Masculinist Evolution New Zealand

COSA Casualties of Sexual Allegations Newsletter November 1995 Volume 2 No 9

Contents of this page:

Editorial: Allegations of sexual abuse as weapons This weapon is frequently used in custody disputes and by many adult women who come to believe they were sexually abused by their parents through memory recovery techniques used in psychotherapy. It is so easy to make such allegations, but almost impossible to mount a defence against them. The burden of proof is reversed, forcing an accused man to prove his innocence, rather than requiring the complainant to provide evidence to support her claim.

Courts: Navy man cleared in rape case

Elderly man found guilty of indecent assault

Man found not guilty of abusing his daughter

Teenage boy found not guilty of raping his girlfriend

Man acquitted of indecently assaulting boy

Wenatchee case (USA).

Donna Hubbard’s conviction overturned (USA).

Souza case (USA).

Literature: Jeopardy in the Courtroom: a scientific analysis of children’s testimony

Commentary: false memory syndrome

The problems of applying Daubert to psychological syndrome evidence

Allegations of child sexual abuse: delayed reporting and false memory

Meeting Proceedings, Paediatric Society of New Zealand to date, no relationship has been found between treatment for child sexual abuse and outcome.

ISSD (International Society for the Study of Dissociation.) extract from a message from the President.

Media: Victim Support gets a flea in its friendly ear

Large proportion of surveyed lesbian women claim past history of sexual abuse

Men fighting sexual harassment claims (USA).

Crimes Compensation Tribunal into recovered memories (Australia).

Newsletters received by COSA includes End Ritual Abuse "dedicated to keeping the subject of satanic ritual abuse (which involves painful, sadistic sexual abuse, torture, killing, and the use of ritual indoctrination such as mind-control) on the public agenda."

Surveys of Psychologists three studies on therapists’ beliefs and practices with regard to recovered memory therapy.

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Editorial

After having our application for funding from the ASB community Trust declined earlier this month, COSA was delighted to receive advice from the Lottery Grants Board that they will grant us $5000 towards Newsletter costs. This means that we will be able to distribute our newsletters to politicians, the media, and other interested parties, and ensure our material can be disseminated to public libraries, Citizen Advice Bureaux, and other relevant agencies. We wish to thank the Lottery Board wholeheartedly for this support.

Allegations of sexual abuse as weapons

It was reported this month that 3 family members have been charged with extortion following the death of a middle-aged Massey man. A woman, her husband and their son, who is in his early 20s, apparently sent the man a document demanding $25,000 or they would make public allegations that the man had sexually abused a woman. In the man’s home the police discovered the extortion letter and a note from the dead man, which said that he denied the allegations but couldn’t see a way out. Police have investigated the sexual abuse allegations and say they are unfounded. The coroner has yet to rule the cause of man’s death but clearly suicide is very likely.

At issue is the use of allegations of sexual abuse as weapons. This weapon is frequently used in custody disputes and by many adult women who come to believe they were sexually abused by their parents through memory recovery techniques used in psychotherapy. It is so easy to make such allegations, but almost impossible to mount a defence against them. The burden of proof is reversed, forcing an accused man to prove his innocence, rather than requiring the complainant to provide evidence to support her claim. No-one is denying that some who are accused of sexual crimes are indeed guilty, but how does the innocent man prove he is innocent?

Many allegations are impossible to prove or disprove. There are rarely any witnesses. Events may be alleged to have occurred 20, 30 or even 40 years ago, there is no physical evidence and no way of proving whether memories are reliable. In the past 10 to 15 years, until recently, there has been a trend to uncritically accept that any allegation a woman made that she had been sexually abused must be true.

The detective in the Massey case, Mr Neil Harkin, is reported as saying that he thinks this case is very unusual and "we are really treading on new ground". Whilst the majority of false allegations are not deliberate (complainants have come to sincerely but wrongly believe they have been abused) use of sexual allegations as weapons is a well-worn path. COSA has documentation of hundreds of false allegations occurring in New Zealand, and evidence of thousands overseas. A number of these do involve extortion or blackmail, and other deaths including suicides are recorded.

To use sexual allegations as weapons for extortion or any other purpose is despicable, and serves to undermine the credibility of those victims who make genuine disclosures of having been sexually abused. COSA wishes to applaud the Massey police in taking this case very seriously.

Felicity Goodyear-Smith

"As far as science knows, memories from the 1st year of age are impossible." Jean-Roch Laurence Concordia University, Canada

Courts

New Zealand

Navy man cleared in rape case

A 27 year old Navy instructor was found not guilty of raping a 19 year old trainee in her quarters. The young woman was said to have regarded the instructor as a "big brother figure". He denied having even entered her room, but the Crown prosecutor suggested to the jury that he either could not remember what he had done because he had drunk a lot of alcohol, or he had deliberately suppressed his recollection. The jury took 2½ hours to find him not guilty.

NZ Herald, Oct 1995

Elderly man found guilty of indecent assault

On 28 Sep 1995 a 66 year old retired Taranaki farmer was found guilty of indecently assaulting a 10 year old girl the previous year. The girl told the court how she and her brother had visited their neighbour and swum in his swimming pool. She claimed he had sexually assaulted her whilst drying her in the bathroom. The man said he had gone to the bathroom door to ask if she needed a towel, but denied sexually violating her.

The accused’s wife said that the girl had left her husband notes signed with the words "love and sex". Both she and the accused had spoken to the girl about the notes.

The Crown prosecutor said that while there were inconsistencies in the girl’s evidence, the allegation was "too sophisticated and detailed to be a lie".

Man found not guilty of abusing his daughter

A judge discharged a Taranaki man on charges of indecently assaulting his daughter and attempting to rape her when she was aged between 5 and 12 years (from 1984 to 1992). The judge halted the trial at the end of the prosecution case and the man did not even have to mount a defence.

Teenage boy found not guilty of raping his girlfriend

On 16 Sept 1995 an 18 year old New Plymouth boy was found not guilty of raping his 16 year old girlfriend last year. The two had been out on date a couple of times and on the night in question they had attended a school party together. They had drunk some alcohol, kissed and cuddled, and then gone to a car where they had had sexual intercourse. Both had been virgins before that night. They were later seen by witnesses back at the party, dancing together and still kissing and cuddling.

The following year the girl had brought charges of rape against him, claiming that she had not consented to having sexual intercourse.

Man acquitted of indecently assaulting boy

A jury found a 60 year old Christchurch man not guilty of indecently assaulting a boy, then aged 14, in 1979. He had not made the allegations to the police until 1993, but now attributed his bad performance at school to having been abused.

Witnesses were called at the trial who could not recall his having confided in them about abuse, and said they had not ever seen any of the alleged incidents he said they had witnessed.

The Press, Christchurch, 20 Oct 1995, 17.

United States

Wenatchee case

In this small Washington town, Detective Robert Perez and prosecuting attorney Gary Riesen have charged more than 80 adults with having weekly orgies with as many as 50 children over the last 2 years.

It all started when Perez’s 10 year old foster daughter, Donna, made allegations that her previous foster-father, and also her biological parents, had sexually abused her. The accusations which she and other children have subsequently been making include group sex at the church and mass child rape (by men all in black wearing sunglasses and by ladies wielding colored pencils and carrots).

Searches for corroborative evidence have failed to produce positive findings. People who have expressed suspicion of the charges (including a local pastor Robert Robertson, a Child Protective Service caseworker Paul Glassen, and a CBS news reporter Tom Grant) have soon found themselves the subjects of accusations.

Most of the 50-odd alleged victims of the "sex rings" named by the 3 child accusers (Donna and Melinda Everett and Andrea Southard) most strongly deny that they were ever abused, but this does not stop Detective Perez relentlessly arresting and charging more and more people on the basis of these children’s fantastic accusations.

Donna Hubbard‘s conviction overturned

Ten years ago, Ricchie Shapard told a jury that his mother helped 2 men tie him up, hang him from a hook and molest him again and again. His mother, Donna Hubbard, was convicted and sentenced to 100 years in prison. In August this year an Appeal court has overturned her conviction.

Ritchie says that it wasn’t until he was a teenager, living with a foster family, that he realised that nothing had ever happened, that "my mom was in prison and that I did it". He has named his baby Donna after his mother and hopes she will live with him and his family after her release from prison.

It had started in the mid 1980s, when a hysteria about child sex rings had swept through Kern County, charging 50 people and convicting 26 of them. These cases are now being overturned on appeal.

After being separated from their families for months and undergoing repeated suggestive and coercive questioning, children made allegations of being molested by dozens of adults and forced to take part in satanic rituals. Children claimed that 29 babies had been killed, and police dredged lakes and excavated yards. No evidence of cult activity was ever found, and later it was discovered that some of the babies were still alive. Despite this, convictions were made on the children’s testimony.

Nine years old at the time, Ritchie describes the interview process "was like being hypnotised, like something was being planted inside me".

Souza case

Three years ago Ray and Shirley Souza of Massachusetts were found guilty of sexually abusing their grand-children. Since then they have been under house arrest, pending their appeal. They wear cumbersome ankle alarms and are subjected to 10 phone calls a day from prison authorities, often in the middle of the night.

The case started when their youngest daughter Shirley Ann attended therapy during college. Her counsellor suggested that her problems must be due to repressed memories of abuse. Shirley Ann dreamed that her father raped her with a crucifix and her mother, equipped with a penis, assaulted her. In the dream, Shirley Ann had no arms or legs. The therapist interpreted this dream as firm evidence that Ray and Shirley Souza were child molesters. Desperately upset, Shirley Ann contacted her sister-in-law Heather, warning her to keep her children away from their grandparents.

Heather repeatedly questioned her 4 year old daughter about abuse, but she denied it. Heather then took her to a therapist, who found no evidence of abuse, and felt that Heather was applying undue pressure on the child. Not satisfied, Heather took her daughter to child abuse "expert" Janine Hemstead, who claimed the girl was exhibiting stress symptoms which must have resulted from sexual abuse. The abuse was reported to the Department of Social Services.

Another daughter, Sharon entered therapy and became convinced she had recovered memories of her parents abusing her as part of a satanic cult when she was a child. Sharon took her 5 year old daughter to Janine Hemstead. After numerous interviews, both grand-daughters eventually "disclosed" abuse. Two years after the supposed events, they testified in court that their grandparents put them in a case in the basement, molested them with a machine as big as a room, and forced them to drink a green potion. One child also claimed Ray and Shirley had put their whole hands and head in her vagina.

The Supreme Court had refused to hear their Appeal. However a new Appeal is now pending, based on the right of defendants in criminal trials to confront their accusers face to face. The children were allowed to testify with their backs to their grand-parents on the presumption that facing them would "re-traumatise" them. This was the basis of a recent successful appeal by the Amiraults (see Oct newsletter). If they lose this Appeal, the Souzas are likely to be imprisoned.

Literature

Jeopardy in the Courtroom: a scientific analysis of children’s testimony

Stephen Ceci and Maggie Bruck, 1995, American Psychological Association Washington DC.

This is an invaluable book for anyone working with child witnesses (especially where sexual abuse allegations are involved), including lawyers, police, social workers and therapists. Ceci and Bruck are world-renowned researchers in the field of developmental psychology, and especially issues involving memory and suggestibility of children.

This landmark book reviews the vast body of scientific research in this area and summarises the most relevant in evaluating and understanding children’s statements made in the legal arena.

Topics covered include:

• prevalence and incidence of CSA
• theoretical overviews of memory and suggestibility
• history of search on suggestibility in the last 100 years
• dynamics of structured and therapeutic interviews with children
• recovery of repressed memories of CSA
• evaluation of research re age differences in reliability of children’s testimony
• general guidelines for interviewing children in a sensitive and professional manner.

Highly recommended

Commentary: false memory syndrome

Boakes, Janet (21 Oct 1995). The Lancet, 346.

Dr Janet Boakes, Consultant Psychotherapist, St Georges Hospital presents a very sensible commentary about the recovered memory debate. She writes: "The notion that traumatic events can lie forgotten for decades until triggered by current circumstances is generally accepted [ by psychotherapists]. However, there is no body of evidence to show that traumatic events are repressed. On the contrary, the indications are that highly disturbing events cannot be forgotten… Many psychotherapists seem to be ignorant of modern understanding of memory to an absurd degree. Among psychotherapists there seem to be two underlying justificatory arguments. There are those who think that to question a literal interpretation of repression poses a threat to psychotherapy per se, which must be refuted at all costs. There are others whose concern is to support abused women and who believe false memory syndrome is part of a backlash to discredit them. Caught in the midst are families whose lives have been devastated, and patients who have been mislead…

It is vital that the mental health professions take a lead to correct erroneous beliefs. They must stamp out political correctness and poor practice, at least within their own ranks, in order to preserve the credibility of psychotherapy overall."

The problems of applying Daubert to psychological syndrome evidence

Richardson, James; Ginsburg, Gerald; Gatowski, Sophia; Dobbin, Shirley (Jul-Aug 1995). Judicature, 79 (1), 10-6.

In 1993, the US Supreme Court Daubert decision dramatically changed the American law of scientific evidence. The ruling overturned the 1923 Frye decision on which the courts had been relying, and means that the courts now have to play a more extensive gate-keeping role in determining whether scientific evidence is admissible. Whilst scientific validity and reliability may be relatively easy to access in the biological sciences, this becomes more difficult in the psychological and social sciences. This article explains some of the difficulties and pitfalls in requiring judges to evaluate scientific evidence before its presentation to a jury, and warns that "this power of judges to shape an image of reality that is colored in part by their own preferences and prejudices about how the world should work… should be sparingly exercised.".

Allegations of child sexual abuse: delayed reporting and false memory

Byrne, Peter; Sheppard, Noel ((Sep 1995). Irish journal of Psychological Medicine, 12 (3), 103-6.

This article presents 11 case histories, of patients who made, or were the subject of, allegations of sexual abuse, where the allegations were subsequently withdrawn or disproved. The authors identify that charges may be withdrawn for a number of reasons:

1. The account is substantially true but is withdrawn because of external pressures such as fear of court appearances, threats from the perpetrator or pressure from the family (none of their cases was in this category);
2. There is a genuine misunderstanding causing someone to be wrongly accused (1 case);
3. A false allegation is made where a vulnerable person needs to escape from a stressful or intolerable situation (3 cases);
4. A deliberately false claim is made with malice or for other motives (3 cases);
5. The allegation resulted from a false recollection of events by the complainant with delayed recall, especially during therapy (4 cases).

Meeting Proceedings, Paediatric Society of New Zealand, 28-30 Nov 1994

New Zealand Medical Journal, 1995, 108: 388-90.

Professor Kim Oates, described as ‘a leading paediatric voice on the subject of child abuse in Australasia, admitted that depressingly, to date, no relationship has been found between treatment for child sexual abuse and outcome.

His statement is in fact backed by a large body of research that demonstrates that in general, psychotherapy is no more effective than placebo. What is alarming is that very large sums of taxpayers’ money (for example, ACC spent $8.3 million last year on sexual abuse counselling) continue to be spent on therapy which has never been shown to be of benefit.

ISSD (International Society for the Study of Dissociation.) NEWS Aug/Sep 1995.

The following is an extract from a Message from the President, Nancy L.Hornstein, MD.

"Fact, fantasy, truth, misperception, delusion, confusion, confabulation, misrepresentation, lying – knowledge, beliefs (true and false), memory, and recollection… or What’s therapy got to do, got to do with it? (with thanks to Tina Turner).

I don’t wish to create trouble with this message, but (watch out for those "buts" – a note worthy expert claims they always reverse the meaning of the preceding statement) I refuse to be intimidated into not confronting the increasing troubles in our field. We are "in it", so to speak, deep. If you don’t believe me, check recent adjudications, not to mention multimillion dollar settlements, against therapists. The trouble we need to address, which is how to serve not only our own interest but also those of our clients, does not stem solely from the efforts of our major detractors in the false memory syndrome movement; it has been lurking in our field from the beginning. There is an urgent need for therapists to become sophisticated enough to provide treatment without presupposing that clients’ reports or "memories" are in accordance with fact, and without assuming that only one (or even several) interpretation(s) can explain even the most suggestive symptoms or dreams.

One reason why this is so important is that some of us, myself included, have increasing numbers of clients who, after years of unproductive therapeutic work with others, experience amelioration of psychiatric symptoms and dysfunction and then report that "memories" of horrendous abuse they previously reported suffering were not factual.

Perhaps we can review our vows to "First do no harm" and recognise that there are powerful counter transference issues in these cases that challenge the most experienced therapist’s ability to be an objective judge of the treatment process in the absence of careful and objective review and supervision."

Media

New Zealand

Victim Support gets a flea in its friendly ear

An Auckland man, Mr Paul Tremewan, spurned the offer of counselling from the welfare group Victim Support after his lawnmower was stolen. He was also peeved that the police had not asked him 1st as to whether he wanted his case referred to the group.

The district manager of Victim Support, Ms Jennifer Haydock, replied that not everyone lived in a privileged world where the theft of a lawnmower was no big issue, and for some such a theft could prove traumatic.

NZ Herald, Oct 1995

Large proportion of surveyed lesbian women claim past history of sexual abuse

The Wellington School of Medicine recently conducted a survey into the mental health of lesbians. The majority of the 561 respondents were Pakeha, aged 25-44 years, and highly educated and reasonably wealthy compared to other NZ women.

73% of the respondents had used a mental health service at some time (35% in the last 6 months). Nearly 60% gave histories of sexual abuse and these women were more likely to show indictors of mental health problems.

NZ Doctor 27 Oct 1995

Men fighting sexual harassment claims

Until recently numbers of professional men in the United States have had promising careers destroyed by vague charge of sexual harassment. However 2 respected university professors have recently mounted successful counter-attacks on these allegations.

Donald Silva, Professor of English at the University of New Hampshire has successfully sued to overturn a suspension for allegedly harassing female students and been compensated for his humiliation. He was suspended for a year without pay for likening belly dancing to "jelly on a plate, with a vibrator under the plate", to illustrate the concept of a simile. A university court had found him guilty of "verbal sexual harassment" when a group of female students complained.

Professor James Maas, Department of Psychology, Cornell University, was the subject of complaint by 4 students who claimed he made suggestive remarks to them and attempted to hug and kiss them. Professor Maas said he often hugged his students, bought them gifts and gave them jobs in his home (invariably when his wife was there). His supporters – including another 39,996 students, present him simply as a nice simple man. He is suing Cornell in an attempt to recover his reputation.

Sunday Star-Times 17 Sep 1995

Australia

Crimes Compensation Tribunal into recovered memories

A panel consisting of members of he Australian psychological Society and the Australian and New Zealand College of psychiatry is being set up by the Crimes Compensation Tribunal to examine cases of people claiming to have recovered childhood memories of sexual abuse.

Sunday Herald, 24 Sep 1995

Newsletters received by COSA

New Zealand Skeptic, Sept 1995, 37 – Contains an article on Pseudo-medicine by Sir John Scott and a number of letters discussing the domestic violence study "Hitting Home".

FMSF Newsletter, 1 Oct 1995, 4 (9)

Includes a legal review of a number of US cases involving repressed memory and appeal courts overturning convictions from the 1980s involving children’s testimony.

End Ritual Abuse Newsletter Aug 1995, 2 (3)

This Lottery Grant-funded newsletter is dedicated to keeping the subject of satanic ritual abuse (which involves painful, sadistic sexual abuse, torture, killing, and the use of ritual indoctrination such as mind-control) "on the public agenda, to educate and inform readers of its prevalence, and to discuss the diagnostic and treatment issues that arise from it".

Most of the material in its 22 pages is anonymous. This issue includes the testimony of a satanic abuse "survivor" and member of the Christchurch ERA survivor group. Her long list of childhood traumas include:

• sexual abuse as baby
• hands and feet cut with crosses to indoctrinate me into a ritual group
• raped when I was 5, incest and ritually
• taken to a morgue and left there with dead bodies on a slab
• becoming pregnant more than once and then my babies taken from my body when 3-4 months old then killed in front of me
• being forced to eat flesh and blood
• urinated and defecate on and being forced to eat it
• being put on a cross at aster time and then sexually abused.

She adds "These traumas are what I’ve acknowledged to date. There are more. Part of me knows."

Surveys of Psychologists

A number of studies have recently been conducted about therapists’ beliefs and practices with regard to recovered memory therapy. Whilst these are British or American surveys, there is considerable evidence that NZ therapists have been exposed to similar training and literature to their Northern Hemisphere counter-parts, and are likely to have had similar views and methods. The following notes are brief summaries of the results of some of these studies:

Suggestibility and repressed memories of abuse: a survey of psychotherapists’ beliefs

Yakpo, Michael (1994). American Journal of Hypnosis, 36 (3).

Sent surveys to over 1000 American therapists (90% were qualified professionals with advanced degrees; 10% were attendees at therapy training courses). Respondency rate: 869; usable questionnaires = approx. 80%. 98% held University degrees, nearly all post-graduate. Some of the questions and answers follow:

• Do you work hypnotically to recover memories? Yes = 56% (rarely, sometimes or often)
• It is necessary for to recover detailed memories of traumatic events if someone is to improve in therapy. 43% agree (strongly or slightly)
• Hypnosis seems to counteract the defence mechanism of repression, lifting repressed material into conscious awareness. 82% agree
• Hypnosis can be used to recover memories of accurate events as far back as birth. 53.8% agree
• When someone has a memory of a trauma while in hypnosis, it objectively must have occurred. 30.7% agree
• People cannot lie when in hypnosis. 44.5% agree

The recovery of memories in clinical practice: experiences and beliefs of British Psychological Society practitioners

Andrews, Bernice; Morton, John; Bekerian, Debra; Davies, Graham; Mollon, Phil (May 1995). The Psychologist, 209-14.

Results of British Psychological Society questionnaire on memories of early sexual abuse.

Total of 4005 questionnaires were sent to all Society members in the Clinical Psychology, Counselling Psychology, Special Group in Health Psychology and Psychotherapy divisions.

1083 returned = response rate of 27%

Results were based on the 810 (75%) of these who indicated they had clients claiming childhood sexual abuse.

• Do you ever use hypnotic regression to uncover traumatic memories? yes = 10%
• Of these [clients who have had reported history of child sexual abuse] have any experienced remembering CSA from total amnesia – i.e. no conscious knowledge of the occurrence of the event – while in therapy with you? yes = 23%
• To what extent do you think that recovered memories of CSA events from total amnesia can be taken as essentially accurate? never 3% sometimes 53% usually 38% always 6%
• To what extent do you think that clients’ reports of having experienced satanistic ritual abuse can be taken as essentially accurate? never 3% sometimes 54% usually 38% always 5%

Recovered memories of abuse among therapy patients: a national survey

Pope, Ken; Tabachnick, Barbara (1995). Ethics and Behavior, 5 (3), 237-48.

Survey sent to 450 female and 450 male licensed psychologists (42% return rate).

• 73% reported at least 1 patient claimed to have recovered memory;
• 50% reported at least 1 patient found external validation for memory;
• 21% concluded the memory was false for at least 1 patient;
• 15% had patients who had who filed a civil or criminal complaint on the basis of recovered memory;
• 12% at least 1 patient later decided memory was false.

It is clear from these studies that a significant number of highly trained and qualified psychologists and psychotherapists in Britain and the United States have believed in the theory of memory repression, have accepted their clients’ recovered memories as valid and largely accurate recall of past events and have believed that accounts of satanic ritual abuse may be essentially accurate.

COSA support groups

Auckland-based support group for anyone falsely accused of sexual abuse, their family and friends. Meetings held 7.30 to 10 pm second Sunday monthly, Awa Taha Marae, 58 Akaranga Drive, Northcote.

If you are available as a contact person in your area and are prepared for your 1st name and phone number to be published in this newsletter, please let us know. As well as our Auckland support group, which has been operating monthly for the last 2 years, groups are now starting to get organised in Christchurch and Wellington. If you wish to assist in co-ordinating a group, contact Colleen.

Coming events

Please notify COSA if you know of any recent or coming workshops, seminars and other relevant events.

Possible overseas speakers

A number of eminent academics and researchers in the field of memory and suggestibility have expressed interest to COSA in coming to New Zealand to present seminars.

In particular, Dr Elizabeth Loftus, University of Washington, research psychologist and world-leading expert on memory, and Dr Paul McHugh, Director and Psychiatrist-in Chief, Johns Hopkins medical institutions, have both expressed keen interest in addressing New Zealand audiences. Both Dr Loftus and Dr McHugh are first-class speakers as well as experts in their field, and their presentation are likely to appeal to a wide range of people, including mental health professionals, the judiciary and the general public.

If any COSA members have the interest or expertise in helping to organise such seminars, or who belong to institutions or organisations which might be able to underwrite such a project, please contact one of the COSA executive members. Thank you.

COSA Casualties of Sexual Allegations Newsletter November 1995 Volume 2 No 9

Contents of this page:

Editorial: Allegations of sexual abuse as weapons This weapon is frequently used in custody disputes and by many adult women who come to believe they were sexually abused by their parents through memory recovery techniques used in psychotherapy. It is so easy to make such allegations, but almost impossible to mount a defence against them. The burden of proof is reversed, forcing an accused man to prove his innocence, rather than requiring the complainant to provide evidence to support her claim.

Courts: Navy man cleared in rape case

Elderly man found guilty of indecent assault

Man found not guilty of abusing his daughter

Teenage boy found not guilty of raping his girlfriend

Man acquitted of indecently assaulting boy

Wenatchee case (USA).

Donna Hubbard’s conviction overturned (USA).

Souza case (USA).

Literature: Jeopardy in the Courtroom: a scientific analysis of children’s testimony

Commentary: false memory syndrome

The problems of applying Daubert to psychological syndrome evidence

Allegations of child sexual abuse: delayed reporting and false memory

Meeting Proceedings, Paediatric Society of New Zealand to date, no relationship has been found between treatment for child sexual abuse and outcome.

ISSD (International Society for the Study of Dissociation.) extract from a message from the President.

Media: Victim Support gets a flea in its friendly ear

Large proportion of surveyed lesbian women claim past history of sexual abuse

Men fighting sexual harassment claims (USA).

Crimes Compensation Tribunal into recovered memories (Australia).

Newsletters received by COSA includes End Ritual Abuse "dedicated to keeping the subject of satanic ritual abuse (which involves painful, sadistic sexual abuse, torture, killing, and the use of ritual indoctrination such as mind-control) on the public agenda."

Surveys of Psychologists three studies on therapists’ beliefs and practices with regard to recovered memory therapy.

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Editorial

After having our application for funding from the ASB community Trust declined earlier this month, COSA was delighted to receive advice from the Lottery Grants Board that they will grant us $5000 towards Newsletter costs. This means that we will be able to distribute our newsletters to politicians, the media, and other interested parties, and ensure our material can be disseminated to public libraries, Citizen Advice Bureaux, and other relevant agencies. We wish to thank the Lottery Board wholeheartedly for this support.

Allegations of sexual abuse as weapons

It was reported this month that 3 family members have been charged with extortion following the death of a middle-aged Massey man. A woman, her husband and their son, who is in his early 20s, apparently sent the man a document demanding $25,000 or they would make public allegations that the man had sexually abused a woman. In the man’s home the police discovered the extortion letter and a note from the dead man, which said that he denied the allegations but couldn’t see a way out. Police have investigated the sexual abuse allegations and say they are unfounded. The coroner has yet to rule the cause of man’s death but clearly suicide is very likely.

At issue is the use of allegations of sexual abuse as weapons. This weapon is frequently used in custody disputes and by many adult women who come to believe they were sexually abused by their parents through memory recovery techniques used in psychotherapy. It is so easy to make such allegations, but almost impossible to mount a defence against them. The burden of proof is reversed, forcing an accused man to prove his innocence, rather than requiring the complainant to provide evidence to support her claim. No-one is denying that some who are accused of sexual crimes are indeed guilty, but how does the innocent man prove he is innocent?

Many allegations are impossible to prove or disprove. There are rarely any witnesses. Events may be alleged to have occurred 20, 30 or even 40 years ago, there is no physical evidence and no way of proving whether memories are reliable. In the past 10 to 15 years, until recently, there has been a trend to uncritically accept that any allegation a woman made that she had been sexually abused must be true.

The detective in the Massey case, Mr Neil Harkin, is reported as saying that he thinks this case is very unusual and "we are really treading on new ground". Whilst the majority of false allegations are not deliberate (complainants have come to sincerely but wrongly believe they have been abused) use of sexual allegations as weapons is a well-worn path. COSA has documentation of hundreds of false allegations occurring in New Zealand, and evidence of thousands overseas. A number of these do involve extortion or blackmail, and other deaths including suicides are recorded.

To use sexual allegations as weapons for extortion or any other purpose is despicable, and serves to undermine the credibility of those victims who make genuine disclosures of having been sexually abused. COSA wishes to applaud the Massey police in taking this case very seriously.

Felicity Goodyear-Smith

"As far as science knows, memories from the 1st year of age are impossible." Jean-Roch Laurence Concordia University, Canada

Courts

New Zealand

Navy man cleared in rape case

A 27 year old Navy instructor was found not guilty of raping a 19 year old trainee in her quarters. The young woman was said to have regarded the instructor as a "big brother figure". He denied having even entered her room, but the Crown prosecutor suggested to the jury that he either could not remember what he had done because he had drunk a lot of alcohol, or he had deliberately suppressed his recollection. The jury took 2½ hours to find him not guilty.

NZ Herald, Oct 1995

Elderly man found guilty of indecent assault

On 28 Sep 1995 a 66 year old retired Taranaki farmer was found guilty of indecently assaulting a 10 year old girl the previous year. The girl told the court how she and her brother had visited their neighbour and swum in his swimming pool. She claimed he had sexually assaulted her whilst drying her in the bathroom. The man said he had gone to the bathroom door to ask if she needed a towel, but denied sexually violating her.

The accused’s wife said that the girl had left her husband notes signed with the words "love and sex". Both she and the accused had spoken to the girl about the notes.

The Crown prosecutor said that while there were inconsistencies in the girl’s evidence, the allegation was "too sophisticated and detailed to be a lie".

Man found not guilty of abusing his daughter

A judge discharged a Taranaki man on charges of indecently assaulting his daughter and attempting to rape her when she was aged between 5 and 12 years (from 1984 to 1992). The judge halted the trial at the end of the prosecution case and the man did not even have to mount a defence.

Teenage boy found not guilty of raping his girlfriend

On 16 Sept 1995 an 18 year old New Plymouth boy was found not guilty of raping his 16 year old girlfriend last year. The two had been out on date a couple of times and on the night in question they had attended a school party together. They had drunk some alcohol, kissed and cuddled, and then gone to a car where they had had sexual intercourse. Both had been virgins before that night. They were later seen by witnesses back at the party, dancing together and still kissing and cuddling.

The following year the girl had brought charges of rape against him, claiming that she had not consented to having sexual intercourse.

Man acquitted of indecently assaulting boy

A jury found a 60 year old Christchurch man not guilty of indecently assaulting a boy, then aged 14, in 1979. He had not made the allegations to the police until 1993, but now attributed his bad performance at school to having been abused.

Witnesses were called at the trial who could not recall his having confided in them about abuse, and said they had not ever seen any of the alleged incidents he said they had witnessed.

The Press, Christchurch, 20 Oct 1995, 17.

United States

Wenatchee case

In this small Washington town, Detective Robert Perez and prosecuting attorney Gary Riesen have charged more than 80 adults with having weekly orgies with as many as 50 children over the last 2 years.

It all started when Perez’s 10 year old foster daughter, Donna, made allegations that her previous foster-father, and also her biological parents, had sexually abused her. The accusations which she and other children have subsequently been making include group sex at the church and mass child rape (by men all in black wearing sunglasses and by ladies wielding colored pencils and carrots).

Searches for corroborative evidence have failed to produce positive findings. People who have expressed suspicion of the charges (including a local pastor Robert Robertson, a Child Protective Service caseworker Paul Glassen, and a CBS news reporter Tom Grant) have soon found themselves the subjects of accusations.

Most of the 50-odd alleged victims of the "sex rings" named by the 3 child accusers (Donna and Melinda Everett and Andrea Southard) most strongly deny that they were ever abused, but this does not stop Detective Perez relentlessly arresting and charging more and more people on the basis of these children’s fantastic accusations.

Donna Hubbard‘s conviction overturned

Ten years ago, Ricchie Shapard told a jury that his mother helped 2 men tie him up, hang him from a hook and molest him again and again. His mother, Donna Hubbard, was convicted and sentenced to 100 years in prison. In August this year an Appeal court has overturned her conviction.

Ritchie says that it wasn’t until he was a teenager, living with a foster family, that he realised that nothing had ever happened, that "my mom was in prison and that I did it". He has named his baby Donna after his mother and hopes she will live with him and his family after her release from prison.

It had started in the mid 1980s, when a hysteria about child sex rings had swept through Kern County, charging 50 people and convicting 26 of them. These cases are now being overturned on appeal.

After being separated from their families for months and undergoing repeated suggestive and coercive questioning, children made allegations of being molested by dozens of adults and forced to take part in satanic rituals. Children claimed that 29 babies had been killed, and police dredged lakes and excavated yards. No evidence of cult activity was ever found, and later it was discovered that some of the babies were still alive. Despite this, convictions were made on the children’s testimony.

Nine years old at the time, Ritchie describes the interview process "was like being hypnotised, like something was being planted inside me".

Souza case

Three years ago Ray and Shirley Souza of Massachusetts were found guilty of sexually abusing their grand-children. Since then they have been under house arrest, pending their appeal. They wear cumbersome ankle alarms and are subjected to 10 phone calls a day from prison authorities, often in the middle of the night.

The case started when their youngest daughter Shirley Ann attended therapy during college. Her counsellor suggested that her problems must be due to repressed memories of abuse. Shirley Ann dreamed that her father raped her with a crucifix and her mother, equipped with a penis, assaulted her. In the dream, Shirley Ann had no arms or legs. The therapist interpreted this dream as firm evidence that Ray and Shirley Souza were child molesters. Desperately upset, Shirley Ann contacted her sister-in-law Heather, warning her to keep her children away from their grandparents.

Heather repeatedly questioned her 4 year old daughter about abuse, but she denied it. Heather then took her to a therapist, who found no evidence of abuse, and felt that Heather was applying undue pressure on the child. Not satisfied, Heather took her daughter to child abuse "expert" Janine Hemstead, who claimed the girl was exhibiting stress symptoms which must have resulted from sexual abuse. The abuse was reported to the Department of Social Services.

Another daughter, Sharon entered therapy and became convinced she had recovered memories of her parents abusing her as part of a satanic cult when she was a child. Sharon took her 5 year old daughter to Janine Hemstead. After numerous interviews, both grand-daughters eventually "disclosed" abuse. Two years after the supposed events, they testified in court that their grandparents put them in a case in the basement, molested them with a machine as big as a room, and forced them to drink a green potion. One child also claimed Ray and Shirley had put their whole hands and head in her vagina.

The Supreme Court had refused to hear their Appeal. However a new Appeal is now pending, based on the right of defendants in criminal trials to confront their accusers face to face. The children were allowed to testify with their backs to their grand-parents on the presumption that facing them would "re-traumatise" them. This was the basis of a recent successful appeal by the Amiraults (see Oct newsletter). If they lose this Appeal, the Souzas are likely to be imprisoned.

Literature

Jeopardy in the Courtroom: a scientific analysis of children’s testimony

Stephen Ceci and Maggie Bruck, 1995, American Psychological Association Washington DC.

This is an invaluable book for anyone working with child witnesses (especially where sexual abuse allegations are involved), including lawyers, police, social workers and therapists. Ceci and Bruck are world-renowned researchers in the field of developmental psychology, and especially issues involving memory and suggestibility of children.

This landmark book reviews the vast body of scientific research in this area and summarises the most relevant in evaluating and understanding children’s statements made in the legal arena.

Topics covered include:

• prevalence and incidence of CSA
• theoretical overviews of memory and suggestibility
• history of search on suggestibility in the last 100 years
• dynamics of structured and therapeutic interviews with children
• recovery of repressed memories of CSA
• evaluation of research re age differences in reliability of children’s testimony
• general guidelines for interviewing children in a sensitive and professional manner.

Highly recommended

Commentary: false memory syndrome

Boakes, Janet (21 Oct 1995). The Lancet, 346.

Dr Janet Boakes, Consultant Psychotherapist, St Georges Hospital presents a very sensible commentary about the recovered memory debate. She writes: "The notion that traumatic events can lie forgotten for decades until triggered by current circumstances is generally accepted [ by psychotherapists]. However, there is no body of evidence to show that traumatic events are repressed. On the contrary, the indications are that highly disturbing events cannot be forgotten… Many psychotherapists seem to be ignorant of modern understanding of memory to an absurd degree. Among psychotherapists there seem to be two underlying justificatory arguments. There are those who think that to question a literal interpretation of repression poses a threat to psychotherapy per se, which must be refuted at all costs. There are others whose concern is to support abused women and who believe false memory syndrome is part of a backlash to discredit them. Caught in the midst are families whose lives have been devastated, and patients who have been mislead…

It is vital that the mental health professions take a lead to correct erroneous beliefs. They must stamp out political correctness and poor practice, at least within their own ranks, in order to preserve the credibility of psychotherapy overall."

The problems of applying Daubert to psychological syndrome evidence

Richardson, James; Ginsburg, Gerald; Gatowski, Sophia; Dobbin, Shirley (Jul-Aug 1995). Judicature, 79 (1), 10-6.

In 1993, the US Supreme Court Daubert decision dramatically changed the American law of scientific evidence. The ruling overturned the 1923 Frye decision on which the courts had been relying, and means that the courts now have to play a more extensive gate-keeping role in determining whether scientific evidence is admissible. Whilst scientific validity and reliability may be relatively easy to access in the biological sciences, this becomes more difficult in the psychological and social sciences. This article explains some of the difficulties and pitfalls in requiring judges to evaluate scientific evidence before its presentation to a jury, and warns that "this power of judges to shape an image of reality that is colored in part by their own preferences and prejudices about how the world should work… should be sparingly exercised.".

Allegations of child sexual abuse: delayed reporting and false memory

Byrne, Peter; Sheppard, Noel ((Sep 1995). Irish journal of Psychological Medicine, 12 (3), 103-6.

This article presents 11 case histories, of patients who made, or were the subject of, allegations of sexual abuse, where the allegations were subsequently withdrawn or disproved. The authors identify that charges may be withdrawn for a number of reasons:

1. The account is substantially true but is withdrawn because of external pressures such as fear of court appearances, threats from the perpetrator or pressure from the family (none of their cases was in this category);
2. There is a genuine misunderstanding causing someone to be wrongly accused (1 case);
3. A false allegation is made where a vulnerable person needs to escape from a stressful or intolerable situation (3 cases);
4. A deliberately false claim is made with malice or for other motives (3 cases);
5. The allegation resulted from a false recollection of events by the complainant with delayed recall, especially during therapy (4 cases).

Meeting Proceedings, Paediatric Society of New Zealand, 28-30 Nov 1994

New Zealand Medical Journal, 1995, 108: 388-90.

Professor Kim Oates, described as ‘a leading paediatric voice on the subject of child abuse in Australasia, admitted that depressingly, to date, no relationship has been found between treatment for child sexual abuse and outcome.

His statement is in fact backed by a large body of research that demonstrates that in general, psychotherapy is no more effective than placebo. What is alarming is that very large sums of taxpayers’ money (for example, ACC spent $8.3 million last year on sexual abuse counselling) continue to be spent on therapy which has never been shown to be of benefit.

ISSD (International Society for the Study of Dissociation.) NEWS Aug/Sep 1995.

The following is an extract from a Message from the President, Nancy L.Hornstein, MD.

"Fact, fantasy, truth, misperception, delusion, confusion, confabulation, misrepresentation, lying – knowledge, beliefs (true and false), memory, and recollection… or What’s therapy got to do, got to do with it? (with thanks to Tina Turner).

I don’t wish to create trouble with this message, but (watch out for those "buts" – a note worthy expert claims they always reverse the meaning of the preceding statement) I refuse to be intimidated into not confronting the increasing troubles in our field. We are "in it", so to speak, deep. If you don’t believe me, check recent adjudications, not to mention multimillion dollar settlements, against therapists. The trouble we need to address, which is how to serve not only our own interest but also those of our clients, does not stem solely from the efforts of our major detractors in the false memory syndrome movement; it has been lurking in our field from the beginning. There is an urgent need for therapists to become sophisticated enough to provide treatment without presupposing that clients’ reports or "memories" are in accordance with fact, and without assuming that only one (or even several) interpretation(s) can explain even the most suggestive symptoms or dreams.

One reason why this is so important is that some of us, myself included, have increasing numbers of clients who, after years of unproductive therapeutic work with others, experience amelioration of psychiatric symptoms and dysfunction and then report that "memories" of horrendous abuse they previously reported suffering were not factual.

Perhaps we can review our vows to "First do no harm" and recognise that there are powerful counter transference issues in these cases that challenge the most experienced therapist’s ability to be an objective judge of the treatment process in the absence of careful and objective review and supervision."

Media

New Zealand

Victim Support gets a flea in its friendly ear

An Auckland man, Mr Paul Tremewan, spurned the offer of counselling from the welfare group Victim Support after his lawnmower was stolen. He was also peeved that the police had not asked him 1st as to whether he wanted his case referred to the group.

The district manager of Victim Support, Ms Jennifer Haydock, replied that not everyone lived in a privileged world where the theft of a lawnmower was no big issue, and for some such a theft could prove traumatic.

NZ Herald, Oct 1995

Large proportion of surveyed lesbian women claim past history of sexual abuse

The Wellington School of Medicine recently conducted a survey into the mental health of lesbians. The majority of the 561 respondents were Pakeha, aged 25-44 years, and highly educated and reasonably wealthy compared to other NZ women.

73% of the respondents had used a mental health service at some time (35% in the last 6 months). Nearly 60% gave histories of sexual abuse and these women were more likely to show indictors of mental health problems.

NZ Doctor 27 Oct 1995

Men fighting sexual harassment claims

Until recently numbers of professional men in the United States have had promising careers destroyed by vague charge of sexual harassment. However 2 respected university professors have recently mounted successful counter-attacks on these allegations.

Donald Silva, Professor of English at the University of New Hampshire has successfully sued to overturn a suspension for allegedly harassing female students and been compensated for his humiliation. He was suspended for a year without pay for likening belly dancing to "jelly on a plate, with a vibrator under the plate", to illustrate the concept of a simile. A university court had found him guilty of "verbal sexual harassment" when a group of female students complained.

Professor James Maas, Department of Psychology, Cornell University, was the subject of complaint by 4 students who claimed he made suggestive remarks to them and attempted to hug and kiss them. Professor Maas said he often hugged his students, bought them gifts and gave them jobs in his home (invariably when his wife was there). His supporters – including another 39,996 students, present him simply as a nice simple man. He is suing Cornell in an attempt to recover his reputation.

Sunday Star-Times 17 Sep 1995

Australia

Crimes Compensation Tribunal into recovered memories

A panel consisting of members of he Australian psychological Society and the Australian and New Zealand College of psychiatry is being set up by the Crimes Compensation Tribunal to examine cases of people claiming to have recovered childhood memories of sexual abuse.

Sunday Herald, 24 Sep 1995

Newsletters received by COSA

New Zealand Skeptic, Sept 1995, 37 – Contains an article on Pseudo-medicine by Sir John Scott and a number of letters discussing the domestic violence study "Hitting Home".

FMSF Newsletter, 1 Oct 1995, 4 (9)

Includes a legal review of a number of US cases involving repressed memory and appeal courts overturning convictions from the 1980s involving children’s testimony.

End Ritual Abuse Newsletter Aug 1995, 2 (3)

This Lottery Grant-funded newsletter is dedicated to keeping the subject of satanic ritual abuse (which involves painful, sadistic sexual abuse, torture, killing, and the use of ritual indoctrination such as mind-control) "on the public agenda, to educate and inform readers of its prevalence, and to discuss the diagnostic and treatment issues that arise from it".

Most of the material in its 22 pages is anonymous. This issue includes the testimony of a satanic abuse "survivor" and member of the Christchurch ERA survivor group. Her long list of childhood traumas include:

• sexual abuse as baby
• hands and feet cut with crosses to indoctrinate me into a ritual group
• raped when I was 5, incest and ritually
• taken to a morgue and left there with dead bodies on a slab
• becoming pregnant more than once and then my babies taken from my body when 3-4 months old then killed in front of me
• being forced to eat flesh and blood
• urinated and defecate on and being forced to eat it
• being put on a cross at aster time and then sexually abused.

She adds "These traumas are what I’ve acknowledged to date. There are more. Part of me knows."

Surveys of Psychologists

A number of studies have recently been conducted about therapists’ beliefs and practices with regard to recovered memory therapy. Whilst these are British or American surveys, there is considerable evidence that NZ therapists have been exposed to similar training and literature to their Northern Hemisphere counter-parts, and are likely to have had similar views and methods. The following notes are brief summaries of the results of some of these studies:

Suggestibility and repressed memories of abuse: a survey of psychotherapists’ beliefs

Yakpo, Michael (1994). American Journal of Hypnosis, 36 (3).

Sent surveys to over 1000 American therapists (90% were qualified professionals with advanced degrees; 10% were attendees at therapy training courses). Respondency rate: 869; usable questionnaires = approx. 80%. 98% held University degrees, nearly all post-graduate. Some of the questions and answers follow:

• Do you work hypnotically to recover memories? Yes = 56% (rarely, sometimes or often)
• It is necessary for to recover detailed memories of traumatic events if someone is to improve in therapy. 43% agree (strongly or slightly)
• Hypnosis seems to counteract the defence mechanism of repression, lifting repressed material into conscious awareness. 82% agree
• Hypnosis can be used to recover memories of accurate events as far back as birth. 53.8% agree
• When someone has a memory of a trauma while in hypnosis, it objectively must have occurred. 30.7% agree
• People cannot lie when in hypnosis. 44.5% agree

The recovery of memories in clinical practice: experiences and beliefs of British Psychological Society practitioners

Andrews, Bernice; Morton, John; Bekerian, Debra; Davies, Graham; Mollon, Phil (May 1995). The Psychologist, 209-14.

Results of British Psychological Society questionnaire on memories of early sexual abuse.

Total of 4005 questionnaires were sent to all Society members in the Clinical Psychology, Counselling Psychology, Special Group in Health Psychology and Psychotherapy divisions.

1083 returned = response rate of 27%

Results were based on the 810 (75%) of these who indicated they had clients claiming childhood sexual abuse.

• Do you ever use hypnotic regression to uncover traumatic memories? yes = 10%
• Of these [clients who have had reported history of child sexual abuse] have any experienced remembering CSA from total amnesia – i.e. no conscious knowledge of the occurrence of the event – while in therapy with you? yes = 23%
• To what extent do you think that recovered memories of CSA events from total amnesia can be taken as essentially accurate? never 3% sometimes 53% usually 38% always 6%
• To what extent do you think that clients’ reports of having experienced satanistic ritual abuse can be taken as essentially accurate? never 3% sometimes 54% usually 38% always 5%

Recovered memories of abuse among therapy patients: a national survey

Pope, Ken; Tabachnick, Barbara (1995). Ethics and Behavior, 5 (3), 237-48.

Survey sent to 450 female and 450 male licensed psychologists (42% return rate).

• 73% reported at least 1 patient claimed to have recovered memory;
• 50% reported at least 1 patient found external validation for memory;
• 21% concluded the memory was false for at least 1 patient;
• 15% had patients who had who filed a civil or criminal complaint on the basis of recovered memory;
• 12% at least 1 patient later decided memory was false.

It is clear from these studies that a significant number of highly trained and qualified psychologists and psychotherapists in Britain and the United States have believed in the theory of memory repression, have accepted their clients’ recovered memories as valid and largely accurate recall of past events and have believed that accounts of satanic ritual abuse may be essentially accurate.

COSA support groups

Auckland-based support group for anyone falsely accused of sexual abuse, their family and friends. Meetings held 7.30 to 10 pm second Sunday monthly, Awa Taha Marae, 58 Akaranga Drive, Northcote.

If you are available as a contact person in your area and are prepared for your 1st name and phone number to be published in this newsletter, please let us know. As well as our Auckland support group, which has been operating monthly for the last 2 years, groups are now starting to get organised in Christchurch and Wellington. If you wish to assist in co-ordinating a group, contact Colleen.

Coming events

Please notify COSA if you know of any recent or coming workshops, seminars and other relevant events.

Possible overseas speakers

A number of eminent academics and researchers in the field of memory and suggestibility have expressed interest to COSA in coming to New Zealand to present seminars.

In particular, Dr Elizabeth Loftus, University of Washington, research psychologist and world-leading expert on memory, and Dr Paul McHugh, Director and Psychiatrist-in Chief, Johns Hopkins medical institutions, have both expressed keen interest in addressing New Zealand audiences. Both Dr Loftus and Dr McHugh are first-class speakers as well as experts in their field, and their presentation are likely to appeal to a wide range of people, including mental health professionals, the judiciary and the general public.

If any COSA members have the interest or expertise in helping to organise such seminars, or who belong to institutions or organisations which might be able to underwrite such a project, please contact one of the COSA executive members. Thank you.