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News items, from the year 2002, about:
RITUAL ABUSE,
SATANIC RITUAL ABUSE (SRA),
MULTIPLE PERSONALITY DISORDER (MPD), RECOVERED MEMORY THERAPY (RMT), etc.
Sponsored link.
News items:
 | 2002-FEB-21: Netherlands: Court rejects RMT case: A court in
Arnhem rejected a civil case brought by a woman from Druten in which she
accused her parents of sexual abuse and of perpetrating an illegal
abortion. She had claimed 40,000 Euros in damages (about $36,000
US). In a classical
example of recovered memory therapy, her therapist used hypnosis and
dream analysis to induce repressed "memories." A court psychologist
determined that the daughter's accusations were untenable, and that the
therapist had acted highly unprofessionally. The court
denied her claim. The parent's attorney, F. van Veghel, considered the
judgment "a landmark decision [for false allegations of incest]. The
parents experience the judgement as a vindication, although it will
never offset the grief they have suffered." The parents had been
arrested and had spent three weeks in jail before criminal charges were
dropped. They are suing their daughter's therapist for 45,000
Euros (about $40,000 US). 1 |
| 2002-MAR-3: Netherlands: RMT: Court awards judgment against therapist:
Following the above case, a court has found the victim's therapist
responsible in part for damages to her family of origin. The therapist
has been ordered to make reparation payments of 19,000 Euros
(about $17,000 US) to the
victim's parents. The parent's lawyer, F van Veghel, called the
court's decision " a spectacular breakthrough". He believes that
this is the first judgement of this type against a psychotherapist. |
| 2002-MAR-14: VA: MPD: Jury rejects woman's MPD defense:
Janice L. Orndorff, 54, of Catharpin, VA was convicted in 2001-MAY of
second-degree murder of her husband, Goering Gustav Orndorff, 47, in
2000-MAR. The sentencing phase of the trial was delayed for almost a
year, while she underwent psychiatric treatment. Richard Loewenstein,
Paul Dale, and two other psychiatrists or psychologists testified for
the defense. They said that she has a higher than normal IQ in the range
of 110 to 120, but that she suffers from DID. She is alleged to have at
least four alternative personalities: one who speaks bad French; a
middle-aged woman who speaks with a New England accent, a 12-year old
girl, and Jacob, an older man who allegedly performed the murder. The
jury recommended a 35 year sentence. Following the verdict, she switched
into her child alter and said that she thought the courtroom was a
church and the jail was a strict school. While in the psychiatric
hospital, she studied MPD and DID in the hospital library. 2 |
| 2002-MAY-8: ON, Canada: RMT controversy at University of Western
Ontario (UWO): Dr. John Briere, a supporter of RMT, was invited by
UWO's Department of Psychiatry during 2001 to lead a seminar. Another
supporter, Bessel van der Kolk, will lead a seminar in a nearby hospital
during 2002-MAY. The head of the Department, Dr. Sandra Fisman, has
published several items which show her her belief in the accuracy of
recovered memories. But when Dr Harold Merskey, emeritus professor of
psychiatry at the university attempted to organize a one-day seminar
questioning the accuracy of recovered memories, roadblocks were placed
in his path. Dr. Fisman allegedly refused to support the conference or
give it CEU credits because it was "too controversial" and
"outside the mainstream" of psychiatric issues.
3 |
| 2002-JUN-11: SRA controversy about Jess LaVey: Jess LaVey
tells a familiar story: suffering from extreme abuse during childhood,
being groomed to become a very senior leader in a Satanic organization,
escaping from the group, converting to Evangelical Christianity, and
either writing books or going on the lecture circuit of conservative
Christian churches. The story has been repeated often. One wonders why
no POM's (Plain Ordinary Members) of Satanic organizations never seem to
leave and expose the group. Also, one wonders why none of these people
ever become liberal Christians, mainline Christians, New Agers or
Neopagans.
Jess LaVey claims to be the son of Antol LaVey, the founder of the
Church of Satan. According to Charisma News Service, his "testimony,
which he has told in churches, interviews and posted on the Internet,
includes accounts of how he suffered years of abuse by his infamous
father, who he said wanted him to become the satanists' leader, before
breaking free from the world of the occult and becoming a [conservative]
Christian." John W. Morehead of the counter-cult
group Watchman Fellowship investigated LaVey and allegedly
was unable to corroborate any of LaVey's claims. Charisma News Service
had published a story about LaVey, but later retracted it. Charisma News
editor Andy Butcher wrote: "Our initial inquiries weren't as
thorough as they should have been. In the light of the unanswered
questions, we regret having given the story further exposure."
4 |
| 2002-JUN-19: WI: Woman sues clinic over malpractice:
According to The Times of Monroe Wisconsin, Marilyn Daly and
members of her family filed a lawsuit in 1998-FEB against psychologist
Robert Beck, psychiatrist William Bell and psychiatrist Rachel Long,
formerly of the Monroe Clinic, for misdiagnosed the plaintiff as having
multiple personality disorder and for implanting false memories of
physical and sexual abuse through hypnosis, guided imagery and age
regression. The incidents are alleged to have happened in 1992 & 1993. "According
to her husband's testimony, during the two years of therapy, Marilyn
Daly recovered memories of being sexually abused by several relatives,
neighbor boys, strangers and witnessing [the body of a murdered woman]
being sexually abused." He testified that before therapy, his wife
was working as a registered nurse at Pleasant View Nursing Home, was an
active parent and kept a clean house. By the end of 1996, she was not
working, sleeping very little at night, took no interest in household
chores or parenting, was self-mutilating and suicidal. 5 |
| By 2002-JUL-24: Appointee to Catholic sex abuse review panel
criticized: The president of the U.S. Roman Catholic bishops had
appointed twelve people to a blue-ribbon review board which will monitor
church leaders as they implement the church's
new clerical sex abuse policy. Included is Paul McHugh, director of psychiatry at Johns Hopkins
University School of Medicine.
At least two supporters of
Recovered Memory Therapy (RMT) have
criticized his appointment, partly because he serves on the scientific advisory board of the False
Memory Syndrome Foundation (FMSF). McHugh has testified at
court cases about the unreliable nature of recovered memories, on behalf of
people accused of child abuse.
 | Paul Fink, professor of psychiatry at Temple University and
past president of the American Psychiatric Association, has
described false memory syndrome as "junk science." Yet
the APA that Fink once headed stated
in 1993
and later confirmed in 2000 that RMT
"memories" are unreliable, and that images recovered during RMT are often
false. Referring to
McHugh's appointment, Fink said: "People are upset by this because he's
clearly someone who wants to downplay the horror of sexual abuse."
|
| Stu Philip of Vienna, Va., was an editor for a newsletter in the 1990s
which supported victims of child sexual abuse. He was astonished the
church would put on the panel "somebody who in any way is affiliated
with an organization which says...that the vast majority of people who
make claims [of abuse] are deluded or had memories implanted by
therapists." In fact, the FMSF has continually suggested that the vast majority of people who have
been sexually abused as children retain memories of the abuse into
adulthood and must be carefully listened to. The FMSF has also taken the
same position as the APA that some memories recovered by RMT are of real
events and others are of events that never happened. They suggest that
corroboration is necessary before a recovered memory can be considered
reliable. A few of recovered "memory" cases have surfaced recently in connection with clergy
abuse. |
|
McHugh, 71, labeled such criticism of his appointment as "ridiculous," adding, "I
don't have a bias for child abusers." He said that most of the cases
involving abusive priests are not based on repressed "memories." He said: "The
church is in trouble because of things that have been corroborated over and
over again. The issues here have very little to do with false memories."
He stated that he remains very proud of his long-standing involvement with
the foundation. Frederick S. Berlin, a psychiatrist at Johns Hopkins and
founder of an affiliated sexual disorders clinic, defended his colleague.
Berlin said: "It's very unfair criticism. He's committed to making sure
the abused children are given proper care, but he's also concerned about the
horror of being falsely accused. He simply tried to suggest that people keep
their minds open." 6
| 2002-AUG-1: Conference on Family Violence includes two sessions
on ritual abuse: The 7th International Conference on Family
Violence: "Working Together to End Abuse" will be held in San Diego,
CA on 2002-SEP-25 to 28. Normally such conferences deal with actual
social evils, or at least with problems that a significant percentage of
experts feel actually exists. This one has two sessions that deal with
ritual abuse:
| Pre-conference workshop #5 is called "Childhood Ritual Abuse."
It is presented at a beginning/intermediate level. The description
reads: "Ritual abuse is the organized systematic use of children in
brutalizing ceremonial acts. Ritual abuse cases are coming into the
system through the accounts of adult survivors, in child custody
disputes, day care and isolated neighborhood cases." A
professional woman will be at the workshop who believes that she is a
survivor of ritual abuse. She will discuss the "cult
experience" and government mind control experiments on children. |
| Pre-conference workshop #20 is called "Psychotherapy with
Ritual Abuse Survivors." This is at an advanced level. It will
feature a psychologist, a marriage and family therapist and another
ritual abuse survivor. "This workshop will provide an understanding
of ritual abuse practices and dissociative responses in victims,
assessment and recognition of ritual trauma...levels of complexity of
mind control, the role of client's spiritual base in this work, and
legal caveats and considerations." |
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Editor's comment: The inclusion of sessions on
ritual abuse, mind control by government
groups and cults, and abuse-generated dissociative
identity disorder in an otherwise conventional conference seemed
strange. But then I noticed that one of the three co-sponsors of the
conference is Children's Institute International (CII) the group that
implanted memories of ritual abuse in hundreds of children at the
McMartin Preschool in the 1980s. Now, it all
makes sense.
| 2002-SEP-1: UK: Allegations of Satanic Ritual Abuse of five young
girls: A five-year-old girl has disclosed to police that
she and four other girls were ritually abused bin Fife, Scotland. Five men
are being investigated by police. Three previous allegations of ritual
abuse in the UK have been traced to lone abusive pedophiles who have no
in-depth knowledge of Satanism, but who involved their victims in Satanic
rituals in order to better control them. This case is unusual, in that
there is more than one alleged perpetrator. 7 |
| 2002-SEP-7: Judge retires early because of recovered memories:
Massachusetts Associate Justice June Miles has taken early retirement.
She left the bench because of mental illness. Her psychiatrist, Dr. David
Henderson, is reported as stating that hearing juvenile cases involving
child abuse caused repressed memories of her own abuse to emerge. He
wrote: "By having her sit on the bench every day, we are knowingly
subjecting her to further traumatic events." Her expected $50,000 a
year pension was increased to $85,000 because she was retired
involuntarily. 8 |
| 2002-OCT-17: Steven Spielberg gets restraining order from alleged
SRA survivor: Director Steven Spielberg obtained a court restraining
order against Diana Louisa Napolis who allegedly wrote in a manifesto
that Spielberg and his wife, Kate Capshaw, were part of a "satanic cult"
that met in the family basement. She allegedly believes that the cult had implanted a microchip in her brain called a "soul catcher" that
was controlling her. The judge ruled that she posed a "credible threat."
9 |
| 2002-DEC-1 (approx): Denmark: First RMT / SRA court case:
Charges were brought against a Danish couple involving incest and Satanic
Ritual Abuse. All "evidence" was based on recovered memories. Some
of the Danish media presented the story as a probable abuse case. However,
most of the coverage was critical. One TV program in particular involved
interviews with the False Memory Syndrome Foundation, Elizabeth
Loftus, and other memory specialists. This appears to have been the first
RMT case in the country. The court dismissed the charges. 10 |
| 2002-DEC: Australia: Government issues Report on
Child Sexual Assault Prosecutions. The New South Wales
Legislative Council issued a 300 page report on how incest and child
sexual assault cases are tried in their courts. Section 2.104 contained
testimony by clinical psychologist Ms Louise Samways about the creation of
false memories: "Memory is not a video of what happened. It is more
like a self-directed movie which changes over time and in the light of
changing information or beliefs. Even if repressed memories do exist [and
the body of research is overwhelmingly that they do not], they are still
memories, and therefore unreliable unless supported by strong
corroborative evidence. A person can genuinely believe their memories are
factually and historically correct even when they are totally incorrect.
Professionals treating people are often not sufficiently knowledgeable nor
trained in the nature and limitations of memory to be able to properly
help people who claim to have been sexually assaulted, e.g. anybody can
call themselves a psychotherapist, psychoanalyst, life coach or counselor.
Many medicos, psychiatrists and even psychologists are ignorant of the
nature and limitations of memory or how it can be deliberately or
unwittingly manipulated."
The report's Recommendation 11 reads: The Committee recommends
that the Minister for Health examine:
| The incidence of "repressed memories" of child sexual assault. |
| Whether the [low] level of regulation of therapists and
counsellors is adequate, and |
| The training of counsellors, in particular the possible
perpetuation of techniques that may give rise to "false memories".
11 |
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| 2002-DEC: Britain: Article about false memories and accusations:
Gisli Gudjonsson, professor of forensic psychology at the Institute of
Psychiatry in London, England is a world-class expert in false
confessions. During an interview by the Guardian newspaper (London,
England) he said: "I believe false confessions today are less of a
problem than false allegations. There is accumulating research evidence
that it is much easier for people to make up false allegations, even
serious allegations, than the courts realize...People are often too eager
to help the police. They may have an over-extended imagination. If the
police ask all the people from a certain care home, 'Were you abused?'
Even that may be sufficient for people to think, 'Maybe it happened to me
then, even though I don't remember it. I think I was abused. Yes, I must
have been abused.'...It's important that people who make allegations are
very carefully interviewed, because their evidence can easily result in a
miscarriage of justice. All interviews in serious cases should be
tape-recorded."
On the topic of recovered memories, he said: "If you look at women in
recovered memory cases, they are not highly suggestible, low-IQ people.
They tend to be from good backgrounds, reasonably bright, but they have a
capacity to produce a vivid imagination. The therapist may have some role
to play in these cases, but sometimes people go to therapists because they
believe they were abused. So, the therapist just helps them to 'remember'
what they're already predisposed to 'remember'. The courts should be very
cautious about accepting any such evidence without corroboration. The main
thing is awareness of the potential dangers of false testimony."
12 |
| 2002-DEC: USA: Theophostic Ministries announces Spring training
classes: The discredited therapeutic technique of recovered memory
therapy (RMT) has seen a rebirth in Theophostic
Ministries -- a Fundamentalist Christian organization devoted to
training Christian counselors. In their spring lineup of classes, the
Level 1 course will deal with identifying dissociation in the client,
handling demons and may discuss Dissociative
Identity Disorder (DID). Level 2 classes deal specifically with the
issues of Satanic Ritual Abuse and
Dissociative Identity Disorder. Live
demonstrations of therapy with SRA survivors will be included.
Participants may apply for permission "to bring their SRA client to
receive ministry in this study."
13 |
- "Judge does not believe incest story," Reformatorisch Dagblad,
National News section, 2002-FEB-6.
- "Jury recommends 35 years for woman diagnosed with multiple
personalities," Associated Press, 2002-MAR-13.
- Posting on a FMS mailing list, 2002-MAY.
- "Doubts over 'Satanic Heir' testimony," Charisma News
Service, at:
http://www.charismanews.com/online/
- Brian Gray, "Argyle woman sues clinic," The Times,
2002-JUN-19, and subsequent articles.
- Caryle Murphy and Sandra G. Boodman, "Psychiatrist on Catholic
Panel Criticized," The Washington Post, 2002-JUL-27, Page A02.
- Marcello Mega, "William Uni lecturer 'in Paedophile Ring." The News of
the World, 2002-SEP-1.
- "A judge's money grab," The Providence Journal-Bulletin,
Providence, RI, 2002-SEP-7, Page B-06.
- Mark Armstrong & Kwala Mandel, "Steven Spielberg Curbs Alleged Stalker
Diana Louisa Napolis, 47," People Magazine, 2002-OCT-18.
- Posting from an FMS mailing list, dated 2002-DEC-3.
- Posting from an FMS mailing list, dated 2002-DEC-16.
- Bob Woffinden, "Confessions of a forensic psychologist: Why do
people admit to crimes they never committed?,"
The Guardian (London, England) 2002-DEC-17, Page16.
- "Theophostic Ministries 2003: Satanic Ritual Abuse / Dissociated
Identity Training with Live demonstrations," news release, 2002-DEC.
Copyright © 2002 by Ontario Consultants on
Religious Tolerance
Latest update: 2002-DEC-20
Author: B.A. Robinson
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