From: WCE2@psuvm.psu.edu
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban
Subject: Satanic ritual abuse update
Date: 10 Nov 92 17:10:58 GMT
Organization: Penn State University

Two items of interest to those following the satanic ritual abuse scare:

1) According to clippings just received from Scotland, the Orkney Island SRA
inquiry report has been issued.  It characterizes everyone involved in
investigating the case as incompetent, biased, and/or careless, including
police, social workers, child care workers, and especially "experts" from the
Royal Scottish Society for the Protection of Children.

As some of us know, the Orkney case was the British equivalent of the McMartin
Preschool Affair: Social workers and police, trained with literature and videos
prepared by American satanic cult "experts," raided four homes in a predawn
raid in February 1990, removing nine children they claimed were being subjected
by their parents to satanic ritual abuse.  Despite lack of any physical or
medical evidence, the authorities insisted in isolating the children from their
parents for five weeks, claiming that parents would use secret symbols to
silence or threaten their children.  A skeptical judge threw the case out of
court on first hearing, but social workers insisted on an inquiry to justify
their methods.

Early readings of the inquiry suggested that the presiding judge, Lord Clyde,
was sympathetic to the authorities, and that the report was likely to be a
whitewash.  Parents have already insisted on a civil trial for damages before
the EC Court of Human Rights.  The strength of the criticisms therefore came as
something of a surprise, and will probably have repercussions far beyond Great
Britain in the SRA camp.

2)  Did anyone else catch "The Brotherhood of Satan" on TNT last night?  This
is a B movie (2 stars) made in 1970, and although I didn't get to watch all of
it (I did tape it) what I saw seemed *very* McMartinish.  It's about a satanic
cult in a rural Southwestern town who needs a little girl to complete its
circle of 13 children.  A couple arrives in town with a blonde-haired, blue-
eyed girl of just the right age, and the movie describes how the cult gain
mental control over her and abduct her from under her parents' eyes.

There's a visual representation of the satanic rituals, in which scenes of
something like a birthday party are intercut with graphics of child sacrifice,
disembowlment, cannibalism, and devil-worship.  It looks a *lot* like what
later emerged in _Michelle Remembers_ and later in the McMartin case, not to
mention a lot of European cases such as Oude Pekela.  Anybody know anything
about the background of this film?  How widely it was distributed?  (It did get
to NYC, for there's an ad and review in the Aug.  6 '71 New York Times.)

And, BTW, for those interested, TNT is going to show a series of Hammer Studio
satanism/vampire films on Saturday night, starting at 8 PM (right after Bugs
Bunny & Pals).  On the docket: "Taste the Blood of Dracula" (3 sex-hungry men
agree to sell their souls to the devil in return for massive libidos) and "The
Satanic Rites of Dracula" (A satanic cult prepares to destroy the world by
releasing a genetically engineered new disease [kinda like the WHO and AIDS,
no?]).  Both have Christopher Lee as the vampire; the second has Peter Cushing
as his antagonist.  Later: "Dracula, A.D. 1972" and "The Legend of the Seven
Golden Vampires."

Bill Ellis (wce2 @ psuvm.psu.edu)                 Editor, FOAFtale News
Penn State, Hazleton Campus                       Voice: 717-450-3026
Hazleton, PA 18201-1291                           Fax: 717-450-3182
"If I am the Devil's child, I will live then from the Devil.  The only right is
 what is after my constitution; the only wrong what is against it."
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban,soc.culture.african.american,sci.skeptic