A Philosophical Buckey Expresses Relief His 7-Year Ordeal Is Ending : Reaction: Molestation defendant says he needed no vindication. He believes the case made him stronger.

As his seven-year ordeal ended Friday with the ambiguity of a mistrial rather than the finality of an acquittal, the nation’s most-famous accused child molester was more philosophical than jubilant, saying vindication was not something he needed nor anything he sought.

“I look at it that I’m innocent until I’m proven guilty,” Ray Buckey told reporters outside the Los Angeles Superior Court minutes after the mistrial was announced in what remained of the McMartin Pre-School molestation case.

“If I’m not proven guilty, I’m still innocent.”

Still, he said, he was “happy” and “relieved” at the outcome. “It’s a lot better than having (the jury) say, ‘He’s guilty.’ ”

Although prosecutors have said they will not seek to try him a third time, the former preschool teacher noted that the case will not officially be over until Superior Court Judge Stanley Weisberg dismisses it. A hearing is scheduled for Wednesday.

Buckey responded cautiously when asked how it felt to “finally be free.”

“I’m not finally free--not till I hear that judge say, ‘Sorry, see you later, I never want to see you again in this courtroom,’ ” he said, adding that he had not expected to be tried a second time, after an earlier jury found itself deadlocked on some of the counts filed against him.

“I don’t think you can ever be free of something like McMartin,” he added. “You can walk away from it and grow from it and not live in the shadow of it, but it affects everybody caught up in it.”

Nevertheless, he said, “I’m very relieved. I don’t know if people can understand the feeling of waiting seven years for people you don’t know to decide your fate.”

Looking trim and muscular--the result of daily workouts, he said--the 32-year-old Buckey seemed to hold a tight rein on his emotions, observing that the case had made him a stronger person. Despite his anger toward the prosecution, there was another positive result. “The jury system has renewed my faith in people as a whole,” he said. “Twelve jurors were not gullible enough to buy something as absurd as the McMartin case.”

To Buckey, the jury’s deadlock seemed logical, a reflection of popular opinion. For the most part, the public has been supportive, he said, but “out of 50 people that come up to me and are very positive, I get two people that yell at me from their car.”

While he compares his case to the Salem witch trials, Buckey said he is not as bitter as some of the parents who believe their children were sexually abused at the Manhattan Beach preschool. “I don’t let myself have those kind of emotions. I can bifurcate my life,” he said, explaining that he is able to have a “real life” outside the courtroom.

“That’s why it’s going to be very easy for me to walk away from this case and start my life over again,” he said.

But at another point, Buckey said that since he was released from jail, his life has followed a simple routine: “I go to court. I go home. I work out. I eat. I sleep.”

Now that the case is almost over, Buckey said he would have to get a job. But he has not decided just what kind of work he will seek. “I don’t want to be a lawyer and I don’t want to be a reporter,” he said, smiling. “It’s too strenuous, and I don’t like wearing ties.”

How will he spend his first evening of freedom? “I’ll probably go watch myself on TV and see if my tie is straight.”