Lies Admitted by McMartin Case Child

Confronted with statements he made a year ago to a therapist and before a grand jury that differ from his recent testimony in the McMartin Pre-School molestation case, a 9-year-old boy admitted Monday that he lied about some of the details.

However, the child, the fourth one to testify in a preliminary hearing for the Manhattan Beach school owner and six teachers, maintained that his most recent account on the witness stand was true.

During questioning by defense attorneys Dean Gits and Forrest Latiner on Monday, the youngster said he did not remember making some of the earlier statements and could not explain the apparent contradictions of the others.

For example, he testified last week that he was taken to a house in a green-and-white van for a nude photography session; last year he reportedly described the vehicle as a red convertible.

“Why did you tell the grand jury you went to the house in a red convertible?” Gits asked Monday.

“I don’t know,” the boy answered.

“Were you lying?” asked the attorney.

“Well, I’m not sure. I think I might have. I think I was,” the boy said.

Asked why he lied, the boy replied, “I don’t know.”

The youngster testified last week that no female teachers from the Manhattan Beach nursery school were ever at the house. A year ago, however, he said that two women were there on one occasion and that, another time, four women were at the house when children allegedly were undressed, put in a closet and then taken out one by one and photographed.

Last week, he testified that the camera was operated by a stranger, although he had previously identified the photographer as chief defendant Ray Buckey, 26. In his most recent testimony, he said he had seen defendants Peggy McMartin Buckey, 58, and Betty Raidor, 65, partly naked. Last year, he named only Raidor.

He also appeared to contradict his testimony last week that Buckey had molested him at the house. On Monday, he denied that Buckey had molested him during the picture-taking session.

The boy, who wears a large a baseball cap and fidgets constantly, asked for a break when the questioning became intense Monday.

Trapped by Defense

Deputy Dist. Atty. Glenn Stevens said during a break Monday that the child had been trapped by the defense into admitting he had lied.

“It was an unfair question--’Was that the truth or a lie?’--for an adult to ask a child,” he said, because the discrepancies may have been caused by confusion, misunderstanding or discomfort.

“He didn’t lie when he said things that may be different,” the prosecutor said, noting that the boy has been interviewed at least six times by different people. “He’s certain about what happened to him at the school, and we shouldn’t lose sight of that.”

The account given by the third-grader, who attended McMartin for three years ending in 1981, has been similar to that of the first three child witnesses. He has also made new allegations: a naked game called “horsie,” a “lookout” game in which he said he sat atop a jungle gym watching for the unexpected arrival of parents while his classmates were allegedly being molested inside the school and the excursion to the house for what he described as a nude picture-taking session.

Thirty-seven more children are expected to testify at the hearing, now in its seventh month.