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Sunday Star Times
July 6, 1997
Failing the innocent
Letter to the Editor
by Grace Thurlow, Wanganui
The article on the Peter Ellis case (June 22) asks: "How on earth can
this have happened?" David Rieff in his book Los Angeles refers to a similar case there
in 1983.
A parent of a pre-school child in Manhattan
had complained to police she suspected her 2<>-year-old son had been
raped. Investigators later concluded that out of the 400 children they
interviewed, 369 had been molested. Former pupils claimed they too had been
sexually assaulted and forced to join in satanic rituals.
The proprietress and her son who had been out on bail awaiting trial on the
first charges were re-arrested. The woman spent two years in jail, and her
son five, before being tried. Both were acquitted. Rieff asks: How could
parents not have noticed the obvious signs of physical molestation? Was Sam
Weller right about the law being an ass?
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