‘Hang them!’ from the parents. The parallels with the New Zealand and Canadian cases are profound and disturbing. In all three cases as with many similar cases, the accusers and prosecutors did not want to accept that they were wrong and fought to prevent justice for the falsely accused – largely succeeding. As this is being written, Peter Ellis sentenced to 10 years in New Zealand, of which he served six years and seven months until his release in February 2000, has still not had his name cleared, and Richard Klassen, cleared in a damming judgement against his malicious accusers in Canada, has still not had an apology from the establishment.
On 14 July 1994, as the Shieldfield pair were driven away in a police van through a mob of parents, Tony Flynn, head of Newcastle city council, went on TV to confirm that they were still dismissed and to say, “We do believe that abuse has taken place - - - and there is no question of us or anyone else employing these people again.”
This was the first sign of the even greater travesty to follow as more ‘experts’ were called in. Newcastle City Council commissioned their infamous Review Report, paying £360,000 to a team of four - Dr Richard Barker, a lecturer in social work at the University of Northumbria, Judith Jones, a social worker, Jacqui Saradjian, a psychologist, and Roy Wardell, a retired director of social services. It may seem incredible that Judith Jones was the social worker at the centre of the 1989 Nottingham satanic abuse case, but not so incredible when one reads Richard Webster’s explanations (link at top of page). Jacqui Saradjian had written about satanic cults where all the usual trappings were offered, including whippings, caging, burning, burying alive, and other devilish practices.
The Review Team report, published in 1988, immediately became sensational. The newspapers reacted with criminal irresponsibility, some with incitement to lynch mobs. They reported toddlers slashed with knives, pedophiles dressed as clowns – it was all there. To find its equal one only has to read some of the descriptions of the ‘child porn’ found by today’s activist-censors on the Internet.
The great travesty unfolded. Television child rights activist, Esther Rantzen, issued a press release from her ‘ChildLine’ platform: “This is one of the worst cases of mass child abuse ever seen in this country.” Some months later, in May 1999, Shieldfield was a main subject at a ChildLine conference, chaired by the Prime minister’s wife, Cherie Blair with speakers such as Hillary Clinton and Home Secretary, Jack Straw. Note the similarities with Canada, where the Saskatchewan premier attended one of the satanic ritual abuse witch-hunt conferences, which fuelled the Klassen-Kvello travesty.
Despite warnings from the police to the Review Team and the council about the consequences for Reed and Lillie from their report, no attempt was made to inform them of the great coming danger. As the UK’s media erupted with the Review Team’s findings, and the lynch mob gathered, they fled. The Sun published this appeal to its readers: “Help us find these fiends - Do you know where perverts Lillie and Reed are now? Phone us on 0161 935 5315 or 0171 782 4105. Don’t worry about the cost - we will call you straight back.”
And here, as in New Zealand and Canada, our faith in humanity begins to be restored as two writers, Bob Woffinden and Richard Webster, decided to come to their assistance, and even go and search for them. In Canada it was first one woman writer, Sheila Steele, briefly arrested for her courage, who came to the assistance of the Klassen-Kvello family, while in New Zealand it has been numerous people, many distinguished, but chiefly Lynley Hood, courageous author of the monumental bookA City Possessed, herself nearly arrested, for refusing to reveal a source (See Peter Ellis story above). Others include the authors of the Harper/Christie report, which has been presented to a Parliamentary select committee, currently considering the merits of a Royal Commission, and to the Chief Legal Counsel at the Crown Law Office.
Woffinden and Webster found the pair hiding separately, each in a terrible state. Dawn had sat in her car with engine running near the edge of a cliff wondering if she should drive over it. They convinced them that there was just one possible course of action and that was to sue for libel, a difficult pill to swallow for a couple whose acquittal had already meant so little in an absolutist United Kingdom where social activists ruled over mob and media. Their rescuers brought them to London and introduced them to solicitor Geoffrey Bindman. He in turn found Adrienne Page QC, to whom he presented Webster and Woffinden’s 200-page analysis of the case. She agreed to act on a conditional fee basis.
The libel action was taken against Newcastle city council, the four members of the review team and the local Evening Chronicle, but on legal advise not against the national media. It began on 11 January 2002 and ran for six months, the longest and the most expensive libel case ever fought in the British courts on a no-win, no-fee basis. Those interested in reading about it in depth can do so both through Richard Webster’s web site (link at top) or directly in the Justice Eady judgement at www.courtservice.gov.uk/judgmentsfiles/j1302/lillie_reed_part1.htm (….part2.htm or part3.htm).
The members of the Review Team were castigated as was the consultant pediatrician at the centre of the travesty, Dr Camille Lazaro, whose conviction that abuse had taken place had driven the investigation. The plaintiffs produced evidence that the Review Team had been so driven by a determination to find them guilty that they dishonestly concealed or misrepresented evidence pointing to innocence. One example given was that the Review Team had ignored this vital fact – During the criminal trial, Mr. Justice Holland had made it clear that one of the main reasons for the not-guilty verdicts was four-year-old Angie’s explicit declaration, recorded in two video interviews, that Reed was innocent.
Psychologist, Maggie Bruck of Johns Hopkins University, testifying for the plaintiffs, described the video interviews as ‘among the worst that I have encountered … extremely young and bewildered children were brought in and interrogated by interviewers, who used the full array of suggestive techniques to elicit allegations of abuse When the children denied they had been abused, they were bombarded with more suggestions, they were scolded, threatened and bribed. When some children whimpered, moaned or begged the interviewers to end the questioning, the interviewers continued’.
The Review Team produced a report from psychologist, Professor William Friedrich, of the Mayo Clinic, Minnesota, in which he said, “It is my clinical impression, based on a review of the documents and videotapes provided to me, that the majority of the evidence points to sexual abuse of these 28 children - - - .The weight of the evidence indicates that the perpetrators were Lillie and Reed”. Under cross-examination, he admitted that he had seen neither the video interviews, nor the transcripts. When he did actually see the videos, he changed his views, and acknowledged the many flaws, such as the frequency of leading questions. Mr. Justice Eady remarked, “As things stand, Dr Friedrich’s report is not worth the paper on which it is written”. The Review Team now had only the parents, but parent after parent failed to offer evidence of any substance, except to heap further blame on Dr Camille Lazaro. The similarities with therapist, Bunko-Rhys, at the centre of the Klassen-Kvello case are striking. Later it transpired that the genital scarring Lazaro had claimed to have found in the girls was also a finding she had claimed in other cases, but that such a condition was so rare in young girls that it placed a question mark over her competence in this area. This same question of competence or bias now stands over so many ‘expert witnesses’ whose opinions have put people in prison, such as Dr Moira Woods in Ireland and Roy Meadows in the UK. Camille Lazaro was described by one observer as ‘playing God’. When she pleaded carelessness, Mr. Justice Eady said to her, “You did realize, I suppose, that it was quite possible that somebody was going to get a sentence of life imprisonment for these offences?”
On 30th July 2002, Dawn Reed and Christopher Lillie achieved a landmark victory and were each awarded £200,000 in maximum damages for having been maliciously libeled by a Newcastle City Council-appointed Review Team of three social workers and one psychologist. Mr. Justice Eady said, “I am quite satisfied that each of the claimants has merited an award at the highest permitted level. Indeed, they have earned it several times over because of the scale, gravity and persistence of the allegations and of the aggravating factors."
Dawn’s husband Mark never doubted her innocence and supported her during the first five years of the ordeal, but finally unable to take the pressure any more he left her. She had also lost the desire to have children. Chris had been unemployed for nearly two years and lived depressed in a strange town, fearful of going out to look for a job. His girl-friend stood by him.
Many believe that the children suffered great harm. As Richard Webster and Bob Woffinden put it: “Questioned and interrogated, subjected to intimate examinations and then re-examined, constantly reminded of traumatic incidents which had never happened, some Shieldfield children became anxious or withdrawn and began to exhibit disturbed behavior. They were the victims not of a pedophile ring but of police officers, social workers, therapists and pediatricians, driven on by the best and most noble of intentions, but utterly blind, because of the nature of their training, to the terrible harm that zeal such as theirs can inflict.”
The disgraceful behavior of the Council and the Review Team continued, using devices similar to those used by the losers of the malicious defamation case in Canada. Newcastle City Council spent £56,000 with a public relations company to advise them on handling the libel verdict, denying opposition claims that the move had been a damage limitation exercise and a waste of money. When they saw the total legal bill for nearly £4 million, the Review Team backed down from their intention to appeal the judgment of malicious libel, but with no expressions of any remorse from the four team members, who complained that the council was not backing an appeal.
The Newcastle Health authority has been ‘reviewing’ the judgement in which the practice of their expert consultant pediatrician, Dr Camille de San Lazaro, is described as ‘unbalanced, obsessive and lacking in judgment’. Separately, the Criminal Injuries Compensation Authority is reviewing cases where she has been involved and has said that it ‘would be extremely reluctant’ to accept her opinions in the future. What all this will do for those prosecuted as a result of her evidence in other cases in which she has been a ‘diagnostic witness and prosecution expert’ remains to be seen. We also await to see if any action is taken against the members of the Review Team, Dr Richard Barker, Jacqui Saradjian, Judith Jones and Roy Wardell, all ‘child abuse experts’, or any examination of their previous cases. Dr Richard Barker, the team head, is a professor of social work at Northumbria University. Mrs. Saradjian a clinical psychologist in Leeds, Ms Jones a child abuse consultant and expert witness, working at North London University.
What should worry all of us
The facts of the case on their own are sufficient cause for worry, although more worrying perhaps was that poor judgement of the underlying causes of the Cleveland travesty allowed the same tainted tunnel vision to be used in the development of the Shieldfield fiasco. But there are greater reasons for worry and even fear. Some of the same people or those connected with them were involved in, or influenced, both travesties, and other similar ones, and some of these people in turn have helped convict other people who may be innocent of the crimes they were charged with.
Take Judith Jones, one of the Review team. Her partner is feminist activist journalist Beatrix Campbell, a severe critic of those who attack the theories of repressed memory recovery. In 1999, she and Jones co-authored Stolen Voices, in which they portrayed the British False Memory Society as part of a pedophile lobby. So many people were libeled in the manuscript that the publisher withdrew the book before publication. Within Newcastle itself, home of the Shieldfield affair, Jones had set up ‘Daughters and Their Allies (DATA)’, a group of therapists and ‘recovered memory victims’ to discredit the BFMS. Jones was one of the instigators of the notorious 1989 Nottingham satanic abuse panic, but, despite the terrible harm it caused, Newcastle Council hired her onto the Shieldfield Review team, where she could contribute to yet another tragedy. Perhaps it did not help that Jones also operated some of the time under the married name of Judith Dawson.
Dr Jacqui Saradjian, the psychologist on the Review Panel, studied under satanic abuse supporter, Dr Helga Hanks, at Leeds University. Hanks had worked closely with the Leeds pediatricians who championed the since discredited ‘anal dilatation’ diagnosis of sexual abuse which was central to the 1987 Cleveland travesty. It is not difficult to understand how Jones and Saradjian could influence the review team’s findings, when we read Justice Eady’s opinion of their panel chairman, Dr Richard Barker, as one ‘who eschewed rational analysis in the approach to his task from the outset’, and whose evidence was so poor that he (Justice Eady) ‘was unable to place reliance upon anything said by (him), for any significant purpose, unless it was independently corroborated’. In addition, ‘acting as a law unto himself, Barker and the team were to promulgate to the Council and to the wider public what was recognized within days - - - to be a specious and disreputable document’.
There is an even more striking connection with Cleveland. This is what Justice Eady said about consultant pediatrician, Dr Camille San Lazaro, whose ‘expertise’ contributed so much to the Shieldfield travesty. "The truth is that where physical findings were negative or equivocal, Dr San Lazaro was prepared to make up the deficiencies by throwing objectivity and scientific rigour to the winds in a highly emotional misrepresentation of the facts."
Camille San Lazaro had trained with Dr Marietta Higgs. Higgs and social worker Sue Richardson had virtually caused the Cleveland case, as a result of which both were barred from involvement in state supported child protection work. After Cleveland was publicly denounced, the professionals and other activists involved in it were disgraced, but, far from giving up, they continued with their machinations, supported by journalist Beatrix Campbell, whose ideology was gender based – men, the patriarchy, oppressed and abused women and children.
Margaret Jervis sees ‘many of the key personnel in the Shieldfield case as part of an ideological axis stretching back through Nottingham to Cleveland’. She goes on: “That it has taken nine years to nail the myth of Shieldfield indicates that the misinformation this faction promulgates within the welfare, police and criminal justice systems continues to cloud professional judgment.”
She concludes: “In an echo of Cleveland, a pediatrician has in effect been found to have made multiple suspect diagnoses of child sexual abuse and acted well beyond her professional remit. Dr San Lazaro has been criticized not simply for the inadequacy of her records or forensic examinations, but for her therapeutic approach to diagnoses. This therapeutic influence, which has gained ascendancy in child abuse work and supplanted a neutral, evidence-based approach to assessments, is at the root of the problem of false allegations and diagnoses of child sexual abuse. As with the Cleveland doctors before her, it was Dr San Lazaro's practice to work in tandem with therapists, passing on unconfirmed diagnoses of sexual abuse for confirmation through psychiatric assessment and play therapy.”
We showed this to Nancy Sutherland who worked with Jonathon Harper and Richard Christie on the New Zealand Peter Ellis case, and she remarked: “ But watch out for cling-on claims, claims from other perspectives that is, which may also purport to be coming from an 'evidence-based' approach. The term 'evidence-based' (including when adjectival to 'policy' or 'practice') could also reference, for example, clinical-psychology derived papers of dubious quality on sexual abuse prevalence and related matters. Such papers may have been published in academic journals/publications/titles that give them a look of quality and an appearance of being scientific, but which are so only superficially.”
A dangerous development
At the end of one of his reports on Shieldfield, Richard Webster puts his finger on a most dangerous development, that of the trawling operation, in which the police actively fish for retrospective allegations against care workers. He believes that as many as a hundred innocent people have been convicted as, induced by compensation rewards, former inmates of residential care institutions have made allegations against named carers.
This is exactly what has happened recently in Ireland where in a knee jerk reaction to a TV programme States of Fear, so like the scare scenarios that generated all the sex abuse witch hunts which stretch back now to the 1980 publication of the spurious book Michelle Remembers, which contributed so much to both the first satanic abuse and repressed memory scares. The Irish government is now facing a potential one billion Euro bill for claims from thousands of former residents of state run homes. Richard Webster calls it ‘a machine for bringing about miscarriages of justice’.
His conclusions also lead to an ironic finding. This latest form of efficient witch hunt, the police trawl, instigated in the first instance by social workers and related activists, is now netting many social workers who in turn are being accused.
Nancy Sutherland reacted thus: “That last sentence would be a bit hard to take if you were one of the social workers who did not 'go along' with the whole sexual abuse scare in the first place, and I believe I know some such people.”
Country by country
Clint Betterridge - stop this extradition! It's over.
The Peter Ellis story
The Shieldfield travesty
The Saskatoon story
The McMartin and other US stories
Act of infamy – the Nora Wall story
Bart Lauwaert tells his own story
Australia’s criminal involvement in Cambodia
Graham Cleghorn writes from Cambodian prisons
The setting up of Rudolf Knuchel
The Pitcairn sex trial – the cast and the story
 |
|
|
