Paul Ingram was an active Christian, well-known and respected in his community in Washington State. He was a deputy sheri and Chairman of the local Republican party. It all changed in 1988 when his two daughters accused him of sexual abuse. After months of interrogation Paul confessed and pleaded guilty without trial. He provided many vivid descriptions of his crimes.

When Paul was interrogated by the police, he said at rst that he had no memories of the abuse. At the same time, he said that he didn’t raise his daughters to lie. Investigators and court-appointed experts told him that it was common for child abusers to be in a state of denial and suppress memories of their crimes. Paul’s pastor conducted an exorcism ritual and conrmed that Paul had an evil side. He advised Paul to pray to the Lord for his memories to return. As Paul prayed, he began to see images of him abusing Ericka and Julie when they were little. The police asked for details, and details followed, very vivid, including the set-up of the room and the time on the clock.

Then the girls’ claims grew stronger. They said they had been victims of more than 800 satanic rituals that involved more than 30 members of the sheri’s department, and that they were impregnated several times and given abortions by their father. They claimed they had many scars from the violent rituals. They also drew maps to show where on Ingram property the satanic rituals had been taking place. They said they had witnessed more than 30 murders and burial of the bodies.

Despite a very extensive search, none of these claims could be supported by evidence, such as medical examination and even excavation of Ingram properties. Finally, Dr Richard Ofshe, an expert in “cult behaviour”, was hired to investigate the case. He conducted extensive interviews with both Paul and his daughters and became convinced that the daughters were not telling the truth and Paul had been manipulated into developing false memories. To test this, he met with Paul and told him that Ericka and Julie described an episode when Paul forced incest between one of them and one of their brothers while he was watching. In fact, Ofshe had made this episode up. Paul told Ofshe he could not remember the incident. Ofshe asked Paul to return to his cell and pray about it in the same way that he used to recover his other memories. What followed several months later was a detailed written confession to an incident that only existed in Paul’s mind. However, this “experiment” was not taken by the court seriously. Paul was sentenced to 20 years in prison. He remained in jail until 2003.

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