A follow-up to the 1991 Frontline program Innocence Lost, this 1993 sequel is a very disturbing and provocative exploration of the circumstances surrounding one of the biggest child sexual abuse cases in the country. Innocence Lost: The Verdict opens with the sentencing of Robert Kelly, owner of the Little Rascals Day Care in Edenton, NC to 12 consecutive life terms following a trial that lasted over 7 months. Talking with mothers of the children, specialists in child psychology, and the jurors, in addition to including filmed clips from the trial and dramatized dialogue (Frontline was not allowed to film the children giving testimony...thank goodness), the program plants serious doubts in the mind of the viewer as to what really happened in the Little Rascals Day Care, and suggests that we may never know. The initial event which all parties agreed happened was that Bob Kelly slapped a young boy at the day care. This incident would eventually spark a chain reaction in the small town as mother talked to mother and children were rushed to four local therapists. Eventually, some 20 adults (including the town sheriff) would be implicated in the children's sexual abuse charges on over 400 separate counts, though only seven defendants would be taken into custody. Testifying several years after the alleged abuse, the children would speak of incredibly vile incidents (and even hearing actors read the graphic descriptions is wrenching), but they would also accuse the defendants of murdering human babies, throwing the kids into shark-infested waters, and taking them on spaceship rides. There was no hard evidence in the Kelly case, neither from any witness nor from medical authorities. As one juror says, "when I walked into the deliberation room, Bob Kelly was not a guilty man." What happened in the jury room is, in itself, an amazing story of people under extraordinary pressure. In the final hour, Innocence Lost: The Verdict looks at the trial of Dawn Wilson who, like the other defendants, had been waiting in jail for some three years. Although she was offered a chance to plea bargain for a lesser sentence, Dawn Wilson chose to go to trial. The shocking conclusion of the program cannot help but make viewers wonder if justice was truly served. Although the program would have benefited from some serious cutting (during the final hour as the camera follows Dawn Wilson around as she asks her co-defendants about whether she should accept the plea bargain, the camera is about as unobtrusive as an elephant in a Winnebago), Innocence Lost: The Verdict is overall very disturbing, not only for its subhuman subject matter but also for the alarming questions it raises about the judicial system. Highly recommended. (R. Pitman)
Frontline: Innocence Lost--The Verdict
(1993) 2 videocassettes, 116 min. each. $200. PBS Video. PPR. Color cover. Closed captioned. Vol. 9, Issue 1
Frontline: Innocence Lost--The Verdict
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