7 Convicted in Child Sex Case Get Settlement

Kern County has agreed to pay $4.25 million to seven plaintiffs in a civil rights suit, the largest settlement arising out of infamous child abuse prosecutions two decades ago that critics dubbed the “Bakersfield Witch Hunts.”

The plaintiffs spent a combined 34 years in prison on molestation charges, only to be freed when, among other things, new evidence cast doubt on the prosecution’s case.

“We’re satisfied,” said Michael Snedeker, whose Portland, Ore., law firm represented three of the plaintiffs, “although it’s small change for the loss of decades of liberty.” The settlement to members of what law enforcement once called the Cox-Modahl ring is the latest, and by far the largest, of more than a dozen payouts to people swept up in the investigation.

In the mid-1980s, dozens of Kern County residents were convicted of sex crimes against their own children in the nation’s largest prosecution of alleged molestation rings. Eight “rings” were uncovered by law enforcement, supposedly involving scores of predatory adults. An atmosphere of hysteria produced lurid accounts of satanic rituals, including blood-drinking and infanticide.

Despite the often-contradictory nature of the testimony by the children seen as victims, 50 parents were arrested and half were sent to prison for terms of as much as 200 years. While the convictions eased the fears of a town that believed it was under attack by highly organized child pornography and molestation rings, the cases began unraveling in appeals courts. Judges cited prosecutorial misconduct and denounced overzealous investigators for wheedling testimony out of children.

The state attorney general’s office later issued a highly critical report on the handling of the cases, citing a “believe-the-children” attitude among investigators, a lack of hard evidence to back up allegations and improper questioning of alleged victims. The Modahl-Cox case involved three alleged victims, all children. The principal plaintiff in the suit was Jeffrey Modahl, who spent 15 years in prison before his sentence was reversed in 1999, when two pieces of evidence turned up that had been withheld from the defense in the original trial.

One piece was a 1984 medical examination of Modahl’s 9-year-old stepdaughter. The exam raised doubts about whether she had been sodomized, as alleged by prosecutors.

The other piece of evidence was a tape recording of the interviews of the alleged victims.

After listening to the tape, Kern County Superior Court Judge John Kelly said the interviews had been conducted in a manner that probably elicited “false and unreliable accusations of sex abuse.” While he did not find any proof that the evidence had been deliberately withheld from the defense, Kelly ruled that Modahl had been denied a fair trial.

Despite that finding, it was the possibility that a civil court jury might conclude that the evidence had been deliberately held back that caused the county to hand over the $4.25-million settlement. “If a jury concluded his civil rights were violated, a jury verdict would be cataclysmic,” said County Counsel Mark Nations.

Snedeker, whose firm is one of three representing the plaintiffs, does not believe the evidence was withheld by mistake. “I don’t see any other reasonable explanation” for why the tape and medical exam were not turned over to the defense, he said. Snedeker, who has helped free several of the defendants, said he used to believe the cases reflected simple overzealousness, but no longer.

He cited exchanges on the tape in which the investigators had flatly led the children, even supplying names of other potential abusers.

Settlements in the earlier cases totaled about $375,000, Nations said.

Modahl’s was the last of the current lawsuits stemming from the child abuse cases. Only one potential case remains, that of a man who has been in prison for 18 years.

Opinion on the dozens of cases still varies widely. There are people who say the allegations were made up, while others believe the prosecution got it right and the defendants are getting out on technicalities.

A more moderate view is that there may have been abuse, but in an atmosphere of fear and paranoia, investigators saw sex rings everywhere.

“A lot of these children were abused,” said Nations. “Were they molested by all these people, or did we cast our net too wide? I don’t know the answer to that.”