Melvin Quinney

I heard the story about this man (who could be any white person’s kindly grandfather) on NPR last night. He is a San Antonio man wrongfully convicted in 1991 during the so-called Satanic Panic hysteria. In court last Monday, Melvin Quinney had his charge dismissed by 227th District Court Judge Christina Del Prado. The state exonerated Melvin Quinney of his conviction of indecency with a child back in February but Monday’s hearing made the exoneration official. “It’s like the beginning of the end of a very long nightmare,” Quinney said.

I wish I could say these kinds of “miscarriage of justice in the name of religion” cases were only in the past but unfortunately, even today, I know evangelicals who still believe these kinds of things. Satan and evil in this world especially related to child trafficking (QAnon certainly is on that page). It’s not that I don’t think that such things happen and I do feel that anytime a child is sexually abused – it is a travesty. But under religious fervor, these heartfelt feelings, can do a lot of harm. A friend said to me once, “It has everything to do with pagan rituals and actual Satanic influence in many places. It’s because of my love for children that I will fight with all I have to rid this world of those things. If I had not studied Biblical Prophecy and Pagan rituals I probably wouldn’t understand what I am seeing now.” Sigh. I understand it is heartfelt for her.

Today, I found this blog – Friendly Atheist by Hemant Mehta LINK>A victim of the “Satanic Panic,” Melvin Quinney has finally been exonerated. The “Satanic Panic” was a conspiracy theory that really took hold among a certain kind of Christian in the 1980s. Perfectly innocent people were accused of ritualistic child abuse, bad behavior was blamed on the devil, and the modern-day witch hunt ruined countless lives. No evidence ever proved this organized abuse was occurring—certainly not the way accusers insisted it was—but as with so many conspiracy theories, its power had nothing to do with the facts.

Melvin got trapped by this when he and his wife were going through a divorce in 1990. It was she that accused the 43-year-old Quinney of leading a Satanic cult that murdered people. His kids were soon taken into custody by Child Protective Services. John, his 10-year-old son, accused Quinney of sexual abuse. After weeks of coercion from therapists, their mother and other adults, Sarah and John developed “memories” of abuse and occult rituals. John came to believe that their father was the leader of a satanic cult that had committed murder and sexually abused him and his sister Sarah as part of satanic rituals. Melvin was arrested in 1990 and charged with indecency with a child. John testified at trial about his “memories” of his father’s abuse of himself and Sarah.

Melvin was released from prison in 1999, an early release for good behavior. However, even then, he was forced to register as a sex offender. This deprived him opportunities to get his life back on track. It wasn’t until 2012, that he finally attempted to get back in touch with his kids (who had grown up believing their father abused them). His children had grown up in foster care. Finally, in 2020, his children testified that there was no evidence that their father ever did those things he was accused of. His son told the court he realized much later, that those stories were entirely fictional. They had been fed to him by his mother, her evangelical friends, and other adults working against his father as a way to override the “good memories” he had of him.

His ex-wife was unable to care for the children not long after he was imprisoned and so, they were pushed into the state’s foster care system. His wife mother passed away in 1999. Her son says that she was clearly mentally ill. He says, “Instead of getting help with the real mental problems she was experiencing, she was persuaded and kept mentally ill with pseudoscience and superstition.” For years, the children thought they would be targeted by satanic cult members. He has since forgiven her.

The blog ends on this thought – the Satanic Panic has always been that no matter how many bad faith actors use Satan as a metaphor for what they hate, there are many pastors who spend every week convincing their congregations that Satan is real and needs to be eradicated from their lives. They’ll never admit they’re lying because they genuinely don’t believe they are. As long as that belief perpetuates in churches, it’s next to impossible to convince people that Satan and the abuse associated with Satan are entirely fictional. That means, much like sin itself, conservative Christians have invented their own problem out of thin air, while presenting themselves as the only solution.