Defendant in McMartin Preschool trials is acquitted

On January 18, 1990, a Los Angeles jury votes to acquit Peggy McMartin Buckey, who was accused of molesting children at the McMartin Preschool in Manhattan Beach, California, of all charges. The McMartin trials, which became a media sensation, had taken over six years and cost more than $13.5 million without a single guilty verdict. However, a jury had deadlocked on 13 charges against Buckey's son Ray Buckey, and prosecutors, not willing to let the matter drop, later retried him on eight of these counts.

The McMartin prosecutions represented the height of the hysteria over sexual abuse of children in America. Despite a complete lack of reputable evidence against the teachers and workers at McMartin Preschool, and with every indication that the children had been coerced and manipulated into their testimony, prosecutors nonetheless charged the Buckeys and four other people with more than 100 counts of child molestation. Charges against the four other other dependents were eventually dropped.

“Believe the children” became the mantra of advocates who insisted that children never lied or were mistaken about abuse. The courts made unprecedented changes to criminal procedure to accommodate this mistaken notion. The California Supreme Court ruled that child witnesses were not required to provide details about the time and place of the alleged molestation to support a conviction. The U.S. Supreme Court held that child witnesses could testify outside the courtroom despite the Sixth Amendment’s clear command that a defendant had the right to confront his or her accusers.

Throughout the nation, parents and day-care workers were jailed after false, and often absurd, allegations about child sexual abuse. As this hysteria swept the country, abuse counseling quickly became a cottage industry, attracting often-unqualified people who seemed to find sexual abuse everywhere.

Ray Buckey’s retrial went much faster. By July, the jury had acquitted on seven charges and were deadlocked (once again, the majority voting for acquittal) on the other six accusations. The district attorney then finally decided to drop the case. The Buckeys successfully sued the parents of one child for slander in 1991, but they were awarded only $1 in damages.