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PAUL CRAIG ROBERTS

RELEASE: WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 16, 1998, AND THEREAFTER

HEARTLESS PROSECUTIONS

Being a columnist has taught me that there is massive injustice in America. I don't mean injustice in the way liberals and the political left mean it --"unfair" income distribution and a preponderance of white males in executive suites and professions. I mean injustice in the true sense -- the prosecution of innocents.

As a result of my columns about the frame-ups of 26 parents on child sex-abuse charges in Wenatchee, Wash., I have received hundreds of letters from anguished people stunned at the ease with which their families were destroyed with similar false charges of child abuse.

Even if I had the resources to investigate all the cases, and even if editors and readers permitted me to write about nothing else, it would be years before I worked my way through the documents already in my possession. And, of course, each new column would bring more letters.

At the same time, I feel a responsibility to do what I can to share these stories -- if only to forewarn those of you who are next in line.

The problem in general is this: For three decades "child advocates" have been propagandizing political elites, judges, prosecutors and newspaper editors that the family is the main source of child abuse. This propaganda resulted in the passage of laws that have endowed government departments such as Human Services (DHS) and Child Protective Services (CPS) with essentially unaccountable powers.

These powers are routinely abused for all the reasons that excessive power is always abused and because a federal subsidy is paid to CPS for every child that is removed from a home. CPS child seizure feeds a network of foster homes and adoption services.

Many parents lose their children and are sent to prison for doing nothing more than parenting. For example, in an Arlington, Va., case that I investigated, a father ended up in prison because he attempted to break up a lesbian relationship between his under-age daughter and an older woman -- the true child abuser in this case. To protect her sex relationship, the daughter accused her father, who was falsely prosecuted.

Children have learned in school that they can retaliate against parents by making child abuse accusations. Speaking to your children about their grades, drug use, undesirable associations or punishment or restrictions of any kind can result in an accusation.

Parents need to understand that false accusations are just as dangerous as true ones. There are two reasons for this. One is that it carries no weight when the child realizes what he or she has done and recants. The other is that more often than not, the charge is not investigated but used as evidence in the case against the parent.

In May 1996, Wayne Pierce in Houlton, Maine, expressed his concern to his 9-year old son about his grades. The boy responded by alleging sexual molestation. A detective and a state mental health official tried to produce incriminating evidence against Mr. Pierce, to no avail. The boy recanted, and there was no physical evidence. Nevertheless, the state has kept the child, who is not even permitted to see his mother.

In most cases, CPS uses charges against one parent to break up the marriage. The non-accused parent cannot get the child back from CPS without deserting, and testifying against, the accused spouse.

If any daughter in a family falls into the clutches of a "recovered memory" therapist, the men in the family are doomed. A woman in Aurora, Colo., wrote to me that she went to a therapist for help with PMS and was maneuvered into accusing her father of sexually abusing her as a child. When she realized the coercive nature of her "therapy," it was all she could do to keep her dad out of prison.

Not everyone is so lucky. A daughter of Ray and Shirley Souza was raped at college and sought therapy to help her get over the incident. A "recovered memory" therapist treated her with "dream therapy," and she dreamed that her parents raped her with a crucifix when she was a child.

A daughter-in-law on the outs with her husband and the Souzas seized on this "evidence" and apparently planted tales in the heads of her kids and others in the family. Charges were brought against the grandparents, and their case ended up before the same Massachusetts judge, Elizabeth Dolan, who presided over the now infamous frame-up of Gerald Amirault. The Souzas are spending their elderly years under house arrest.

Defense attorneys in child abuse cases should give every juror a copy of Dr. Harris Graf's Jan. 28 address to the New Hampshire legislature, which shows how prosecutors broke the law in order to frame his son, Carl, on child sex abuse charges. Until the public wakes up, no parent, scoutmaster, teacher or day care provider is safe.

To find out more about Paul Craig Roberts, and read features by other Creators Syndicate writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators Syndicate web page at www.creators.com.

COPYRIGHT 1998 PAUL CRAIG ROBERTS DISTRIBUTED BY CREATORS SYNDICATE, INC.

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