By Catherine McKnight
The further jury trial continued in People v. Ellis on Wednesday morning. The People rested their case and Deputy Public Defender Joseph Gocke presented his evidence and sole witness, Dr. William O’Donohue.
Dr. O’Donohue is a professor at the University of Nevada and has received his PhD in clinical psychology. He is the director of the Victims of Crime Treatment Center in Nevada and is also a member of several other boards and organizations. Judge Stephen Mock allowed Dr. O’Donohue to testify as an expert witness in areas such as childhood memory, human sexuality and childhood development.
On direct examination, Dr. O’Donohue testified that he and colleagues received a grant from the National Institute of Mental Health to support research on the evaluation of the forensic interviewing of children.
Deputy District Attorney Robert Gorman later asked, “Can children be subject to suggestion by others?”
“Yes, very normally suggestive.” He went on to explain that by nature, children like to believe adults and that affects their evaluative beliefs. He also has done research on false memories that children may have and why, and that problematic interviewing may play a role in such, as, for instance, repeated questions.
Dr. O’Donohue explained the different cues children pick up on, such as verbal, paraverbal, and nonverbal. This simply means cues such as the semantic content of a question, tone of voice, and bodily signs. He testified that he did an evaluation of both interviews in this case – both videos were shown to the jury in the earlier stages of the trial.
Dr. O’Donohue explained how certain things are easier to evaluate than others, such as a contradictory statement that simply cannot be true. He said that these kinds of statements are particularly revealing because the notion is that, in children who have actually been abused, their statements are almost always consistent. When a child is inconsistent, he said, the allegation is partly false because of logic.
In Child Doe One’s interview, Dr. O’Donohue noted the core details such as the defendant, Mr. Ellis, instructing him and his cousin to masturbate, their being in a tent, and a pornography video being shown. However, a bizarre detail that Child Doe One discussed was not discussed at all in Child Doe Two’s interview – Kevin Ellis putting a lighter “up his butt.”
Dr. O’Donohue talked about another incident in the tent when one child was able to become erect and penetrate Mr. Ellis in the anus. He said that this seems inconsistent, because if fear and anxiety are factors – such as both children repeated in the interviews – it would inhibit a male from getting an erection. When somebody is traumatized, especially a child, it is logistically difficult to accomplish.
He went on to explain how core details such as the lighter should be salient to both boys present. When one reports that, he said, and the other does not, that is an inconsistency that is unusual and could be a reflection of a false report. He also explained in further detail how, when a child is scared or traumatized, the mind is focused in a different way and that things are processed astutely.
In sexual abuse cases, Dr. O’Donohue said it is more likely than not that the victim remembers specific events because they have been hurt, puzzled, or simply are in fear. “Abuse causes fear. Most children in sexual abuse cases tend to avoid the perpetrator.”
Dr. O’Donohue has been counseling victims of abuse for 25 years, with about 2000 victims total. Mr. Gocke asked him about ways that a child’s memory could be impacted. He said that when being interviewed, for example, there could be repetitive questions, leading questions, conformity press, selectively reinforcing, disconfirmation, poor rapport, and so on.
Outside contamination occurs when other people talk to the child, especially family. This is because they could have their own agendas – although outside contamination does not have to be intentional. In Child Doe One’s interview, Dr. O’Donohue said there could be outside contamination because the child said he talked about the allegations to other people. The child also had another conversation with his stepmom, who had said that Mr. Ellis had abused others before.
Dr. O’Donohue said that situations like this could create a negative halo, such as when somebody tells another that someone is bad – it could create false memories or they could reinterpret the experience in a more negative light.
Mr. Gocke questioned him on how common it would be for a pedophile to perform an act with a child in front of another child. Dr. O’Donohue said that is rare and that most pedophiles would not do that because it creates a witness to the act, and almost all pedophiles like to isolate their victims.
This means that they do not want the victim to be out in public soon after the act, and that it would be unusual for the perpetrator to sexually abuse a child and then an hour or two later, go out with that same child and the family to get pizza, hypothetically.
On cross-examination, DDA Gorman had Dr. O’Donohue list all 18 potential biasing factors an interviewer can use. He asked him to do this to show that there are only a couple factors that point to bias or contamination.
The main factors Dr. O’Donohue pointed out were that neither of the boys were instructed for “disclosure inhibition” – he said this is important because, if there had been anything that they were uncomfortable discussing, the interviewer did not know. The other main factor was outside contamination, which was discussed above.
He went on to explain that outside contamination was the source of his concern in both interviews. He did say, however, that the interviews were both “good” in general.
What we do not know, he went on, is why neither child was ever asked if they had discussions about what happened with each other. Because of that, we do not know the nature of their conversations, if any, or if they could have influenced each other.
Mr. Gorman asked the doctor about performance anxiety and if it is really possible in a 10- or 11-year-old. He said yes, that it does play a factor and that if someone is being abused, there should be anxiety, which inhibits erections. He also said that is a “pretty reliable finding” and that, in some cases, after hundreds of times of being abused, the child may be able to become erect, but it is rare in the first few cases.
He also said that there might be some homosexual or bisexual tendencies if the boy were able to become erect, because there needs to be arousal in order to get erect.
Mr. Gorman also noted that there are consistent core details in both cases, and the doctor agreed. However, the core details that one boy noted and the other did not point to inconsistencies. He also discussed how, if marijuana were involved, the “pedophile” would worry about the child being high, especially if going out in public.
Finally, he repeated that the “inconsistency in a core detail is rare in a sexual abuse case.” Although there is variance in some factors, it could be possible that the other child did not see the lighter, but the doctor said that is very unusual.
On re-direct, Mr. Gocke asked him about conformity press. “In your experience, can an interview in an MDIC [Multi-Discipline Interview Center] setting be fine, but still have logistical problems in the allegations?” He said yes, and that children almost always tell the truth in sexual abuse cases. He said he would expect two children to have similar recalls of the event.
Overall, Dr. O’Donohue said that they were good interviews, but at the same time, they failed to collect the children’s memories of the situation. He also said that it would be very unusual for a child to seek out help with math homework by the perpetrator after being sexually abused, which is what allegedly happened in this case. It was also discussed that children would not normally want to bring their friend into a situation where they have been abused.
Dr. O’Donohue was excused and the defense rested their case. Closing arguments are expected to be heard Thursday morning.
After seeing the lack of interest in this case I believe people would be more interested if Mr Ellis was an accused child molester in addition to being an outspoken opponent of the plastic bag ban.
Or been a proponent of fluoridation.
i’m not sure what i would even say until we see whath jury comes back with.
As of a couple of days ago, one juror was sure he was guilty.
Asked why a guilty defendant would go to trial rather than work out a plea, in light of the graphic testimony and shocking details, the answer was that the defendant appeared to enjoy the attention of the trial, and appeared smug.
It will be extremely difficult, if not impossible, to overcome jurors’ belief — formed on the first day of testimony, and reinforced for 5 more days or so — that the defendant is anything but guilty. O’Donohue’s expert testimony may have come too late in the proceedings to overcome first impressions.
Is someone soliciting a juror for information?
No. The juror was very, very upset about testimony/evidence that young children had been badly abused/molested and wanted to unload a little bit without saying too much about an ongoing trial.
My question to the juror was hypothetical; I didn’t expect an answer. I had my own ideas about the reason for a trial but didn’t want to say what I thought and take any chance on influencing the juror.
Interesting
@Eagle eye….. you do know you are instructed NOT to speak to a juror? I am curious as to who you were inside the courtroom? Or how you found yourself in the company of a juror? I must agree with Mr. Obvious, interesting………indeed!