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Dr. Alan Tesson Testified That a 6- Allow Hearsay Evidence FALSE MEMORY SYNDROME FOUNDATION NEWSLETTER SPRING 2008 Vol. 17 No. 2 Dear Friends, opinion, had been wrongly imprisoned for nineteen years. Thanks to Goggle we were able to find enough informa- A reporter called the Foundation in March asking for a tion about this case to question Toward’s conviction. When response to recent research showing that young children are we learned that the therapist who interviewed the first child less prone to false memories than are adults. She seemed to bring charges against Toward was Alan Tesson, M.D., we concerned that the research in some way “undid” many became convinced that the case should be completely reex- notions that have appeared in the newsletter about the relia- amined. Readers of this newsletter may recall that in 1996 bility of children’s testimony. That is not the case. Dr. Tesson settled a case for $650,000 with former patient Reyna and Brainerd[1] first observed that false memories Sue Tinker who sued him for malpractice, including the increase with children’s development, and since then about induction of false memories of abuse and satanic rituals.[2] 30 papers have followed by other researchers—part of the flood of scholarly information about false memories and In this issue, we provide a few excerpts from an interview memory development. Research has shown that meaning- Dr. Tesson had with the first Glendale Montessori school based memories are primarily responsible for false memo- child. Dr. Tesson was trying to help the child remember ries in adults. Children develop the ability to extract mean- being abused. We think that , in effect, the child was abused ing from experience very slowly and thus are less likely to during the interview. develop false memories. Several readers contacted the Foundation after the last Young children can be accurate reporters of events, newsletter to express their distress at the Nebraska jury even traumatic events—if they are properly interviewed. award of $1.75 million to the daughter of Gordon Vella for The young children whose testimony has been written about the sexual abuse she claimed she had suffered as a child. A in this newsletter, however, were subjected to aggressive critical witness for that trial was Daniel Brown, Ph.D. who and suggestive interviews by therapists or police officers, testified about dissociative amnesia. On December 14, especially during the late 1980s and early 1990s, during the 2007, Judge Richard G. Knopf of the United States District wave of day-care cases following in the wake of McMartin. Court for Nebraska vacated that judgment in response to a Between 1984 and 1995, there were approximately 185 motion brought by the daughter’s own attorney. (See page adults who were charged with ritual sexual abuse. Over one 11.) hundred of those were convicted, mainly on the testimony After the trial, Gordon Vella appealed the judgment. of young children. Most, but not all, have now been The appeal accused Brown of misrepresentation. It stated: released. “newly discovered evidence establishes that Dr. Daniel We received a reminder of this dreadful period when a Brown, either intentionally or through reckless indifference young adult contacted the Foundation to tell us about the Glendale Montessori School case in Stuart, Florida. (See In this issue... page 3.) She told us about being a student in the school and about the experience of a therapist using hypnosis to try to Glendale Montessori case ................................................3 find “memories” of her abuse by James Toward, the head- Hershel Walker ..................................................................8 master of the school. That is quite aggressive interviewing! Legal Corner ....................................................................11 From Our Readers ..........................................................13 The caller said that she was concerned that the world had Bulletin Board ..................................................................17 forgotten about the Glendale case and that Toward, in her The next newsletter will be sent in July. 1955 Locust Street, Philadelphia, PA 19103-5766, 215-940-1040, Fax 215-940-1042, www.FMSFonline.org to the truth, misrepresented the existence of an error rate ileged upbringing was withdrawn in March. Or Misha relating to the hypothesis of dissociative amnesia, misrepre- Defonseca’s memoir about being a Holocaust Jewish sented the findings of numerous published articles as being orphan at 4 who wandered alone through the forests which supportive of dissociative amnesia theory, misrepresented has also recently been exposed as false. Or Binjamin the level of acceptance among the relevant scientific com- Wilkomirski's memoir about recovering memories of being munity for the dissociative amnesia hypothesis, and even a child Holocaust survivor when, in fact, he spent the war allowed misrepresentations concerning his qualifications to safe in Switzerland. Or so many other books that have been testify as an expert witness.” Declarations written by R. exposed as frauds in some way or another. Why don’t pub- Christopher Barden, Ph.D., J.D., Richard J. McNally, Ph.D., lishers do a better routing job of fact checking to verify an and Harrison Pope, Jr., M.D., M.P.H. were submitted with author’s incredible accounts? Does it matter? Yes, it does, the Motion. especially when the book is about a medical diagnosis such Although Brown wrote an affidavit defending his testi- as multiple personality disorder that has caused such unnec- mony, it was the plaintiff’s attorney who then asked to have essary pain and havoc in the lives of so many people. For the judgment vacated. Brown’s name is likely familiar to editors, the fascination of working with a famous football newsletter readers because he has testified in so many FMS- hero or Holocaust survivor and the dreams of press tours, 60 related cases. Readers may recall that NH Superior Court Minutes and big sales must surely cloud judgment. Judge Tina Nadeau wrote devastating comments about As we have for so many years now, sixteen to be exact, Brown’s testimony in the Bourgelais case.[3] Daniel Brown we thank you for your support and urge you to pick up pen is a prolific purveyor of misinformation about memory and and paper if something in the media needs correction. repression and false memories—dragging the memory wars on and on. Pamela 1. Brainerd, C.J. & Reyna, V.R. (2005). The Science of False Memory. The media also continue to help keep the memory wars Oxford University Press. alive by influencing the cultural climate in ways to make 2. See Tinker v. Tesson, in the Circuit Court of the 19th Judicial Circuit, recovered memories and multiple personalities acceptable. in and for Martin County, Florida, Case No. 95-444-CA. FMSF New books promoting recovered memories and multiple Newsletter, 6(2). personalities keep on coming. The most recent is a memoir 3. See NH v. Bourgelais, No. 02-S-2834, Rockingham, NH Sup. Ct. April 4, 2005, FMSF Newsletter, 14(3). from famed football star Herschel Walker called Breaking 4. Strickland, C. (2008, March 15). Herschel Walker reveals he suffers Free: My Life with Dissociative Identity Disorder. (See page from multiple personality disorder. Atlanta Journal-Constitution. 9) Jerry Mungadze, Ph.D., founder of the Mungadze Retrieved on March 26, 2008 from http://www.startribune.com/sports Trauma Programs wrote the Foreword to the book. /vikings/16686526.html. Mungadze’s name may seem familiar to some readers for his connection to memories of satanic ritual abuse and “The problem with the brain is that it is not a very dis- aggressive memory excavation. According to newspaper criminating processor. It has no spam folder for imaginary reports, [4] Herschel Walker and his book will be featured on or coerced memories. Movie plots, unsubstantiated “60 Minutes” on April 13, 2008. rumors and images from dreams are stored in our brain It may be that Herschel Walker has a slightly different alongside memories of our 10th-birthday party, first kiss take on MPD from what is usually found. He has explained and high school graduation.” (p. 48) his approach: “People have to shift themselves and their Lambert, K. & Lilienfeld, S.O. (2007, October/November). personalities in so many different areas to be successful. BrainStains. Scientific American Mind, 18(5), 46-53. You don’t want Herschel Walker the football player, Amnesia: Fiction vs. Real Life babysitting your kids. Those are two different people.” Those are his alters. About his childhood trauma he said: “Like the future, amnesia has become a crowded lit- “When I was a kid I had a speech impediment and I used to erary terrain. Rare in life, amnesia abounds in contempo- get teased all the time. I didn’t love myself and I didn’t rary literature and in the most stylish contemporary know how to love myself.”[4] movies.” We suspect that publishers Simon & Schuster did no “Unlike amnesiacs in life, whose fugues of patholog- more fact checking about Dr. Mungadze or multiple person- ical forgetfulness are likely to be caused by strokes, brain ality disorder and its controversial diagnosis than most other tumors, alcoholism, malnutrition, severe trauma to the publishers had done for the numerous recent memoirs head, and degenerative diseases like Alzheimer’s, literary exposed as untrue. For example, Margaret Jones’ memoir and cinematic amnesiacs have usually suffered psycho- claiming that she had been brought up as half Native logical traumas, to be revealed in flashbacks;” American in a foster home, when, in reality, she had a priv- Oates, J.C. (2007, July 19). Lest we forget. The New York Review of Books, 54(12), 47-50. 2 FMS Foundation Newsletter SPRING 2008 Vol. 17 No. 2 IN MEMORIAM Glendale Montessori School released. Toward agreed to an Alford Case Resurfaces plea[3] and received a 27-year sentence. Donald P. Spence, Ph.D., a long State of Florida vs.
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