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Child sex
abuse hysteria and the Ellis case |
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The wisdom of
Gordon Waugh - Index |
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For someone with so
little genuine knowledge of the Peter Ellis case, Sandra Coney has a lot to
say. Her commentary is ill-informed, emotive and misleading. It ignores the
main issues. Our judicial process is
the heart of our community and we have an inherent right to examine it when
it goes badly awry. Peter Ellis was convicted on the incomplete, imaginative
and uncorroborated testimony of small children, and the opinions of so-called
"experts". Widespread public and
professional concern resulted from suggestions of satanic ritual abuse, the
dropping of charges against his co-workers, suggestions of process abuse and
the withholding of masses of critical evidence from jury scrutiny. A key
child witness recanted her stories. Where was the physical,
medical and forensic evidence of injury, surgery, murder, mutilated
carcasses, cages, tunnels, trapdoors, guns, needles, exploding children or
sexual abuse? The case was based on
hysteria and fantasy. Methods used by those who excavated
"evidence" from child witnesses were unscientific, unethical and
unsafe and so was the conviction. Years later, our concerns remain, heavily
underscored by similar cases overseas. An inquiry, albeit a very limited one,
will be held. We have a right to know. |
