The Fells Acres day care sexual abuse trial took place in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts following charges initially lodged in the mid-1980s against family members who operated a day care center, Fells Acres Day School, in Malden, Massachusetts. The facility had been opened in 1966 by Violet Amirault (1923–1997). She and her two children—son Gerald Amirault and daughter Cheryl Amirault LeFave —were tried for sexually abusing children at their facility. Gerald was tried in 1986 while his sister and mother were tried in 1987. All three were convicted and sentenced to prison. The Amiraults deny the charges, which supporters regard as a conspicuous example of day-care sex-abuse hysteria.
The Little Rascals Day Care Center was a day care in Edenton, North Carolina, where, from 1989 to 1995, there were arrests, charges and trials of seven people associated with the day care center, including the owner-operators, Bob and Betsy Kelly. In retrospect, the case reflected day care sex abuse hysteria, including allegations of satanic ritual abuse. The testimony of the children was coached.
Day-care sex-abuse hysteria was a moral panic that occurred primarily during the 1980s and early 1990s, and featured charges against day-care providers accused of committing several forms of child abuse, including Satanic ritual abuse. The collective cases are often considered a part of the Satanic panic. A 1982 case in Kern County, California, United States, first publicized the issue of day-care sexual abuse, and the issue figured prominently in news coverage for almost a decade. The Kern County case was followed by cases elsewhere in the United States, as well as Canada, New Zealand, Brazil, and various European countries.
The Federal Medical Center, Rochester is a United States federal prison in Minnesota for male inmates requiring specialized or long-term medical or mental health care. It is designated as an administrative facility, which means it holds inmates of all security classifications. It is operated by the Federal Bureau of Prisons, a division of the United States Department of Justice.
Candace Elizabeth Newmaker was a child who was killed during a 70-minute attachment therapy session performed by four unlicensed therapists, purported to treat reactive attachment disorder. The treatment, during which Newmaker was suffocated, included a rebirthing script. She was wrapped in flannel to represent a womb and told to free herself while four adults used their hands and feet to push down on Candace's small body, making it impossible for her to move or breathe. This resulted in Candace losing her life, killed in the hands of her caretakers.
Samuel B. Kent is a former United States district judge of the United States District Court for the Southern District of Texas, whose term ended in resignation in 2009 following charges of sexual abuse.
Attachment therapy is a pseudoscientific child mental health intervention intended to treat attachment disorders. It is found primarily in the United States, and much of it is centered in about a dozen clinics in Evergreen, Colorado, where Foster Cline, one of the founders, established his clinic in the 1970s.
Advocates for Children in Therapy (ACT) is a U.S. advocacy group founded by Jean Mercer and opposed to attachment therapy and related treatments. The organization opposes a number of psychotherapeutic techniques which are potentially or actually harmful to the children who undergo them. The group's mission is to provide advocacy by "raising general public awareness of the dangers and cruelty" of practices related to attachment therapy. According to the group, "ACT works to mobilize parents, professionals, private and governmental regulators, prosecutors, juries, and legislators to end the physical torture and emotional abuse that is Attachment Therapy."
Indictment: The McMartin Trial is a film made for television that originally aired on HBO on May 20, 1995. Indictment is based on the true story of the McMartin preschool trial.
Jessie Marie Davis was a murdered, near-term pregnant, 26-year-old American woman first reported missing from her home in Lake Township, Stark County, Ohio on June 15, 2007. The case drew an extraordinary response from the American media. On February 15, 2008, Bobby Lee Cutts Jr., a police officer and the father of her 2-year-old son and unborn daughter, was convicted of the aggravated murders of Davis and their unborn child. He was sentenced to life in prison without parole for 57 years on February 27, 2008. A high-school friend of Cutts, Myisha Lynne Ferrell, was also later charged.
The Bad Newz Kennels dog fighting investigation began in April 2007 with a search of property in Surry County, Virginia, owned by Michael Vick, who was at the time quarterback for the Atlanta Falcons football team, and the subsequent discovery of evidence of a dog fighting ring. Over seventy dogs, mostly pit bull terriers, with some said to be showing signs of injuries, were seized, along with physical evidence during several searches of Vick's 15-acre (61,000 m2) property by local, state and federal authorities.
Lance Timothy Mason is a convicted murderer and former politician, government official, and judge, who served in various offices in and representing Cleveland, Ohio.
The sexual abuse scandal in the Catholic Archdiocese of Philadelphia, in Pennsylvania, U.S., is a significant episode in the series of Catholic sex abuse cases in the United States, Ireland and elsewhere. The Philadelphia abuses were substantially revealed through a grand jury investigation in 2005. In early 2011, a new grand jury reported extensive new charges of abusive priests active in the archdiocese. In 2012, a guilty plea by priest Edward Avery and the related trial and conviction of William Lynn and mistrial on charges against James J. Brennan followed from the grand jury's investigations. In 2013, Charles Engelhardt and teacher Bernard Shero were tried, convicted and sentenced to prison. Lynn was the first official to be convicted in the United States of covering up abuses by other priests in his charge and other senior church officials have been extensively criticized for their management of the issue in the archdiocese.
The murders of Byrd and Melanie Billings occurred on or about July 9, 2009, in Pensacola, Florida, United States. Byrd Billings, 66, and his wife, Melanie, 43, were found shot to death on July 9, 2009. The suspects, dressed in "ninja garb," stole a safe and other items during the break-in at the sprawling Billings home west of Pensacola. Nine of their children were home at the time, but were not hurt by the intruders. The family's attorney said that the safe contained jewelry, family papers, and prescription medications.
W. Carlton Weddington is a former member of the Ohio House of Representatives for the 27th District. He resigned his Ohio House seat after his indictment on bribery and ethics charges in March 2012, the first sitting state legislator in Ohio indicted for bribery in 100 years. Weddington was convicted of the charges and sentenced in June 2012 to three years in prison.
Anthony Edward Sowell was an American serial killer and rapist known as The Cleveland Strangler or The Imperial Avenue Murderer. He was convicted in 2011 of murdering 11 women whose bodies were discovered at his Cleveland, Ohio, home in 2009. After being sentenced to death for the murders, Sowell died in prison from a terminal illness.
The murders of Calyx and Beau Schenecker occurred on January 27, 2011; 16-year-old Calyx and 13-year-old Beau Schenecker were found dead by police at their home in Tampa, Florida. Their mother, Julie Powers Schenecker, was arrested on suspicion of their murder after a confession.
On the morning of February 27, 2012, six students were shot at Chardon High School in Chardon, Ohio, resulting in the deaths of three of them. Witnesses said that the shooter had a personal rivalry with one of his victims. Two other wounded students were also hospitalized, one of whom sustained several serious injuries that have resulted in permanent paralysis. The fifth student suffered a minor injury, and the sixth a superficial wound.
Between 2002 and 2004, Ariel Castro abducted Michelle Knight, Amanda Berry, and Gina DeJesus from the streets of Cleveland, Ohio and later held them captive in his home of 2207 Seymour Avenue in the city's Tremont neighborhood. All three young women were imprisoned at Castro's home until 2013, when Berry successfully escaped with her six-year-old daughter, to whom she had given birth while captive, and contacted the police. Police rescued Knight and DeJesus, and arrested Castro hours later.
Robert Walter Jones was a Cleveland, Ohio lawyer, politician, law professor, civil rights litigator and environmentalist. As an attorney, he was employed in public capacities in Northeastern Ohio as a Legal Aid Public Defender, United States Attorney, and City of Cleveland attorney. In response to the Cuyahoga River fire, as U.S. Attorney in 1970 he led the first Federal grand jury water pollution investigations and prosecutions setting into motion the recovery of the Cuyahoga River and Lake Erie and the development of the Clean Water Act.
