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Encyclopedia > Kern County child abuse cases
 This article needs additional citations for verification.
Please help improve this article by adding reliable references. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. (July 2007)

The Kern County child abuse cases started the day care sexual abuse hysteria of the 1980s in Kern County, California. [1] The cases involved claims that sadistic ritual abuse that were performed by pedophilic sex rings with as many as 60 children testifying they had been abused. At least eight people were convicted and most of them spent many years imprisoned. All of the convictions were eventually overturned on appeal. Image File history File links Question_book-3. ... It has been suggested that this article or section be merged into Satanic ritual abuse. ... Kern County is a county located in the southern Central Valley of the U.S. state of California. ... Sadistic Ritual Abuse, or SRA, refers to any extremely cruel, unusual or otherwise sadistic ritualistic abuse performed by individuals sometimes claiming to be members of cults. ...

Contents

History

In 1982, Alvin and Debbie McCuan's two daughters, coached by their step-grandmother, who had custody of them, alleged they had been abused by their parents, and accused them of being part of a sex ring that included Scott Kniffen and Brenda Kniffen. The Kniffens' two sons also claimed to have been abused. No physical evidence was ever found, but the McCuans and Kniffens were convicted in 1984 and each sentenced to hundreds of years in prison. [2] Year 1982 (MCMLXXXII) was a common year starting on Friday (link displays the 1982 Gregorian calendar). ... This article is about the year. ...


The convictions of the McCuans and Kniffens were overturned in 1996 and the two couples were released. In 2001, a TV movie about the plight of the Kniffens was released under the name Just Ask my Children[3]. The cases were stopped when children began to accuse police officers and social workers of being members of sex rings. Police officers in South Australia A police officer (or policeman/policewoman) is a warranted worker of a police force. ... A social worker is a person employed in the administration of charity, social service, welfare, and poverty agencies, advocacy, or religious outreach programs. ...


Six similar cases occurred quickly throughout Kern County. For instance, the testimony of five young boys was the prosecution's key evidence in a trial in which four defendants were convicted, with John Stoll, a 41-year-old carpenter, receiving the longest sentence of the group: 40 years for 17 counts of lewd and lascivious conduct. "It never happened," Ed Sampley, one of the accusers, told a New York Times reporter in 2004. He lied about Stoll, an easygoing divorced father. Sampley and three other former accusers returned in 2004 to the courthouse where they had testified against Stoll, this time to say that Stoll never molested them. In their late 20's, each of them said he always knew the truth -- that Stoll had never touched them.[4] In the case, the only defendant with a previous conviction of molestation was Grant Self, who rented Stoll's pool house briefly. John Stoll had to wait until 2004 for the reversal of his convictions, but was released on the new testimony. Self remains in a mental hospital for sexual offenders because he had a prior conviction for child molestation.


See also

It has been suggested that this article or section be merged into Satanic ritual abuse. ... The McMartin preschool case was based on allegations of sexual abuse of the schools children by the schools owners, the McMartin family. ... The Wee Care Nursery School was in Maplewood, New Jersey and was one of many day care child abuse cases that went to trial in the 1980s. ... Fells Acres Day Care Center was located in Malden, Massachusetts. ... This article is about pedophilia/paedophilia in movies/films. ...

References

  1. ^ "Who Was Abused?", New York Times, September 19, 2004. Retrieved on 2007-08-21. "There are several ways to view the small white house on Center Street in Bakersfield, California. From one perspective it's just another low-slung home in a working-class neighborhood, with a front yard, brown carpeting, a TV in the living room." 
  2. ^ Kern County ritual abuse cases. Religious Tolerance. Retrieved on 2007-08-26. “The triggering incident occurred in 1980 when Becky McCuan disclosed that her grandfather, Rod Phelps, had touched her inappropriately. The family doctor confirmed the abuse.”
  3. ^ http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0280474/
  4. ^ http://www.nytimes.com/2004/09/19/magazine/19KIDSL.html?_r=1&pagewanted=print&position=&oref=slogin

The New York Times is an internationally known daily newspaper published in New York City and distributed in the United States and many other nations worldwide. ... is the 262nd day of the year (263rd in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. ... Year 2004 (MMIV) was a leap year starting on Thursday of the Gregorian calendar. ... Year 2007 (MMVII) is the current year, a common year starting on Monday of the Gregorian calendar and the AD/CE era in the 21st century. ... is the 233rd day of the year (234th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. ... Bakersfield redirects here. ... Year 2007 (MMVII) is the current year, a common year starting on Monday of the Gregorian calendar and the AD/CE era in the 21st century. ... is the 238th day of the year (239th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. ...

External links

Books

  • (1993) Behind the Playground Walls - Sexual Abuse in Preschools. New York, London: The Guilford Press. ISBN 0-89862-523-8. 

  Results from FactBites:
 
Day care sexual abuse hysteria - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia (1719 words)
The Kern County child abuse case was the first prominent instance of accusations of ritualized sex abuse of children.
It is one of the most famous of all the sexual abuse cases and it is, as of 2006, the longest and most expensive trial in the history of the United States.
In the Cleveland child abuse scandal allegations of child sexual abuse were being made by Marietta Higgs, a pediatrician at a Middlesbrough, United Kingdom hospital.
BAKERSFIELD / KERN COUNTY, CA RITUAL ABUSE CASE (4735 words)
The grandmother was arrested for discussing the case with her grandchild; she was not allowed to testify at the trial, and had her visits terminated for years afterwards.
These Kern County residents were accused of having formed a "sex-ring" to sexually molest boys over an interval of several months in the mid-1980's.
Child "V" admitted during questioning by a defense attorney that it is OK to lie, that it is OK to make mistakes while testifying.
  More results at FactBites »


 

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