COMMENTARY: Injustice in the criminal justice system

(UNDATED) Twenty-seven years ago, Brenda and Scott Kniffen, a homemaker and an inventory manager of a diesel shop, were arrested and charged with sexually abusing their two sons, Brian, 6, and Brandon, 8. Under intense questioning by police and social welfare workers, the boys claimed to have been molested by their parents and ritually abused […]

(UNDATED) Twenty-seven years ago, Brenda and Scott Kniffen, a homemaker and an inventory manager of a diesel shop, were arrested and charged with sexually abusing their two sons, Brian, 6, and Brandon, 8.

Under intense questioning by police and social welfare workers, the boys claimed to have been molested by their parents and ritually abused in a satanic cult. The boys said they had been hung from the ceiling by hooks, forced to engage in sex acts and photographed for child pornography.

The Kniffens were only two of more than three dozen defendants — many of them parents of the alleged victims — in Bakersfield, Calif., who were accused of horrifying acts in elaborate child molestation and satanic ritual abuse rings in the 1980s.


The accusations were shocking. Outrageous. Unbelievable.

And, the years would reveal, wholly untrue.

After serving 12 years of 240-year sentences, the Kniffens were exonerated and released from prison. Many of the other Bakersfield adults were also freed after their convictions were appealed and overturned.

The Bakersfield molestation cases were tainted by coercive interrogation of impressionable young children and flagrant prosecutorial misconduct — including the suppression of exculpatory evidence.

The Kniffens’ story, and that of a half-dozen other accused Bakersfield parents, is told in unblinking, heart-wrenching detail in the new documentary, “Witch Hunt,” which airs nationally this month on MSNBC. (Check local listings for air times, or visit http://www.witchhuntmovie.com to watch clips or buy a copy of the film.)

“Witch Hunt” is narrated by Oscar-winning actor Sean Penn, who told TV Guide magazine in a recent interview, “The public hysteria that surrounded this case is every bit as essential to discuss as the public corruption.”Penn also said that “The devastation that occurred during those investigations and trials continues. It continues in the heroic efforts of the victims — by that I mean the convicted — to rebuild lives that were shattered.”

As is often the case with wrongfully accused and exonerated folks, many of the Bakersfield parents harbor little bitterness toward those who helped put them in prison — including their own children.

All of the stories in “Witch Hunt” are wrenching. But it is the Kniffens whose faces and story stay with me most indelibly. When they were arrested and sentenced to unthinkably long prison terms, they were a simple, working-class young couple. They were in love. They loved their sons. The accusations were mind-boggling, and they had faith that they would be cleared of the horrendous charges.


When they weren’t, their sons went to live in foster homes, and they went to separate prisons. But the Kniffens held on to faith and to the love they had for each other and their children. During their more than a dozen years in prison, the Kniffens wrote to each other daily. Love letters. Spiritual letters. Letters full of hope and blind faith.

That faith paid off. The Kniffens are free, they’ve reunited with their sons, and they’re still married. Amazing.

“Witch Hunt” begins with a dedication in white on a plain, black screen. There are more than 2 million people serving time in U.S. prisons. “This film is dedicated to the thousands of them who are actually innocent,” the film says.

During this Easter season, when Christians remember the trial, execution and resurrection of Jesus Christ — a wrongfully accused and convicted innocent man — may we take a moment to consider the spiritual implications of the failures of our justice system.

“Witch Hunt” is a cautionary tale. Fear makes people do crazy things, and hysteria can be deadly. If it could happen in Bakersfield, it could happen anywhere. “It’s essential that we not be too prone to respond in packs or herds,” Penn said, “like sheep.”

Jesus, the Good Shepherd, spoke of prison when he described God’s final judgment on humanity. It’s the passage where he talks about “the least of these.”


When we feed the poor, help the sick, clothe the naked, he says, we are doing that for him. “I was in prison,” Jesus says, “and you visited me.”

Jesus was a prisoner. So were St. Peter and St. Paul.

Clearly, God holds a special concern for those in trouble with the law — whether they are innocent or guilty.

(Cathleen Falsani is the author of “Sin Boldly: A Field Guide for Grace” and the upcoming “The Dude Abides: The Gospel According to the Coen Brothers.”)

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