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John Stossel on the Amirault Case
Monday, January 18th, 2010Old 20/20 episode. Via Walter Olson.
17 Responses to “John Stossel on the Amirault Case”
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For anybody that needs more on Coakley.
http://blog.simplejustice.us/2010/01/17/the-coakley-condition.aspx?ref=rss
A part of a plea bargain was that she demanded that the lawyer not represent the other defendants later. How can that be enforceable?
At least a start in the right direction.
Chip on his shoulder? Why the mention of the Pulitzer twice?
Be sure and go to youtube and have a look at the comments. Especially the ones by stopritualabuse.
People who defend those prosecutions are like the idiots who see a memory lapse as irrefutable evidence of an alien abduction. A lot of people think that the use of the term “witch hunt” to describe these cases is an exaggeration. It’s not. These prosecutions were no more legitimate than pulling people out of the population at random and condemning them to psychological torture for the remainder of their lives.
A accusation of child sex abuse is society’s way of issuing a blank check for anyone to do whatever they want to you, guilty or not.
I feel I have been through the same thing at the hands of a board of medical examiners. I was sent to a place where I saw five interviewers and had a five or six question lie detector test, done against my better judgment. Their final report was riddled with errors and the, farce of a, lie detector test said I was being deceptive!? I scored in the normal range in all of the psychological tests on sex abuse. Not hard to do, since I was the one being stalked by my present wife, who happened to be an acquaintance and a patient. It was the reason I was sent to the shrinks.
I had it reviewed by a nationally known psychiatrist, who was also a previous consultant. He said, after reviewing my notes and the study report, that he did not understand how they came up with such conclusions. He mentioned the fact that the sexual abuse questionnaires were perfectly within the normal response range! Yet, today, I am no longer working. I was labeled as a “sexually aggressive male”!? I would love to be in Haiti, helping. But, I sit here and rot.
Things is , I know there is not, always, justice, here on earth. Especially with this type of railroading of people by the “experts”!
I did get a little revenge. The sheriff’s ex-daughter-in-law is now my adoring wife! She is perfect! Well, almost! Too bad her information could not have been used to convict her ex!
Interesting that those that think Amirault was guilty are called “idiots” and are compared to alien abduction. This is simply name calling and proves nothing.
Yet, Amirault was found guilty and this verdict was upheld several times by both political parties (Swift). There were physical findings of abuse in the children and the children showed signs of strong sexualized behaviors after the abuse. The children as adults continue to state they were abused.
Letters to the Editor: The Real Darkness Is Child Abuse WALL STREET JOURNAL 02/24/95 Hardoon
The three Amiraults — Gerald, Violet and Cheryl – were convicted after two trials before different judges and juries almost one year apart. They were represented by able and well-known defense counsel. The convictions were upheld after review by state and federal appellate courts….in Amirault, the majority of the female children who testified had some relevant physical findings, as did several female children involved in the investigation who did not participate in the trial. The findings included labial adhesions and hymenal scarring…The victims and their families in these cases have been irrevocably harmed by what was done to them by the Amiraults. Every argument raised by Ms. Rabinowitz was ably presented by the defense at the trials. The juries, by their verdicts, rejected these arguments. Justice was done.
Swift won’t free Tooky by David R. Guarino and Elisabeth J. Beardsley Wednesday, February 20, 2002 Boston Herald
Swift said Amirault should be jailed at least until he’s up for parole in 2004 on his 30- to 40-year sentence. “She carefully analyzed every bit of information generated through the investigation and came to her decision that the verdict was just and the sentence was appropriate
If nothing else, at least the comments lean toward skepticism that the convictions were legit.
Google “Rolando Cruz” and then tell me about “upheld” verdicts. Read Grisham’s “The Innocent Man: Murder and Injustice in a Small Town” and tell me about the absolute intelligence of juries. People who think juries establish truth ARE idiots and comparable to those who believe they were probed anally when abducted by aliens.
“There were physical findings of abuse in the children”
Can you elaborate on that? Was the Stossel piece misleading when it said that there was no physical evidence of abuse?
“and the children showed signs of strong sexualized behaviors after the abuse.”
Hardly a surprise, if true. These interviewers convinced the children that they’d been sexually abused. I shouldn’t be surprised to learn that even manufactured memories of sexual abuse would traumatize the children.
“The children as adults continue to state they were abused.”
Of course they do. They believe that they were. The point here is that the interviewers persuaded them that they were abused. Once they’ve accepted that belief as children, and it’s become a huge part of their self-conception, how on earth would they ever abandon that belief as they grow up?
“This is simply name calling and proves nothing.”
Speaking of proof, by the way, have you got any evidence apart from bare assertion and a letter to the editor that the Amiraults were guilty?
The fact that they were found guilty by juries isn’t very persuasive, in light of the fact that newer science has revealed just how worthless the coerced testimony of the children was.
One might just as well argue that Salem was full of witches in 1692 because several were convicted by juries of the day.
Poster #6 has been spaming other sites about this. She has a website that attempts to support the satanic ritual abuse claims of the ’80s and 90s. A complete fanatic! She also usucessfully tried to get her material into Wikipedia.
The verdict was upheld by both parties? WTF does that have to do with it? All that proves is that the witch hunts were a bipartisan effort, which, by the way, isn’t exactly earth shattering news.
Wait a sec. Are you quoting a letter to the editor of the WSJ by the lead Fells Acre prosecutor as an authoritative impartial source?
Yep, the governor refused to commute Amirault’s sentence. And quoting further from that same article: Swift rejected the unanimous July Parole Board recommendation that there was “real and substantial doubt” of Amirault’s guilt.
This case is about a bunch of children who were coaxed into regurgitating suggestions by the interviewers in order to crucify innocent people. Some of the things they told investigators were clearly fantastic, but the prosecution chose to focus on what they could use, claiming it was believable even though many of the clams were not believable. In fact, they they didn’t even find it worth mentioning when the children denied that anything happened. In the minds of the prosecutors, any child who claimed nothing happened must have been lying, right?
As for my reference to alien abductions, I think it was right on the money. There will always be people who choose to believe incredible things, so there will always be people who claim these prosecutions were legitimate. But, keep in mind that the vast majority of the public, who were at one time convinced that justice was being done, now know these”ritual abuse” cases for what they were: witch hunts fostered by prosecutors who used them to bolster their political future.
At the very least, the trial was a sham and the Amiraults were, by no means, proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt. In fact, this case is the poster child for reasonable doubt and a prosecutor with the integrity of a fly spec would never have brought it to trial.
Like you, those who still hold out that they were guilty basically make the argument that, if they were innocent, they wouldn’t have remained in prison. Your post simply says that the government reviewed it’s own prosecution and and determined that they did a good job. What a surprise. Whether that’s the argument of an idiot or not, I’ll let others decide for themselves.
COMMONWEALTH vs. GERALD AMIRAULT. 404 Mass. 221 Four of the children who testified in this case were occasionally left behind on field trips.
children were often removed from their classroom and sent to another less crowded room during nap time. those children were called away by Miss Vi or Miss Cheryl.Each of the children stated that he or she was forced to touch the defendant’s penis, to lick food from his penis, or that the defendant touched or put his penis in the child’s vagina or rectum.
COMMONWEALTH vs. GERALD AMIRAULT. 404 Mass. 221 The children stated that they were threatened by Tooky or Miss Vi that if they told anyone about the incidents, that their parents, or family, would be killed, or cut up in pieces, or that the children would be sent away….The parents of the child witnesses testified about their children’s behavior while, or shortly after, attending Fells Acres. The children complained and cried about the school.
COMMONWEALTH vs. GERALD AMIRAULT. 424 Mass. 618
“These parents also testified to instances of extremely sexualized behavior on the part of the children including masturbation, sexualized play with dolls, boys sticking their tongues in the mouths of their mothers, and the simulation of sexual acts. Many of the children also developed generalized symptoms indicative of trauma such as bedwetting, baby talk, pain in their genital areas, headaches and stomach aches, and fearfulness.”
I think #6 has a future at Fox News.
#13, You seem willing to believe anything no matter how preposterous so long as it gives you an opportunity to play the role of childrens’ champion. So you won’t admit to yourself the harm that was done to the children by people who think like you do. And you will not admit the wrong that was done to those that were accused.
You cheered on a terrible evil in the name of fighting evil. I suggest that you develop a conscience.
#13,
If those three paragraphs are considered proof of guilt beyond a reasonable doubt after these children were virtually brainwashed by interrogators then we are all in danger of going to jail for sexual abuse even if you’ve never been in the same room with a child in your life.
Here’s a quarter, go buy yourself a clue.
Well, would ya look at that. Coakley lost with 47% to Brown’s 52%.
Aside from whatever the reasons are for her loss, the fact that a Republican won Ted Kennedy’s Senate seat is just friggin’ astounding to me. I mean, isn’t Massachusetts the center of the liberal universe?