The Paul Ingram Case
The Charges
In 1988, Paul Ingram was a deputy sheriff in the Stat of Washington, a position he had held for almost 17 years. He was married, the father of five children and a central member of a local Pentecostal Church. Apparently the paragon of mainstream values, he was even the Chair of the Thurston County Republican Party. He spent many working hours in schools, warning children of the dangers of drug use.
But suddenly his life changed, as he was charged with a number of incredibly heinous crimes: sexual abuse, the rape of his own daughters and participation in hundreds of satanic cult rituals that included the slaughter of some 25 babies. Even more amazingly, these charges stemmed from allegations by his eldest daughter Ericka, aged 22 At that time, who claimed that her father had repeatedly molested not only her, but also her sister. The abuse had ended in 1979, Ericka said, when she was 9 and her sister Julie was 5. But Julie later reported that she had been molested as recently as 5 years before, when she was 13.
Ericka first made the charges public in the summer of 1988 at a church camp where she served as a counselor. As she talked to police later, the allegations built in extremity and detail:
She had caught a disease form her father
He had led satanic rituals in which live babies were sacrificed
A fetus had been forcibly removed form her body when it was almost full term
Contrary to her first revelations, Ericka now told the police that the last incidence of abuse had happened just 2 weeks earlier.
After Ericka came forward with these claims, Julie provided further allegations. The police acquired two letters that Julie had written a teacher 5 or 6 weeks before. One letter stated:
I can remember when I was 4 years old he would have poker games at our house and a lot of men would come over and play poker with may dad and they would all get drunk and one or two at a time would come into my room and have sex with me. They would be in and out all night laughing and cursing. I was so scared I didn’t know what to say or who to talk to.
Investigation Procedures
Even though he was a law enforcement officer, Paul Ingram had no experience with interrogations. After his arrest, he was kept in jail for 5 months and interrogated 23 times during that period. At first, he denied any knowledge of that claims. He was hypnotized and given graphic crime details. Mystified by his inability to remember any details of these acts, he was told by a Tacoma forensic psychologist, Richard Peterson, that sex offenders often repress memories of their offenses, because they were too horrible to acknowledge. His pastor, who urged him to own up to the claims, told him the charges were probably true, because children did not make up such things. Even while Ingram’s response was that he could not remember having ever molested his daughters, but added if it did happen, we need to take care of it.
Ingram’s Response
Leading questions by the police and the psychologist attempted to cause Ingram to visualize scenes involving group rapes and satanic cult activities. His response began to change from “I didn’t do it” to “I don’t remember doing it.” After further questioning, he told the police, “I really believe that the allegations did occur and that I did violate them and abuse them and probably for a long period of time. I’ve repressed it, probably very successfully from myself, and now I’m trying to bring it all out. I know from what they’re saying that the incidents had to occur, that I had to have done these things…my girls know me. They wouldn’t lie about something like this. Yet at that point he could not recall any specific incidents of abuse
Later, Ingram was able to visualize scenes the detectives had suggested and he did confess in detail, but in a rather detached and almost remorseless manner. For example: He would describe events by saying, “I would have…” rather than saying “I did…” The admissions, given after relaxation exercises by the psychologist were devastating. They included:
Having sex with his daughters many times beginning when Ericka was 5 years old
Having taken Julie for an abortion of a fetus he had fathered when Julie was 15
For a time he came to believe the accuracy of the charges. He “recalled” the crime scenes to specifications and admitted guilt. For example:
He reported seeing people in robes kneeling around a fire and cutting out a beating heart from a live cat
He watched other of the sheriff’s deputies having sexual intercourse with Ingram’s own daughters
Evaluating the Accuracy of Ingram’s Confession
A social scientist, as an expert witness, played a unique role in this case. Richard Ofshe is a social psychologist and Professor of Sociology at the University of California at Berkeley. Even though he was called as a witness by the prosecution, he came to conclude, after interviewing Ingram, that through hypnosis and “trance logic,” Ingram had been “brainwashed” into believing that he had been part of a satanic cult. Ofshe decided to try a daring experiment with Ingram. He suggested that Ingram had forced one of his sons and one of his daughters to have sex with each other, and watched them while they did. After repeated questions and suggestions by Ofshe, Ingram began to “remember” and acknowledge that he had done that too, and even embellished details of the act. He prepared a three page, excessively detailed description of the incestuous act. Ofshe began to have serious doubts “that Ingram was guilty of anything, except of being a highly suggestible individual with a tendency to float in and out of trance states and a rather dangerous eagerness to pleas authority. Ofshe became an advocate of Ingram’s innocence.
The Outcome
But it was too late, Ingram had not only pleaded guilty, but had plea bargained to six counts of third degree rape. There was no trial. Ingram was sentenced to a 20 year term in prison, with the possibility of parole after 12 years. Although he has been moved to a prison in a different state some 15 years after his conviction he remains incarcerated.
Yet no physical evidence exists that he was a Satanist or a child abuser. Ingram no longer believes he was and his attorneys have appealed, unsuccessfully, to withdraw his guilty plea. The Washington State Supreme Court rejected his appeal in September 1992.