Remembering Satan

  The contrast between the sisters struck Ofshe strongly when, the next day, he met Ericka. Julie was such a casual dresser—to the point, really, of being careless—whereas Ericka was heavily made up and wore her hair teased into a dramatic coif. Instead of shrinking from the spotlight, Ericka seemed eager to claim center stage. The sisters scarcely seemed related at all, except as opposites: Julie so shy, Ericka so bold; Julie so plain and naive, Ericka so attractive and shrewd.

  Until now, the interrogation of the girls had focused on the commission of crimes. Ofshe chose another tack. He proposed to Ericka that he was like an anthropologist who had just dropped into her town and was interested in learning about her life in the cult. Tell me what the meetings were like, how they fitted into your ordinary life, he said. It was similar to the approach he had used in debriefing members of other cults. In such organizations there is a hierarchy of personalities; there are routines, taboos, maxims, legends, dogma, group history—a society, in other words. By her own estimate, Ericka had attended eight hundred and fifty rituals during her life and watched twenty-five babies sacrificed. What, exactly, went on during the rituals? Ofshe wanted to know. “They chant,” Ericka said. What were the words? She couldn’t remember. Did you sit or stand? he asked her. She couldn’t remember that either. Who were the other people and what were they like? It was too stressful to talk about. Before concluding the interview, Ofshe asked if her father had ever forced her and one of her brothers to have sex while he watched. Ericka said that nothing like that had ever happened.

  That day Ofshe visited Ingram again, in jail. Ingram said he had gotten some clear memories of Ericka and Paul Ross having sex. He had made some notes. Once again, Ofshe asked him to say no more, just go back to his cell and pray and visualize and write it down for him.

  Ofshe also met with Sandy. She told him that she was beginning to retrieve more memories now, through the counseling of Pastor Bratun. She had also seen a psychiatrist and a psychologist.

  “How does Pastor Bratun help?” Ofshe asked.

  “He kind of prods,” Sandy said. “When we start, initially he did describe a scene to me.”

  “One that Paul had given him?” asked Ofshe.

  Sandy agreed that most of her memory sessions began this way.

  Ofshe wanted to know if Sandy was afraid of her husband.

  “No,” she said. “I remember him hollering at me sometimes, in my normal memory, but it was never anything that seemed out of line. I remember him hitting me one time, in my normal memory, but I don’t remember anything that would have given me a clue that something was wrong.”

  “Where did you get this idea of a normal memory and some other kind of memory?” Ofshe asked.

  “There are things I remember, like birthday parties and how old the kids were in this particular year,” Sandy said. “Then there are the things that I’ve remembered since then. It is different from what my other memories are.”

  Ofshe asked her to describe the memories she was getting with the help of Pastor Bratun. Sandy detailed several rape scenes with Rabie and Risch, and satanic rituals in the woods. She watched Paul having sex with the high priestess. “I remember being tied to a tree,” she said. “There was water and fire. One time, Jim took the kids by their heels and dumped them in the water. And they wanted me to put on a white robe.… Ray’s standing out there and he’s holding all the robes, and when I first saw the scene it felt like an initiation.”

  “Do you ‘see’ the scene, or do you remember it?”

  “No, I see it,” Sandy said. “And, uh, everybody says this pledge of allegiance and we’re all outside, and there’s this book on the table and, uh, Jim is holding my shoulder and his nails are all painted black and they’re real long and they go into my shoulder and this book is bleeding”—her voice broke, and she began to sob—“and Paul and [the high priestess]* and Jim touch it, and the blood runs all over Jim and up his arm and all over his head and then it runs all over me!”

  “So the blood runs uphill?”

  Sandy laughed despairingly. “Jim says I am ready, and they put me on the table, and there’s like a leather strap around my neck and my arms and my legs and my ankles, and then [the high priestess] cuts my clothes off with the knife!”

  By now Sandy was shaking. Everyone who had seen her when she was caught up in this state had been alarmed by her bobbing head, her rolling eyes, and her high, quaking voice. Her face became bizarrely contorted. When Sax Rodgers deposed her, it had been one of the most rattling experiences of his life. Even Loreli Thompson had been unnerved by the eerie spectacle that Sandy presented.

  Ofshe now pulled her back by getting her to describe ordinary memories, such as family vacations. She immediately calmed down. She talked about trips to Deer Lake in eastern Washington, and picking up Andrea beforehand, and other times, when the kids were small and they would all go camping and take long walks together. “There was a little store there, and paddle boats, and the kids could fish off the dock and swim.”

  “Do you remember those things?” Ofshe asked.

  “Yes.”

  “Can you remember them without ‘seeing’ them?”

  “Yes.”

  “Can you remember the other kinds of scenes without ‘seeing’ them?”

  “I don’t know. I just see ’em, that’s all,” Sandy said. “I can feel them touching me and holding me. I can smell things.”

  “So it’s real for you.”

  Sandy agreed that it was very real.

  “Would it surprise you if I told you that I think nothing happened?” Ofshe asked.

  “Well, we’ve talked about that,” Sandy admitted. “I’ve even thought about that myself—you know, that this was all a big lie and a hoax.”

  “Those aren’t the words I would use,” Ofshe said gently. “If I told you I thought this had all come about by mistake, would that surprise you?”

  “Well,” Sandy said, “everything that’s happened has been very surprising and very strange, but I’d wonder why I was feeling them touching me, holding me, and I could smell them, feel them, and hear them.”

  “Do you have bad dreams like this?”

  “No,” Sandy said. “There’d have to be another explanation—or else you can just put me away! And I don’t think I’m crazy.”

  To everyone’s astonishment, Paul Ross had returned to Olympia for a spell, and Ofshe managed to interview him as well. Like the detectives, Ofshe was struck by the air of dangerousness that surrounded the young man. Paul Ross related the same story that he had told before, about his mother being tied to the bed while Rabie raped her, and his father hitting him. He described his father as a “Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde” personality. His mother, on the other hand, “always seemed to be the loving, caring mom,” but after what his sisters had said about her, Paul Ross supposed she must have been involved in the abuse. He guessed she too must have a separate personality.

  Paul Ross said he didn’t know anything about the satanic rites that had supposedly gone on in his family, except what he had read in the newspaper, and yet he was quite learned on the subject of demonology, a subject he had been studying for the past ten years. He had read Aleister Crowley, the Egyptian Book of the Dead, and many of the most significant books on witchcraft, satanism, magic, and voodoo. As a professor, Ofshe admired Paul Ross’s scholarship, and he was frustrated that this angry but nonetheless quite studious young man was working in a warehouse. He several times took the opportunity to recommend that Paul Ross apply to college, and even offered to advise him.

  “I would like to touch on whether or not anything at all was done to you,” Ofshe then said cautiously, “and whether or not you were ever part of any group sessions that had any aspect of ritual.”

  “First of all, I don’t know,” Paul Ross responded. “And second, I don’t remember anything.” When Ofshe asked him to explain, the young man said he had no clear memories before he was eight years old, although after talking to detectives he reca
lled that he had fallen down the stairs a lot. “Either I was really clumsy, or somebody did a lot of pushing. I remember one time waking up in the hospital after they had shaved the back of my head. It seems like I should remember falling down the stairs.” This happened when he was four or five years old. He still had a scar. But as for being present at satanic rituals all through his childhood, Paul Ross said, “I couldn’t say yes or no. I don’t remember anything.”

  Like everyone else in the case, Ofshe was perplexed by Paul Ross’s story. It was so suggestive but also so unconfirming. Did the abuse happen? The young man believed it must have, but he couldn’t remember it; nor could he remember the rituals. The only thing he clearly recalled was Rabie’s assault on Sandy. And yet, Ofshe felt if that part of Paul Ross’s story was actually true, then everything else the family remembered—even the most fantastic ritual scenes—must be true as well.

  The next time Ofshe visited Ericka, she said she believed that her mother was still a member of the cult. She related a recent incident in which Sandy had come to visit her at the house of Pastor Ron Long and had given her the cult’s “death kiss.” Ofshe asked her to describe it. What made it different from an ordinary kiss? Ericka couldn’t say. When Ofshe later asked the pastor and his wife if they had seen Sandy kiss Ericka, what they described was an ordinary peck on the cheek.

  Ofshe now saw Paul Ingram for a third time. Schoening recognized the look on Ingram’s face when he came into the interview room. He was beaming. Ingram was always proud of himself after he had come up with a new memory. He handed Ofshe a three-page written confession. Ofshe read it through. “Daytime: Probably Saturday or Sunday Afternoon,” the confession began, very much like a movie script:

  In Ericka’s Bedroom on Fir Tree. Bunk Beds set up. Ericka & Julie are sharing the room. I ask or tell Paul Jr. & Ericka to come upstairs & then we go into Ericka’s room. I close the door and tell them we are going to play (a game?).

  I tell them to undress. Ericka says “But Dad”, I say “Just get undressed and don’t argue” From my tone or the way I say it, neither objects and they undress themselves. I’m probably blocking the door so they could not get out.

  Ericka is about 12–13. Body fairly well developed. Paul is 12–14. Both have some pubic hair.

  I tell Ericka to knell and to caress Paul’s genitals. When erect I tell her to put the penis into her mouth and to orally stimulate him. I also tell her to continue using her fingers. I have her also run her tongue along his penis. When Paul has his orgasm I have Ericka hold his penis in her mouth and continue stimulation. I tell her to swallow the sperm, but she runs to the bathroom and spits. I tell her to get back to the room & tell her the sperm is protein and won’t hurt her.

  I have Ericka lie on her back on the floor. I tell Paul to knell over her to rub her vagina gently with his fingers. I also tell him to caress and touch her breasts. When he has a full erection I tell him to enter Ericka and complete the sex act. When they are finished, I have Ericka clean up and tell her to come back to the bedroom.

  I undress and tell Ericka to orally have sex with me. She does what I tell her to do. That is to stimulate me with her fingers, tongue and mouth until I come. I tell her to catch sperm in her mouth, and she can swallow or spit. I believe she spits in the bathroom.

  I have her lie on the floor. I caress her vagina and breasts and probably orally caress her vagina. I have vaginal sex. Paul watches all of this. If she did not have an orgasm I would have stimulated her with my fingers until she did.

  I may have told the children that they needed to learn the sex acts and how to do them right. That it is important that each participant have a pleasurable experience.

  I may have anal sex with Paul, not real clear. At other times I have had anal and oral sex with him.

  We all get dressed. I ask “Now you both enjoyed that didn’t you?” Neither looks me in the eye, nor says anything. I say “You might as well enjoy it. We need each other, there’s no reason to fight it.”

  Paul goes downstairs. I go to my bedroom, perhaps to clean up, Ericka stays in her room. I go downstairs. Sandy and the other children are down there. I go to Sandy in the kitchen and kiss her as if nothing has happened. Nothing is said about what just happened. I don’t think Sandy is aware of what went on.

  I’m not sure how often this type of activity occurred. I believe that I tell them to be gentle with each other.

  I believe that when I tell Paul & Ericka to come upstairs, those on the main floor who heard me and Paul & Ericka, knew what was going on and not to interrupt us.

  The ability to control Paul & Ericka may not come entirely from me. It seems there is a real fear of Jim or someone else. Someone may have told me to do this with the kids. This is a feeling I have.

  Here was a detailed, explicit confession, complete with dialogue, of a scene that never happened. So far, Ofshe’s little experiment had demonstrated just how much pressure it took to make Ingram comply with his demands to create a memory, and the answer was scarcely any. The next task was to determine whether Ingram now would admit that the confession was false. But in this, Paul was unshakable. “It’s just as real to me as anything else,” he maintained.

  Ofshe now had serious doubts whether 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 patent and rather dangerous eagerness to please authority. He suspected Ericka of being a habitual liar. Throughout the investigation, Julie’s accusations had followed Ericka’s lead. Ofshe doubted whether the sisters had ever intended their charges to be drawn into the legal arena. Once the charges had been filed, Ofshe believed, the sisters pasted over the inconsistencies in their original accusations with ever more fanciful claims. The whole misadventure was a kind of mass folly—something that would be suitable mainly for folklorists if it were not that innocent people’s lives were being crushed. When Ofshe left Olympia, he was convinced that a new Salem was in the making. The witch trials, he believed, were about to begin.

  *The name of the woman referred to as the high priestess, as well as the names of other persons who were implicated in the investigation but who were not charged, are not part of this account.

  12

  Chris listens to his older brother, Jim, talk about how Chris was lost in a shopping mall when he was five years old. “It was 1981 or 1982. I remember that Chris was five. We had gone shopping at the University City shopping mall in Spokane. After some panic, we found Chris being led down the mall by a tall, oldish man (I think he was wearing a flannel shirt). Chris was crying and holding the man’s hand. The man explained that he had found Chris walking around, crying his eyes out, just a few moments before and was trying to help him find his parents.”

  This scene comes from an experiment conducted by Elizabeth F. Loftus, a professor of psychology at the University of Washington in Seattle. It was part of a study to determine whether false memories can be implanted and come to be believed with the same assuredness with which one believes real memories. Chris, who is fourteen, has no memory of ever being lost in a shopping mall, but when he is told this story by a person he regards as an authority—his older brother—his usual resistance to influence falls away. Just two days later, when Chris is asked to recall being lost, he has already attached feelings to this nonevent: “That day, I was so scared that I would never see my family again. I knew that I was in trouble.” The next day, he remembers that his mother told him never to do that again. On the fourth day, he recalls the old man’s flannel shirt. By day five, he can see the stores in the mall. He can even recollect fragments of conversation with the old man. When Chris is finally told by his older brother that the lost-in-the-mall memory is false, he is shaken: “Really? I thought I remembered being lost … and looking around for you guys. I do remember that. And then crying, and Mom coming up and saying, ‘Where were you? Don’t you—don’t you ever do that again.’ ”

  Dr. George Ganaway, who has written extensive
ly about the effect of hypnosis on memory, performed a related experiment that was inspired by Loftus’s research. He asked a highly hypnotizable subject to allow him to make a suggestion to her while she was in a trance state. The suggestion was that between the time she left the shopping mall and arrived home there were five missing hours. Could she account for the time? The subject began to tell a story about driving past a ranch and stopping to help a cow deliver a calf. Ganaway, who admits he was looking for something more exotic, added the detail that there was a bright light overhead. At once the woman recalled that there was a great noise, and she looked up to see a UFO. Both the woman and the newly born calf were taken up by aliens.

  “Did they experiment on you?” Ganaway asked.

  “No.”

  “Try harder,” he suggested.

  “Oh, yes,” she suddenly remembered, and then began to unfold an elaborate abduction drama, which spiraled back into an earlier time in her life when she had also been abducted. She then recalled a near-death experience and kept regressing until she entered a past life in eighteenth-century England, when she was living in a castle. All of this unfolded from the hypothesis that there was a gap in her day for which she needed to make an accounting.

  When the subject came out of her trance, Ganaway asked what she recalled. She remembered only delivering the calf, which she knew didn’t happen. She was shocked when he showed her a video of herself producing these statements, but upon reflection she was able to describe the daily experiences that formed the raw material of these fantasies. For instance, in the trance the subject said that the aliens had taken a tissue sample that had left a cloverleaf scar. As it happened, the day before she had been wrapping a clover leaf as a present. The eighteenth-century British lady complained of having to “sew, sew, sew,” and the subject had just completed sewing a dress for her daughter.