Читать книгу False Allegations Of Child Sexual Abuse - Edward Nichols - Страница 6

"Hysteria" may be defined as a wild outbreak of feelings that greatly exaggerate reality. With respect to the subject of allegations of child sexual abuse, it is my opinion that a certain measure of "hysteria" exists among child protective agencies, the courts, and a significant segment of our population. As a direct result of this hysteria, innocent parties are found to have perpetrated the sexual abuse of a child when in fact no such sexual abuse has taken place. This happens in civil cases in the context of domestic disputes, and increasingly, in criminal actions. Thus the false allegations of child sexual abuse has become a strategic weapon in the arsenal of some, and in other cases, persons of good intent have been seduced into the hysterical atmosphere that characterizes the false allegations. In any case, the need for this volume has become obvious. For example:

Man puts life back together after child recants molestation charge

THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

The Sun News

Myrtle Beach, S.C.

Dec. 28, 1993

REIDSVILLE, N.C. Although he's a free man, Bill Forester fears he'll never escape the label that a then 6-year-old girl hung on him: child molester.

"...I know people will always wonder whether Billy Forester molested that little girl," Forester, 48, said in an interview published Monday by the News & Record of Greensboro.

Mindy Coppenger recanted her story, but not before Forester spent two years in prison. He was released last month.

These days, Forester busies himself with putting his Reidsville home and his life back together.

Mindy Coppenger, now 10, busies herself with multiplication tables at school in Tennessee. For a long time, she was unhappy there, but she's feeling much better now.

I'm happy now, and I'm very sorry," Mindy said. "I know that I shouldn't have told a story because it was wrong."

Before Bill Forester met Mindy, he met her mother, Vicky Bowers.

Forester, a supervisor for Brian Electric Co. of Greensboro, left Reidsville in 1989 to take a job in Maryville, Tenn. Forester met Vicky Bowers when he gave her a job on his construction crew. And after her second day of work, she invited him home for dinner. It was a whirlwind romance. Within days, the couple and child were living together in a Maryville apartment. Bowers' parents often kept Mindy.

When Forester and Bowers decided to move to Reidsville, Mindy cried. Forester built a swing set and sandbox to keep her busy, and drove her frequently to Tennessee to visit her grandparents.

But he insisted on discipline for a child he considered spoiled.

"Vicky wouldn't spank Mindy, and she usually bought her things whenever she wanted them," Forester said. Over Mindy's protests, Forester insisted she eat her vegetables and be in bed by 9 p.m. He also spanked her when he believed she needed it.

In November 1990, Rockingham County sheriff's deputies charged Forester with sexually abusing Mindy Coppenger. Soon after he was arrested, Forester and Bowers broke up. And Forester didn't see Mindy again until his trial in November 1991 for sexual assault.

The most convincing prosecution witness was a sobbing Mindy Coppenger.

Bowers told jurors that she had no reason to suspect Forester of molesting her daughter. But Forester was convicted, sentenced to two life sentences plus 10 years and sent to Raleigh's Central Prison in November 1991.

Forester eventually got a new attorney and won a new trial. Before prosecutors could build a fresh case against Forester, it unraveled when Mindy Coppenger said that Forester never molested her.

The girl admitted her lie to her grandmother, Margaret Bowers. Mindy explained that some children at school told her that getting Forester in trouble would be her ticket to life with her grandparents in Tennessee.

Forester was freed Nov. 17 after Mindy signed a sworn affidavit recanting her story and the charges were dropped.

Sadly, accounts such as this are commonplace. Indeed, several cases of false allegations, and convictions, make the national news regularly. To be sure, children are indeed sexually abused, but there is only one word to describe the thinking of those who attempt to justify the conviction of the innocent hysterical. Thus, based upon over twenty years of the author's academic and professional experience, this volume attempts to stem the tide of those whose zeal to protect children has begun to threaten the integrity of our justice system.

The primary purpose of this publication is to put at an attorney's fingers a volume of "usable" and practical knowledge that will prove invaluable to his next representation of a client who is falsely accused of the sexual abuse of a child. Though today virtually anyone may be so falsely accused, the largest number of falsely accused, in the author's experience, are to be found among the increasing large number of fathers involved in custody disputes. The false allegations in that context may be called the nuclear weapon in the strategic arsenal of the parent who will go to "any length to win" a domestic controversy. Experience has also taught, however, that any attorney involved representing anyone so falsely accused will benefit from much of what is presented here.

How is it that the false allegations may prevail against the best efforts of the innocent client's attorney? The seeds of this breach of justice are sown in three broad areas in which attorneys have failed to provide effective advocacy:

First, the public hysteria regarding the sexual abuse of children needs to be recognized and effectively addressed. This reality places upon the attorney a "special" burden of proof that addresses the dynamics of the emotional issues.

Second, the attorney must be an effective case manager able to initiate appropriate discovery activities, able to identify and preserve the critical "chain of evidence", and able to manage the available financial resources effectively.

And finally, the attorney must be ever mindful of the importance of the expert testimony. He or she must be skilled at identifying and using the appropriate research to organize effective cross-examination and to present effective testimony to support the falsely accused client.

Based upon the author's experience, ten principles of successful representation have been observed that fall into these three areas.