Previous News Items from 2004
Letter by Madeline Greenhalgh in response
to "War Trauma and Telepathy"
Powers must be evidence-based
I was disappointed to read your article on the subject of
psychic powers. A local newspaper has a responsibility towards its readers.
On the surface, it may appear to be a 'bit of fun' to describe alleged
psychic powers, but what if someone is drawn in to the point of taking
the myths and the beliefs seriously?
Can it do any harm? Yes, it can. The British False Memory Society is
a testament to that fact.
Unsound, unscientific therapeutic practice can cause a vulnerable person
to believe in events which are not true, ultimately leading to a breakdown
in mental health and destruction of families.
This doesn't happen easily, but prepare the ground with unsound theory,
a confidence level lacking any scientific credibility, bring in a vulnerable
candidate and you have the ingredients for a severe health warning. In
these circumstances it is a case of caveat emptor.
The Chronicle is not given to articles offering fascinating but potentially
dangerous products, so neither should it take lightly its responsibility
to ensure that it encourages only evidence-based therapeutic practice.
***
War Trauma and Telepathy - The Bath Chronicle,
19 October 2004
Catherine used to meet up with a friend on a regular basis, but after
a while she became aware of a severe look in her friend's eyes - as if
she were looking down the barrel of a gun and Catherine felt the terror
of being at the receiving end. It turned out that her friend's father
had shot an Italian face-to- face during the Second World War. The Italian
had a picture of his wife and children in his pocket and the father never
dealt with the guilt and depression that followed, nor did he ever tell
his daughter.
Catherine said: "She must have absorbed that as a child. I became
very interested in telepathy. How did this information get from him to
her and then to me."
Now she is researching war trauma and how the mind shuts down on events
but the information gets transferred to loved ones.
She is also working as a psychotherapist in a drug and alcohol treatment
centre.
"A lot of drug-addicted young people have grown up in households
where their fathers have been in war and have come back unable to talk
about experiences," Catherine said. "Somehow the trauma gets
transferred to the children, who then grow up and spiral into drug addiction."
*****
Letter by Dr Alan Ward in response
to "Consequences of childhood trauma" by Dr Helen Kennerley
Dear Editor
It is important to stress that Dr Kennerley's piece has
a predominantly unilateral perspective. What can be presented as a bona
fida 'expression of memory' may sometimes, for a variety of reasons,
not depict actual events. In maintaining a non-judgemental stance the
clinician should be mindful of any underlying issues/agendas relevant
to the presenting patient. Additionally the nature and manner of accessing
those 'memories' should be ascertained. Expressed memory may be unintentionally
or sometimes intentionally 'altered' from reality consequent of both
intrinsic (e.g. family conflict) and extrinsic (e.g. inappropriate counselling)
factors.
Doctors naturally assume that their patients tell them
the absolute truth. It should however be noted that the false allegation
of child abuse is sometimes used as a powerful and destructive weapon
commonly with awful outcomes. (1)
Arguably even more disastrous outcomes are consequent
of clinicians believing allegations that are in fact false than disbelieving
truthful ones. It is absolutely crucial for the welfare of the patient
themselves, their family and any 'outside' alleged abuser (and their
family) to get things right.
Yours sincerely,
Alan G Ward
Dr Helen Kennerley responds -
I agree, and have stated in the article, that memory can be distorted
and that recollection of the past should be elicited with caution. This
brief article was intended to focus on the needs of survivors and that
is why it might appear 'unilateral' in its perspective.
Nonetheless, I wholly support the point that disclosure
of abuse can sometimes reflect false allegation.
Unpublished letter by Mark Pendergrast
in response to "Consequences of childhood trauma"
Dear Bronagh Miskelly, Editor of GP:
Helen Kennerley's article on 1 October 2004, "Consequences
of Childhood Trauma," is misguided, misinformed, and dangerous.
It is the sort of article I would have expected to see ten years ago,
but not today. She implies that she believes in the theory of massive
repression or dissociation -- i.e., that people can completely forget
years of childhood abuse. In fact, as I wrote in my book, Victims of
Memory, people usually recall prolonged trauma all too well. Dr. Kennerley
provides a stereotypical, broad laundry list of supposed "symptoms"
of abuse, including anxiety, eating disorders, intractable pain, body
image disturbance, anger, depression, low self-esteem, and interpersonal
problems. Most people have suffered from one of those items at one time
or another, and there is no reputable scientific evidence that they
are caused by child abuse. Worse, Kennerley appears to caution against
"disbelief or rejection," even if the so-called "memories"
are demonstrably false or change in content over time. GP readers --
all 40,000 of them -- need to be warned that the advice in this article
is flawed. Certainly, physicians should bear in mind that childhood
trauma can be damaging, and they should not dismiss anyone's always-recalled
abuse experiences. But the idea that certain symptoms always stem from
abuse, and that abuse is often "repressed" or "dissociated,"
has been widely debunked.
Yours,
Mark Pendergrast
Unpublished letter by Madeline Greenhalgh
in response to "Consequences of childhood trauma"
Dear Editor,
In her article, 1st October 2004, Dr Helen Kennerley is
right to suggest that as GPs may be the first to hear an adult's disclosure
of an abusive childhood that this is a critical stage for management
of the case.
I agree, but not because Dr Kennerley is concerned about
perceived disbelief and rejection but because the very opposite response
of affirmation may be provided without foundation. This is not to deny
the right help for genuine cases but to highlight the importance of
taking a collateral history before assumptions are made and a patient
committed to a course of action which could worsen their prognosis and
the lives of other people involved.
False accusations of childhood sexual abuse can and do
happen; the BFMS has heard from over 2,000 families as well as many
retractors who have described how this problem has wreaked havoc in
their lives. Dr Kennerley acknowledges that 'false memories' are not
unusual but she is misleading to suggest that basically the memory is
accurate. A 'false memory' is not a 'memory' at all; if the incident
did not happen then there cannot be a real memory of it. Sadly, it is
possible for a vulnerable person to come to believe a whole narrative
that has no basis in fact. It can happen if the person believes in the
concept of repression and the account is told and re-told, embellished
and empathised with, it will become embedded and believed, accompanied
by a good deal of pain and suffering. Careful assessment of the situation
at the start is crucial to ensuring the best prognosis for everyone.
Yours,
Madeline Greenhalgh
***
Consequences of childhood trauma
- GP Clinical, 1 October 2004
In the first of a series on emotional problems, Dr Helen
Kennerley discusses trauma in childhood.
GPs need to be aware of the consequences of childhood
trauma in adults. Its sequelae can manifest as psychological and/or
physical problems.
It is prevalent enough for the average GP to be likely
to be consulted by someone with a history of abuse pertinent to her
or his problem.
Primary care is often the first port of call for the sufferer
and the GP is the first person to hear about the problem. Management
at this stage can be critical: perceived disbelief or rejection significantly
worsens the patient's prognosis.
Defining abuse
It is accepted that emotional, physical and sexual abuse
of a minor can traumatise that child. For example, emotional abuse can
be as pernicious as physical and/or sexual abuse, and the closer the
familial relationship, the worse the prognosis. Prognosis worsens with
increased episodes of abuse, more brutal abuse, a greater number of
perpetrators, the absence of carers and poor problem-solving skills.
In psychological terms, the consequences of the childhood
abuse depend on the child's interpretation of events.
A secure child might deal with abuse, knowing that he
or she was not to blame. Another, insecure child might respond to the
same situation with shame and guilt, drawing extremely damaging conclusions
about themselves or others, such as: 'I am worthless' or 'Others are
untrustworthy'. Thus, objective severity of abuse can be misleading.
Spotting childhood trauma
There is no true 'childhood trauma syndrome'. What research
over the past 25 years has shown is that survivors can present with
a diverse range of psychological and/or physical problems linked with
childhood trauma.
Examples include anxiety disorders, eating disorders,
intractable pain, body image disturbance and anger problems. However,
depression and low self-esteem are particularly common, as are dissociative
experiences and interpersonal problems.
The most common spontaneous dissociative experiences are
flashbacks of the abuse. Traumatic flashbacks are intense and usually
emotionally loaded recollections of an adverse event or events. Often
the patient is disoriented in time and perceives the memory as if the
event were happening. Many are terrified by the experience which can
leave them feeling re-traumatised.
Flashbacks, like all memories, are vulnerable to distortion
and, over time, can change in content. This does not invalidate the
experience.
'False' memory is not unusual. Our general memories are
reliable but our recollection of detail is not, and memories can be
created in some through suggestion and repetition.
Implications for the GP
Any child in an abusive relationship is likely to develop
interpersonal beliefs such as:' I can't trust others', or 'I am despised',
which will impede healthy relationships. This is perhaps why childhood
trauma is over-represented in those with a diagnosis of personality
disorder and why many survivors remain in dysfunctional relationships.
Commonly, but not invariably, shame pervades the thoughts of the survivor,
which can inhibit them from seeking help.
Be open minded - accept that patients with any presentation
could have a relevant history of abuse. Adopt a non-judgmental stance.
Do not assume a patient's needs on the basis of an objective appraisal
of her or his experiences - what the abuse meant is what matters. Be
prepared for difficulties in your relationship with your client.
Dr Kennerley is a consultant clinical psychologist at
the Oxford Cognitive Therapy Centre, Oxford
Next week: overcoming bulimia nervosa
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London.
*****
Letter by Madeline Greenhalgh
in response to "Do not fear the paediatrician" by Professor
Sir Alan Craft
Prejudice over child assaults harms all - The Daily Telegraph,
6 September 2004
SIR - Prof Sir Alan Craft (Letters, Sept 3) is clearly unaware that there
is a climate of fear among professionals dealing with child protection
matters which breeds an irrational urge to believe that child abuse exists
even when credible evidence is missing. No one is denying the need for
a watchful remit, but hasn't this gone too far?
We know from our case-load that little or no time is given by practitioners
to taking an individual's history; rather, there may be some previous
medical note that is read and accepted without question, leading to an
enormous leap into the dark. Or, as one adult reports being told by a
consultant psychiatrist: "I knew that you were sexually abused in
your childhood because you would not make eye contact with me when we
first met." This level of diagnosis is on a par with the claims made
against Sally Clarke's husband following the viewing of a television programme.
People are being accused of serious criminal offences and having their
lives and those of their families ruined on the basis of flawed, unprofessional
and sometimes frankly malicious accusations made by consultant clinicians
who not only have a duty to prevent harm but also to do no harm.
Madeline Greenhalgh, British False Memory Society, Bradford-on-Avon
***
Do not fear the paediatrician - The
Daily Telegraph, 3 September 2004
Sir - There is abundant and undisputed evidence that any
parent can harm a child (Health, Aug 31). I am surprised that Dr James
Le Fanu has not come across this. The NSPCC has just issued a report saying
that child abuse deaths are going unrecognised.
Dr Le Fanu implies that, as a college, we are complacent on behalf of
our members. Far from it. Next week we publish a report, jointly with
the Royal College of Pathologists and chaired by Baroness Kennedy, which
gives clear guidance on how infant deaths should be investigated. When
the protocol is implemented, it will minimise the risks of miscarriages
of justice.
No paediatrician makes an accusation of child abuse lightly and, when
he does, it is within a system designed to do what is right for children
and their families. Paediatricians do not make unilateral decisions: they
are well aware that Le Fanu's "Tracey and Johnny" are far more
likely to have injured themselves falling downstairs than that they have
been deliberately harmed.
Parents need not fear that a paediatrician's reaction to an injury will
be suspicion of deliberate harm. Most of us are parents ourselves and
all of us have spent our professional lives working in this complex area.
From:
Prof Sir Alan Craft, President, Royal College of Paediatrics and Child
Health, London W1
*****
Father fails in bid to sue over sex
abuse lies - The Daily Mail, 9 July 2004
A father accused of sexually abusing his daughter on the strength of
her ' recovered memories' during psychotherapy has failed in his bid to
sue a local health authority.
A judge yesterday threw out a claim by Jim Fairlie, a former deputy leader
of the Scottish National Party, seeking Pounds 250,000 compensation from
Perth and Kinross Healthcare NHS Trust.
The claim was rejected on a legal technicality, even though Mr Fairlie
stressed that his daughter Katrina had withdrawn the allegations months
after making them.
She was admitted to Perth Royal Infirmary in 1994, when she was 25, suffering
from severe abdominal pains. Despite a number of treatments, her symptoms
continued and she was taken to a psychiatric unit at Murray Royal Hospital
in Perth.
Mr Fairlie, 63, of Crieff, Perthshire, claimed that while a patient of
consultant psychiatrist Dr Alex Yellowlees his daughter underwent Recovered
Memory Therapy (RMT).
After RMT, she alleged that her father and others had sexually abused
her.
Mr Fairlie maintained Dr Yellowlees accepted the claims without making
any attempt to verify them as a psychiatrist exercising proper skill and
care should have done.
He said the doctor knew that, at the time Katrina was making the allegations,
she was in a very disturbed mental state and taking powerful medication.
Mr Fairlie said his previously unblemished reputation-and close and loving
relationship with his family had been damaged when Dr Yellowlees told
other members of the family abuse had occurred.
He said he suffered 'upset, distress, shock and anger' when confronted
with the false allegations.
The claim against the local health authority was based on Mr Fairlie's
contention that the psychiatrist had a duty to act with reasonable care
to avoid harm resulting from the psychiatric treatment of patients.
He said Dr Yellowlees should have assessed the likely truth of any allegations
resulting from RMT, instead of relying solely on interpretation of nightmares
and flashbacks recounted by Katrina during her treatment.
The health authority, which contested liability, disputed that she had
undergone RMT and argued that the psychiatrist could not be said to owe
a duty of care to Mr Fairlie.
The authority claimed that, in general, a doctor could only be said to
owe such a duty to his or her patient.
James Peoples, QC, on behalf of Mr Fairlie, told a Court of Session hearing
in Edinburgh yesterday that false claims of abuse were highly damaging
and had been recognised as such in a number of legal cases.
But the judge, Lord Kingarth, said in his ruling: 'There is nothing in
my view clearly to indicate circumstances in which it could be said that
Dr Yellowlees came at any stage into a special relationship with Mr Fairlie
such that he owed a duty to him as well as to Katrina.
'It goes without saying that if, as Mr Fairlie claims, the psychiatrist
made the diagnosis which it is said he did, and it was one reached carelessly
and without proper investigation, his concern to seek redress is wholly
understandable.
' I am nevertheless required to decide this case within the boundaries
of the law as it has recently developed.' After the hearing, Mr Fairlie
said: 'This reinforces my intention to petition the parliament on the
whole question of duty of care to third parties for local authority psychiatrists,
health trusts and so on.
'As the law stands, these people can do enormous damage to families and
third parties, but are not answerable in law.'
*****
It was like a witch hunt - The
Guardian, 16 July 2004
by Rosie Waterhouse
In October last year the remote Scottish island of Lewis was torn apart
by allegations of ritual child abuse. But two weeks ago, the case against
the accused suddenly collapsed, just as similar actions in the Orkneys
and Nottingham did before them. It was another case of 'Satanic panic',
but as Rosie Waterhouse finds out, the community remains divided It was
pitch black outside, misty and bitterly cold, when Ian Campbell rose at
6am on October 3 2003 to get ready for work on a fish farm on the remote
island of Lewis in the outer Hebrides. As his wife and five children slept,
he made a cup of coffee and sat down in the kitchen of their cottage on
the edge of the peat moors of Ness, north of Lewis, when there was a knock
at the door.
"There was a plain-clothes officer standing there who identified
himself as being the police," Campbell recalls. "Suddenly there
were police everywhere. They said, 'We've got a warrant to search your
house.' They said something about child abuse."
Shocked and confused, Campbell went to wake his wife, Penny, asleep on
the sofabed in the lounge. In the chaos that ensued, plain-clothes and
uniformed officers and social workers from Western Isles council seemed
to fill up every room in the cramped, two-bedroom home, a converted traditional
stone "black house" dating from 1840.
Campbell, 39, was handcuffed and driven off in an unmarked car. Penny,
32, was asked if she wanted to help dress the children, aged between eight
months and 11 years, then she too was taken away - leaving her children
behind - to be questioned at Stornoway police station, 28 miles away.
The couple were interviewed separately - Ian for more than four hours,
Penny for three. The allegations they both faced were devastating - child
sexual abuse involving three young girls on the island.
The Campbells were among 11 people arrested that October morning in dawn
raids on homes on Lewis, Leicestershire, West Yorkshire and Dorset. Three
people, including Penny, were released without charge later that day.
Eight others, including Ian, and a 75-year-old grandmother, were charged
with sexual offences against children over a period of six years between
1995 and 2001.
The charges were said to involve three girls under 16 who had been in
the care of the Western Isles social services department. It is understood
that the investigation began after one of the girls said something to
a carer that caused her concern. This was relayed to a social worker and,
over several months, allegations of abuse followed.
The arrests, in what police code-named Operation Haven, soon made headlines
on local and national radio, television and newspapers. The more lurid
referred to a "child sex abuse network" and a suspected "paedophile
ring".
All eight accused denied the charges and a trial was expected soon after.
But two weeks ago, on Friday July 2, the case suddenly collapsed. In a
statement, Northern Constabulary said the Scottish Crown Office had instructed
that no proceedings would be taken. The Crown Office confirmed that all
charges had been dropped. No explanation was given.
The next day, determined to clear her husband's name, Penny Campbell
wrote a long and impassioned statement which she emailed to the press.
In it she revealed publicly, for the first time, the bizarre nature of
the allegations that Ian and the others had faced - Satanic ritual child
abuse.
Transcripts of police interviews, seen by the Guardian, reveal that those
charged were accused of being devil worshippers, of raping and sexually
abusing children in black magic rituals and wife-swapping orgies during
which they dressed in ceremonial robes and masks, sacrificed animals and
drank their blood.
The charges were redolent of similar cases in Orkney, Rochdale and Nottingham
- among many others that occurred in the early 1990s - all of which were
dismissed due to lack of evidence. The so-called Satanic abuse was exposed
as a myth; how could this happen again?
Research into a series of similar ritual abuse investigations in Britain,
conducted by Professor Jean la Fontaine and published by the Department
of Health in 1994, concluded that although there might have been sexual
abuse of children in some of the cases, there was no forensic evidence
that Satanic ritual abuse existed.
Further investigations revealed the "Satanic panic" had originated
in the United States and been spread there and here by evangelical born-again
Christians, and police, social workers and therapists who attended conferences
and seminars on this apparently newly discovered and most depraved form
of child abuse.
Last Tuesday (July 13) Western Isles council announced it would be conducting
a review of events on Lewis and invited the Social Work Services Inspectorate
to analyse their involvement. The inquiry is expected to examine methods
used by social workers to conduct "disclosure interviews" and
therapy sessions with the children whose allegations led to the charges
of sexual abuse. The review will start immediately.
It is also expected to investigate how the allegations of "Satanic
ritual abuse" first arose and how they developed. An earlier statement
from the council, after the charges were dropped, said its employees were
to be "commended for their professionalism and commitment in difficult
and complex circumstances."
The Guardian has interviewed three of the accused men who remain on Lewis,
and also members of their families who were originally suspected of being
perpetrators, to piece together accounts of their nine-month ordeal. We
also talked to local people in a community that has been shattered by
allegations that there was a paedophile ring in their midst.
Peter Nelson, 59, and his daughter Mary-Anne, 37, had also been asleep
at their home in Lochs, on the west of Lewis, when they were woken by
their dogs barking and the police banging on the door. It was the same
routine as with the Campbells - a search warrant was produced and they
were invited to the station.
"When they raided this house I don't think the detectives realised
I am disabled," Nelson says. "I have spinal injuries and my
daughter is my carer. But one of them asked me: 'Is it an unnatural relationship
with your daughter? Do you share the same bed?' The next thing he said
I was being accused of the rape of three children. And my daughter was
being accused as well."
John and Susan Sellwood, were also arrested that cold morning and driven
in two cars to Stornoway police station, bewildered and afraid.
"They treated me as guilty from the start," says John. "In
the car on the way to the police station they accused me of rape and said
they had got me on a video so there was no point me denying it. They said
there were others involved so it would be better if I got it off my chest,
because if I stayed quiet and the others spilled the beans I would be
made to look worse. I didn't know what they were talking about."
Susan Sellwood was interviewed for almost six hours by two male officers
in plain clothes. "I was crying and hysterical for most of the interview,"
she says. "I suffer from panic attacks. At one point I thought I
was going to be physically sick. They stuck my head out of the window
and told me to get some fresh air.
"I was accused of having relationships, orgies, with all the men.
I was accused of holding the girls down while the men performed. I was
accused of joining in with a vibrator. They asked what I knew about the
occult and the sacrifice of animals. I was just totally hysterical by
this time."
The Campbells, the Sellwoods and the Nelsons were interviewed simultaneously
at Stornoway that morning. The Campbells were quizzed for longer and in
more depth about the Satanic elements and their interest in the occult.
The Campbells are Pagans. They made no secret of their religion when they
moved to the island in 1997. New Agers flock to Lewis at significant times
such as the midsummer solstice because of the famous standing stones of
Callanish, monoliths considered second only to Stonehenge as a mystical
tourist attraction.
"As soon as I said I was a Pagan I knew I was sunk," says Ian.
"The police officers interviewing me didn't know what a Pagan was.
They equated being a Pagan with being a Satanist and a devil worshipper.
They had taken away two books on Paganism from my house and saw them as
evidence of Satanism. We also had a bible and a book on Jehovah's witnesses
but they didn't take those.
"When they raided the house again last February - after Penny started
writing letters of complaint to the police - they took away some of her
clothes including a purple velvet hooded top, a full-length blue and gold
Kaftan and a mauve and black lace tunic, which belonged to one of my daughters.
They obviously thought Penny was a witch."
There has been no explanation from the police or the Crown Office as
to why the charges were suddenly dropped. The Crown Office statement merely
said: "We can say that all the available evidence was carefully examined
before this decision was taken."
Last week, in the local pub and social club in Ness, where most of the
accused had lived at some time, feelings were still running high. At the
bar, a table of women on a girls' night out were shocked the charges had
been dropped. "There must have been something in it; the police must
have had evidence to make arrests," insists one, the mother of two
small children.
All eight accused had moved from England to Lewis at some stage, for
a better, simpler life, and if there was one consolation for the community
it was that at least they were not islanders. A well-known local figure,
who agreed to be called Angus, who seems to know everyone in Ness, believes
the majority want those accused who remain to leave.
"These charges of paedophilia and child sex rings have brought the
island into disrepute," he says. When asked what he thought about
the revelation that the allegations included Satanic rituals he says:
"I don't believe in that rubbish myself. But we all knew the Campbells
were white witches. We all heard this was what the neighbours were saying
before they moved to this part of Lewis."
In the nine months that followed the accusations, the effects on the
accused have been traumatic. Those in Lewis were subjected to vigilante
attacks, personal abuse and have been ostracised by many in the community.
Campbell, Nelson and Sellwood have all had the word "paedo"
daubed in paint on the walls, and in Sellwood's case on the main road,
outside their homes. While Nelson was in prison, the garden that he and
his daughter had cultivated over seven years was raided and wrecked. He
was so fearful for their safety, that he installed CCTV cameras, which
transmit views from around his house and garden onto a massive TV screen
in his lounge.
Last March, when he hit his lowest point, Nelson attempted suicide by
taking an overdose. "The stress of everything, the hatred that was
being shown to us, the damaging of the property and our garden we had
worked so hard to create; it was like living in a nightmare," he
admits.
Mary-Anne found him unconscious on the sofa and he recovered after four
days in hospital. Nelson's mental state is still fragile, and he breaks
down often at the memory of recent events, but he is stubbornly defiant
and determined to stay on Lewis. "I will probably become a hermit,"
he says, "and just potter around my garden. But they will not drive
me out."
The Sellwoods and the Campbells are not so confident. After mulling over
their future in recent days, both couples have decided they will probably
leave the island to begin a new life. For Ian Campbell, his world has
been turned upside down.
"The way we were as a family has changed," he says. "I
find it hard to be close to the kids like I used to be. I can't hug them
like I used to. Even now I worry that holding my daughter's hand in the
street is going to be interpreted as something different.
"To be called a paedophile, it's like a sickness inside. I have
lost control of my life and I have become very angry. I was also very
frightened. When the police were interviewing me about devil worshipping,
animal sacrifice and the Satanic stuff, they just believed it was true.
It was like a 17th-century witch hunt. If this had happened then, Penny
and I would have been burned at the stake."
*****
I've never done anything, I swear -
Sunday Herald, 11 July 2004
by Neil Mackay
How easy is it to maintainand believe in one's innocence of terrible
crimes when the police appear to know better? Not easy at all, finds Investigations
Editor Neil Mackay from the transcript of the gruelling interrogation
of Lewis child abuse accused Ian Campbell
ALMOST six hours after the arrest, the interrogation ended with a broken
man called Ian Campbell howling his innocence in the face of horrifying
accusations that he took part in the ritualistic sexual abuse of children.
Campbell was one of eight arrested and accused of sexual assaults against
young girls on Lewis. Police believed that a horrific, satanic paedophile
ring was operating in the Western Isles.
All charges against the eight were dropped on July 2, yet, according
to the transcripts of his police interrogation - which have been passed
to the Sunday Herald - there is medical evidence that proves that the
children in what we must, for legal reasons, call family X, were sexually
abused.
Those children are still in the care of Western Isles Council social
workers and are considered ''vulnerable''. Nobody - at the moment - is
facing any charges relating to their sexual abuse.
The transcripts reveal just how devastating it is for an innocent man
to be accused of some of the most dreadful crimes imaginable.
By the end, Campbell is effectively broken, having faced four-and-a-half
hours of questioning during which he was told that his wife Penny had
told police he had had ''physical contact'' with the X children. In fact,
all Penny Campbell told the police was that her husband might have allowed
one of the children to sit on his knee at a birthday party some five years
previously. Under questioning, Campbell retreats into repeating a mantra
of denial.
Officer: There's no coincidence in the fact that your wife Campbell:
I've never touched any child, I have never touched any child, I have never
touched any child Officer: is coming out with conflicting Campbell: I
have never touched any child, I have never touched any child, I have never
touched any child ...
Officer: Will you be quiet? Campbell: I have never touched any child,
I have never touched any child, I have never touched any child, so don't
accuse me of doing it.
Officer: your wife is coming out with an account which is conflicting
with yours
Campbell: I have never touched any child, I have never touched any child,
I have never touched any child, I have never touched any child, I have
never touched any child.
Officer: I think you have.
Campbell: I have never touched any child, I have never touched any child.
Officer: There is no coincidence in the fact that there is medical evidence
to prove that these children have been sexually abused to a serious extent.
Campbell: But how, I don't understand why, how we have been implicated
in this, I mean, I don't know.
Officer: I do. I know why you have been implicated in this, because it's
true. Campbell's interrogation began at 8.08am on October 3, 2003, an
hour-and-a-half after he was arrested. Early signs of strain are shown
when he finds it impossible to remember the make of his car. When he is
asked if he knows members of the X family, he says the surname ''rings
a bell'', but adds: ''No, I don't actually know them personally.'' But
later he reveals that Mr X had helped him move to the island, and that
his family had met with the X family a few times shortly after their arrival.
Campbell tells police he had forgotten about his brief relationship with
the X family, adding: ''I mean, bear in mind I haven't seen them for bloody
ages anyway.'' The police ask how he could forget knowing someone who
helped him move home.
Campbell tells the police that his family didn't continue with the friendship
because they had heard rumours that ''they had their kids taken away ...
that one of the kids was taken away from them because he was playing or
interfering or doing something''. Campbell insists he had had no ''physical
contact'' with the X children.
The questioning then moves to Campbell's wife, Penny. He's asked if she's
violent, ''over sexual'' or if they have ''been involved in wife swapping''.
Campbell is interrogated over his own sexuality; asked whom he is ''sexually
active with''; what type of people he is ''sexually attracted to''; and
if he is ''attracted to children''. Campbell is also asked if he has paid
for sex.
Next he is questioned about his ''religious beliefs''. He declines to
answer,
saying: ''I wish to remain anonymous on my beliefs because at the moment
I'm not sure what I actually believe in.'' The police then ask Campbell:
''Do you have any interest in the occult?'' He says he's curious about
it. The police ask: ''Have you any knowledge of the use of statues in
practising in the occult? What about the ritualistic killing of animals?''
Next Campbell is questioned about ''ritualistic dress'' and his own mental
health.
Campbell later says he has ''one or two'' books on paganism, but becomes
annoyed at police attempts to link that with devil worship. It appears
as if the police are either confused about what paganism is or are deliberately
trying to appear ignorant. Police detectives say one of the books was
about ''how to bring up your children in witchcraft''. ''You have got
to open your mind here a little bit,'' Campbell tells officers.
Police later say: ''We have information that you raped and sexually abused
[one of the X children]. What would you like to say in response to this?''
''I think it's bloody nonsense,'' says Campbell, ''and whoever made the
allegation should be investigated themselves.'' He denies knowing the
name of the child. The police then tell him they have information that
he raped and sexually abused two other female children from family X.
Campbell says: ''It is totally ridiculous ... oh God, f***ing nightmare,
go on.'' He is asked: ''Have you ever so much as touched them on the shoulder,
patted their head, had them sat on your lap?'' Campbell says he may have
patted them on the head but denies that the children sat on his lap, saying:
''The last time I seen 'em was years and years ago, how in the hell am
I going to remember? I mean, you ought to wise up a bit you know.'' AS
the interview becomes increasingly surreal, the police bewilder Campbell
by asking if he has ever had the nick-name ''Tommy''; they tell him the
information against him ''has been gathered through interviews of the
children''.
Campbell: Right let's prove it. I mean this is, this is bloody ridiculous.
Officer: Our information is that you, a man known as Tommy Campbell:
No, I have never been called Tommy, I am not called Tommy Officer: Who
was married to a woman named Penny, and who moved to Lewis abused these
children Campbell: No, no, that's f***ing, no, untrue.
Officer: The information is that you would rape the girls within the
front room of the house.
Campbell: No.
Officer: Do you deny it?
Campbell: Course I deny it. Campbell demands to have a solicitor present,
but the police refuse.
Chaos breaks out when Campbell objects to a question about his wife and
switches off the tape recorder. A female officer intervenes to calm the
situation and Campbell agrees to stop ''shouting and swearing and turning
the tape off''.
The police go on to say that the mother of the X children is also ''telling
us that this happened''. The allegations then become more distressing,
with officers recounting how the children cried as they were undressed
and raped. Campbell is asked if the X children's father had done ''this
sort of thing to these children''. He is then told by the police that
they ''have information that you were involved in devil-worshipping ceremonies''.
They also ask him if he owns a ''white gown'' or a ''ceremonial mask''.
Campbell is asked if he has taken part in ''any form of dancing'' during
ceremonies, or if he dressed his children in gowns and masks. ''There
is a lot of information you've got there,'' says Campbell, ''which ain't
bloody true.'' He's told that Penny took part in these ceremonies with
him, that ''Indian music'' was played, that chanting took place, that
the event was recorded. Campbell is then asked if he has watched snuff
movies, with the officer saying the videos showed ''serious sexual abuse
people being killed and I'm not talking acting here as I say, the information
we have is that this has happened and that some of it has been videoed
either by yourself or others''. Campbell again denies everything.
A later part of the interview becomes a litany of bizarre allegations
put to Campbell. To each question he simply replies ''no''. He's told
by police that he and Mr X sacrificed chickens, rams and lambs with hammers
and knives as part of ceremonies, and that they ''abused dogs''. Campbell
is asked if he has ''ever drunk the blood of a chicken''.
Police then drop a bombshell on him, saying that his wife has contradicted
his claims that he had no ''physical contact'' with any of the X children.
In a letter to the Sunday Herald later, Penny said: ''I recalled at the
birthday party one of the girls sat on Ian's lap. He didn't like this
and stood up. That is the extent of the 'physical contact'. You cannot
tell me that two people will recall the same event in exactly the same
way, especially after six years. Ian doesn't recall the girl sitting on
his lap.'' Shaken, Campbell tells the police: ''I wouldn't hurt a kid,
I would not, could not do that.'' He is told there was ''no collusion''
between the children, and that ''this child isn't with her parents any
more, so there has been no collusion here''.
They then hit a clearly broken Campbell with a barrage of questions and
allegations. ''Is it any coincidence that some of the evidence that's
come out here has been about ritualistic abuse and the fact that we find
a book related to witchcraft in your house?'' Campbell can only reiterate:
''That's, that's paganism, that's got nothing to do with '' At this point
he starts repeating ''I have never touched a child'' some 30 times. Accused
again of raping the X children, he says: ''I have never done anything
like that, I swear.'' The officer replies: ''You can swear all you want
for me.'' Campbell says: ''I've got nothing to be ashamed of, I've not
touched anybody.'' Officer: I think you have your wife says otherwise.
Explain that. Because you can't I will put it to you that you are a liar
and that this has happened and you just don't want to admit it. Campbell
again asks for a solicitor. As the police begin to formally charge him,
he says: ''Oh no, no, you can't.'' He gets up and is told to sit down.
Now clearly shattered, he repeats ''can not hear you'' over and over as
police try to caution him. Eventually he stops and says: ''But I have
never done anything, I swear.'' Campbell is then charged with raping two
of the X children between August 1995 and September 2001 - only then is
he told he may get a solicitor. The interview finished at 12.39pm with
Campbell being led back to his cell in Stornoway police station.
*****
Sir: Contrary to Professor Morton's claim (letter, 26 April),
I am aware of at least two alternative explanations for Dissociative Identity
Disorder that do not link it to a history of abuse. The two coherent accounts
that spring immediately to mind are those proposed by Ian Hacking and
the late Nicholas Spanos. Given that there is a serious debate in the
psychological literature about the very existence of the disorder (let
alone what might "cause" it) I think a far more cautious stance
is warranted.
Dr JAMES OST, International Centre for Research in Forensic
Psychology, University of Portsmouth
***
Sir: It would be a pity if the casual reader of Thomas Sutcliffe's review
of the BBC1 drama May 33rd (22 April) came away with the belief that Dissociative
Identity Disorder did not exist.
There is growing experimental evidence from cognitive psychology for
the existence of individuals with separate personality states which are
profoundly amnesic for each other. This is what was graphically depicted
in author Guy Hibbert's script and in Lia Williams' performance, and is
the core of the definition of DID in the standard diagnostic text. The
experiments, I should say, specifically test for faking.
Given the existence of the condition, some explanation is necessary.
The only account around is one based on early traumatic abuse. Nobody
tells another coherent story. Mr Sutcliffe implies that the condition
can be induced by therapy. However, no evidence has ever been put forward
that therapy can induce personality states with mutual amnesia of the
kind I and others have studied.
Professor JOHN MORTON, Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience, University
College, London
***
Last night's television: few benefits amid the
doubts; MAY 33RD BBC1 SHANE ITV1 - 22 April 2004
by Thomas Sutcliffe
WE WERE informed at the start of May 33rd that it was based on the lives
of real women. "It can be easier not to believe them," the epigraph
continued portentously, a pre-emptive insult to anyone who might have
found themselves feeling sceptical as the drama unwound its tale of satanism
and dissociative identity disorder, a disputed psychological syndrome
which, it is argued, is often the result of ritual abuse.
As far as television dramatists go, the truth is the opposite: it's far
easier to believe the victims. Disbelief would require you to negotiate
the tricky business of therapy- induced disorders and false memories,
and to acknowledge the adult uncertainties of the subject matter and the
trauma that false allegations have caused. Believing means you can go
to town with the split-personality scenes and chill your audience with
the facile menace of suburban occultists, exchanging humdrum chat as they
prepare for a black mass. In short, it allows you to introduce that serially
abused dramatic device: the sexual-abuse revelation.
Since I want to argue that May 33rd was irresponsible and silly, I'd
better say what was good about it first. Lia Williams's performance as
Ella, a disturbed woman whose multiple personalities were the result of
years of abuse by a cult called "The Family", was remarkable,
a transformation into a pinched, belligerently asexual figure who flickered
between mental states like a faulty television.
Guy Hibbert's script was as knowing in its application of pressure as
Edward, the osteopath who began to unlock Ella's different memories. "I
can see that you're very tense," Edward said on her first visit,
"but that's something I can help you with." His very compassion
carried the shadow of an abuser's predatory grooming.
David Attwood's direction, meanwhile, saw that the most banal landscapes
can take on a threatening aspect: his footage of pedestrian walkways and
lay-by cafes was wonderfully bleak.
Yet these virtues serviced a plot which dispensed with nuance and ambiguity
- the very substance of the issue. In real life, it has proved difficult
to come up with hard evidence of ritual satanic abuse, but in fiction
you can invent your proof, as May 33rd did with its coven scene.
To disbelieve after that wasn't an option. Hibbert had shown you the
truth and the implication was inescapable: whenever someone claims to
have been the subject of mind-boggling trauma, it's our moral duty to
give them the benefit of the doubt. Never mind that honest, uncowardly
doubt might be what they need, or that believing them obliges us to disbelieve
others.
It also seemed perverse for a drama that prided itself on its psychological
accuracy to create incredible subsidiary characters. Edward scarcely knew
Ella (except that she was seriously disturbed), yet he turned out in the
middle of the night to rescue her. He then installed her in his home without
a murmur of dissent from his wife, who you might think would have some
feminine anxieties about her husband's outreach programme. Even after
Ella tore up the living room in the midst of a panic attack, this eerily
charitable woman didn't question the wisdom of having her in the same
house as her young son. It was all too easy not to believe her, though
that was perhaps not what the opening epigraph had in mind.
*****
The child abuse myths unravel - Sunday Times, 1 February
2004
by Margarette Driscoll
After Munchausen's syndrome by proxy, another medical theory looks set
to crumble.
Cases of shaken baby syndrome (SBS) examined in a review of infant deaths
ordered by the attorney-general. Like the hundreds of parents accused
of causing or faking illness in their children as a form of child abuse,
those involved in SBS cases argue they have been damned by a medical diagnosis
that does not hold water.
Sally Clark is the Manchester solicitor whose wrongful conviction for
the murder of her two babies began the unravelling of Munchausen's, the
abuse theory formulated by Professor Sir Roy Meadow. She was originally
accused of having shaken one of her babies to death. Several other mothers
are in prison, convicted of murder or manslaughter on the basis of supposedly
"classic" signs: bleeding in the baby's brain or eyes and fractures
to the rib or leg bones. More have suffered the intrusion of social service
investigations or have had their children taken away. "I have had
lots of hopeful calls from families," said Rioch Edwards Brown, who
founded the Five Percenters, a campaign group, after she was wrongly accused
- then cleared -of shaking her son Riordan. "We now know that injuries
producing these symptoms can be caused by trauma at birth or falls. Which
is not to say babies are never shaken, but there is no such thing as a
'syndrome'."
This week the first anti- Munchausen's conference will take place in
Australia. One of the speakers will be Charles Pragnell who was among
the first to raise the alarm about the diagnosis in Britain. Now living
in Australia, Pragnell has witnessed the damage that can be wrought when
zealotry overtakes common sense. He was working for Cleveland social services
when scores of children were taken into care on the say-so of Marietta
Higgs, a paediatrician working on a now discredited theory about sexual
abuse.
"One of the things we were supposed to learn from Cleveland was
that social workers should not act on the basis of a medical diagnosis
alone," Pragnell said.
"If you look at Munchausen's cases there is often no corroborative
evidence." The child protection service has a history of accepting
theory as fact: satanic abuse, anal dilation, repressed memory syndrome
and now Munchausen's and SBS. "If a paediatrician suspects child
abuse there is no need to give it a label," said Pragnell. "It's
for the police and social services to investigate. By pinning the blame
on someone the doctor is acting as judge and jury."
Yet one has to wonder whether the furore over Munchausen's risks the
pendulum swinging too far the other way. Margaret Hodge, the children's
minister, said up to 5,000 cases that had been through the family courts
might need to be looked at again and added fuel to the fire by saying
parents whose children had been adopted would not get them back. But a
relatively small number of cases are likely to hinge on medical evidence
alone.
Paediatricians are becoming reluctant to get involved in child protection,
fearing complaints or worse. Several have had their car tyres slashed
and their homes daubed with slogans.
Despite the criticism Professor Alan Craft, president of the Royal College
of Paediatrics and Child Health, said he retained "complete confidence"
in the diagnosis of Munchausen's and believes the row can have only harmful
consequences for children: "There is no doubt that some parents do
abuse children. We are getting to a stage where (cases of) children being
harmed will not be picked up."
*****
Abuse cases doc face probe - The Evening Chronicle,
26 January 2004
by Rob Kennedy
Dozens of child abuse cases could be re-opened because of the evidence
of a controversial expert.
Calls were today made for a review after a North East man had his conviction
for raping a boy overturned because of the evidence of Dr Camille San
Lazaro.
Dr Lazaro was criticised in 2002 for her role in the investigation into
false claims of abuse at a Newcastle nursery by Dawn Reed and Christopher
Lillie.
Now her evidence has been blamed for Kevin Brown's conviction. He has
served his seven-year sentence for raping the five-year-old boy.
Today it was claimed dozens of other convictions could be overturned
after the Appeal Court referred back to the 2002 libel proceedings in
which Dr Lazaro's evidence was branded "completely discredited".
Dr Lazaro, a senior lecturer and consultant paediatrician at Newcastle
Royal Victoria Infirmary and Newcastle University, is facing a probe by
the General Medical Council in March.
Tom Watkins, of justice campaigners the Portia Campaign, said: "Every
case she has been involved in should be looked at again. There must be
a review here.
"I think cases where an expert's opinion has got someone convicted
need to be reviewed. It's unsafe unless something else proves they are
guilty.
"Without corroborating evidence of another kind that makes it certain
that they committed the offence, it is extremely dangerous."
Brown, 38, of Medwyn Close, Bournmoor, Chester-le-Street, had already
served the sentence after his conviction in 1996. Dr Lazaro's evidence
had been central to the prosecution.
Lord Justice Kennedy told the court that in the 2002 libel trial, the
doctor had been "completely discredited" in relation to her
handling of a number of allegations of sexual abuse prior to February,
1995.
The judge ruled the conviction of Brown was unsafe in the light of fresh
medical evidence. Brown had denied raping the boy.
Brown's first appeal was dismissed in 1997 but his case was referred
back to the Appeal Court by the Criminal Cases Review Commission which
investigates claims of miscarriages of justice. The CCRC obtained three
medical reports, including one from a doctor at the forefront of the 1987
Cleveland Child Sex Abuse Inquiry, that suggested injuries to the boy
may not have been caused by a sexual act. Ruling the conviction unsafe,
Lord Justice Kennedy said medical evidence at the trial had been oversimplified
to the detriment of the defence. He added that a large part of the prosecution
case at trial had been reliant on evidence from Dr San Lazaro.
Lord Justice Kennedy concluded of the boy's injuries: "It now has
to be recognised that what was found is capable of a number of explanations.
"If the jury had the advantage of hearing the additional medical
evidence that we have heard, it seems to us that they would have been
bound to have had serious doubts about the extent to which they could
rely on the medical evidence to assist them to reach a conclusion.
"Were it not for the fact that the trial took place seven and-a-half
years ago and Mr Brown has served his sentence we would have ordered a
re-trial because the prosecution can still present a strong prima facie
case.
"But, because that sentence has already been served, we order that
the appeal be allowed and the conviction quashed."
Today the Crown Prosecution Service and the Criminal Cases Review Commission
said it would be up to other individuals convicted of similar offences
to seek an appeal based on the evidence of Dr Lazaro.
Boris Worrall, of the CCRC, said: "The commission has not yet studied
the judgment in detail, and although it is obviously open to interpretation,
the circumstances of every case would have to be looked at individually.
"
A CPS spokeswoman said: "There are no mechanisms to check which
witnesses have given evidence and it would be down to the defence to come
forward. After the High Court criticised this doctor we looked at all
live cases to see if there was any impact but there wasn't."
A spokeswoman for Newcastle Hospitals NHS Trust, which employs Dr Lazaro,
said: "Arising out of the criticisms directed at Dr Lazaro, primarily
in relation to the Newcastle libel case judgement, the clinical practice
of Dr Lazaro has been extensively reviewed by four experienced assessors
from the Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health.
"They recommended Dr Lazaro should return to work although not in
the field of child abuse and pending the outcome of a General Medical
Council hearing. The trust and the University of Newcastle accepted the
recommendation."
A Durham Police spokesman said: "A thorough investigation was carried
out into what was a particularly nasty offence. The facts were presented
to a jury who convicted the defendant.
"While noting the action of the Court of Appeal we feel there is
nothing further we can add except to say we have no plans to look into
the case."
The Chronicle reported in 2002 how two top sex abuse experts' reputations
were in tatters after they were damned by a libel trial judge.
Dr Lazaro was blasted by a judge who awarded nurses Christopher Lillie
and Dawn Reed £200,000 in libel damages.
The pair were accused in a Newcastle City Council report of systematic
sex abuse of dozens of children at a Newcastle nursery. But Mr Justice
Eady declared them innocent of all charges and condemned the report as
a legal `shambles.'
Dr Richard Barker, head of the review team which wrote the report Abuse
in Early Years, was slammed for being unprofessional. The judge said his
four-strong inquiry team had fallen under the spell of Dr Lazaro.
Dr Lazaro had examined more than 50 children who had alleged abuse at
the hands of the two nurses. She decided some of them showed signs of
sexual or other abuse and her findings were used in the report which wrongly
found Mr Lillie and Ms Reed guilty of abuse.
During cross examination during the libel trial, she admitted that her
reports to the CCRB, which had helped parents recover compensation from
public funds, had been `exaggerated and overstated in the past.'
After discrepancies were found in the medical notes of one of the children
she examined, Dr Lazaro said: "All of this is a substantial professional
lapse, I would have said."
The Home Secretary will decide on whether Brown's case is suitable for
compensation.
*****
Hodge 'ignored' warning on family-wrecking scandal
- The Sunday Times, 25 January 2004
by Jon Ungoed-Thomas
Margaret Hodge, the children's minister, and Harriet Harman, the solicitor
general, were warned more than three years ago about a growing scandal
in the family courts of children being wrongfully removed from their families.
Jan Loxley, a former government adviser on childcare, wrote to both Hodge
and Harman. She told them that families were being destroyed because of
false accusations of child abuse based on theories expounded by Professor
Sir Roy Meadow.
Last week Hodge announced reviews of an estimated 5,000 cases in family
courts where children have been taken from parents. Another 258 criminal
cases involving Meadow's theories will be re-examined. Meadow, a distinguished
paediatrician who retired in 1997, now faces a General Medical Council
investigation into allegations of misconduct.
Loxley is angry that action was not taken sooner. In her letters dated
May 17, 2000, she wrote that many mothers were being falsely accused of
Munchausen's syndrome by proxy, a diagnosis created by Meadow based on
the theory that carers may deliberately harm children to attract attention.
She wrote: "I do hope that you will take this issue seriously, the
statistics are frightening concerning the numbers of families wrongly
accused and the harm done to them."
Hodge has previously been accused of failing to heed warnings of childcare
scandals. As the leader of Islington council in north London, she dismissed
an investigation into the borough's childcare homes as "gutter journalism"
- although many of the abuse allegations were subsequently proved.
Loxley's letter highlighted a psychologist's report which denounced "horrifyingly
inappropriate" instances of misdiagnosis of Munchausen's by proxy.
The psychologist, Lisa Blakemore-Brown, said the syndrome had no "robust
scientific and statistical base".
Loxley herself had been accused of deliberately harming her young son,
despite no evidence of abuse. Her son and daughter were put on the at-risk
register, but were removed after local politicians and supporters campaigned
for her.
She said this weekend: "I find it incredible that Hodge and Harman
are suddenly announcing action as if they were previously unaware of the
scale of the problem. The government knew for years and was either wilfully
negligent or completely inept."
Harman said last week that she had known Loxley for many years but could
not specifically recall the letter. "Concern has been growing over
this issue over the years and Jan is one of many who has been saying this,"
she said.
"A court judgment has now set out the kind of approach other judges
should take when dealing with medical experts. We are acting as quickly
as possible."
A spokesman for Hodge at the Department for Education and Skills said
it had not traced the letter.
*****
Letters by Professor Jeffrey Gray, Allen Esterson
and Mark Pendergrast (all as yet unpublished) in response to "A
Freudian theory proved"
Dear Sir,
It has been known for some time that people can forget things when instructed
by an experimenter to do so. Such 'instructed forgetting' is not the same
process as Freud's hypothetical mechanism of repression. Repression is
supposed to happen automatically if the repressed material is emotionally
threatening, whereas instructed forgetting is a voluntary process operating
upon material largely devoid of emotional content. The demonstration (Tim
Radford, 'A Freudian Theory Proved', January 9) that, like everything
else in psychology, instructed forgetting has a basis in the activity
of the brain is neither here nor there. The Freudian theory of repression
remains as weak after this demonstration as before.
Yours faithfully,
Jeffrey Gray, Emeritus Professor of Psychology, Institute of Psychiatry,
King's College London
***
To the Editor
It is interesting that Freud should be given credit for the notion of
"memory suppression" ("A Freudian theory proved, January
9), given that the idea of repression did not originate with him, and
that his own theory of the mental mechanism was so simplistic that he
himself was forced to acknowledge that his exposition of the process of
repression in "Introductory Lectures on Psychoanalysis" was
"both crude and fantastic and quite impermissible in a scientific
account".
Allen Esterson
***
Dear Guardian,
"A Freudian Theory Proved," by Tim Radford, is wrong on all
counts. First, Radford didn't write the article. It is a near-verbatim
regurgitation of a Stanford University press release. More important,
the experiment by Michael Anderson et al proves nothing whatsoever about
Freud's pseudoscientific theories about how memories for traumatic events
such as sexual abuse are supposedly repressed. Anderson asked people to
rehearse word pairs (nothing to do with trauma), then, while flashing
the first word, asked some to concentrate only on the first word. Not
surprisingly, those who repeatedly focused only on the first word recalled
the second one less well than a control group that only studied the words
once. This tells us something about memory rehearsal but nothing about
"repression." Anderson has added bells and whistles to this
word play by attaching electrodes to subjects and scanning their brains.
The results, ballyhooed as "proving" repression, tell us virtually
nothing other than that the frontal cortex is active while people think.
This is not news. Extensive research demonstrates that people usually
recall repeated trauma all too well.
Yours,
Mark Pendergrast, Author, Victims of Memory
*****
A Freudian theory proved - The Guardian, 9th January
2004
by Tim Radford
Psychologists have proved Sigmund Freud's repressed memory theory. What
has always sounded like a contradiction in terms - that the brain can
remember to forget - has a neurological basis.
Michael Anderson of the University of Oregon and John Gabrieli of Stanford
University in California report in Science today that they made volunteers
learn 36 pairs of words, such as ordeal-roach, steam-train, and jaw-gum.
They tested them with the first word in the pair and set them the challenge
either of thinking of the second word or suppressing their awareness of
it. To do the latter they used the part of the brain which comes into
play when humans stop themselves performing an involuntary action.
The control of unwanted memories was linked with extra activity in the
right and left frontal cortex which in turn led to reduced activity of
the hippocampus, the part of the brain used to remember experience. The
more volunteers activated their frontal cortexes, the better they were
at suppressing unwanted memories.
*****
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