mcmartin preschool trial was the longest and most expensive trial in us history when the trial ended in 1990.
mcmartin preschool trial was the longest and most expensive trial in us history when the trial ended in 1990.
longest and most expensive trial in us history when the trial ended in 1990?
mcmartin preschool trial
the mcmartin preschool trial was a day care sexual abuse case in the 1980s, prosecuted by the los angeles district attorney ira reiner. members of the mcmartin family, who operated a preschool in manhattan beach, california, were charged with numerous acts of sexual abuse of children in their care. accusations were made in 1983. arrests and the pretrial investigation ran from 1984 to 1987, and the trial ran from 1987 to 1990. after six years of criminal trials, no convictions were obtained, and all charges were dropped in 1990. when the trial ended in 1990, it had been the longest and most expensive criminal trial in american history. the case was part of day-care sex-abuse hysteria, a moral panic over alleged satanic ritual abuse in the 1980s and early 1990s.
mcmartin preschool trial
over 300 witnesses were called to give evidence at a trial which lasted fifty four days and cost £4 million, at the time the longest and most expensive trial in scottish legal history, and ended in ferris being acquitted of all charges. after the trial ferris returned to glasgow and set up a car dealership named jagger autos, and also became a consultant for security firm premier security, which had a reported annual turnover of £6.2 million. he also maintained contacts in the underworld, including paul massey and rab carruthers in the north of england. in 1993 his brother billy escaped from a prison escort after being allowed temporary release to visit his sick father, and was one of the six most wanted men in britain until being captured in blackpool. later that year, ferris accused the police of having a vendetta against his family after billy was refused permission to attend the funeral of their father. in august 1994 ferris received a £250 fine from a court in manchester after being charged with possession of crack cocaine. he told the court "i'm no gangster", and claimed he used the drug to alleviate his psoriasis. in 1995 ferris appeared in a television interview with john mcvicar in which he remarked "if anyone was born into crime, it was me. crime is in my blood", and also claimed he had "always used a weapon of sorts".
paul ferris (scottish writer)