This case caused an absolute sensation among people who follow ritual abuse cases. This was the first known instance of a person pleading guilty to Satanic Ritual Abuse. Ingram was a sheriff's deputy in Olympia, WA, and local official in the Republican party. Ericka, his 21 year old daughter, attended a Pentecostal youth retreat for teenage women called Heart to Heart. A woman with prophetic and discernment powers told her that she had been sexually abused by her father. Ericka had no memories of such abuse, but went into counselling with a therapist who uses Recovered Memory Therapy to restore abuse memories that had been repressed. She was able to recover memories of Satanic Ritual Abuse involving her father which started when she was about 5 and continued until one year previously. Later she remembered that the abuse continued until just before she left home. She recalled that she had caught a sexually transmitted disease from her father and had been treated for it by two doctors: one in California and the other in Olympia. The other daughter is Julie, aged 18. She disclosed long term abuse that had continued until three years previously. They accused their father and his "poker buddies" who played a game every week at the Ingram home. One of the buddies was a vehicle mechanic who worked for the state; the others were mostly fellow police officers.
Both sisters left home. Paul was then arrested and interrogated by his fellow police officers.
The Church of Living Water that he attended taught two religious concepts that were to cause him incredible problems later:
At various times during the interrogation, he recovered images of killing a cat and murdering a prostitute.
His daughters recalled that her mother Sandy had taken a relatively passive role in the abuse. Erica recalled details of Satanic ceremonies in which 6 to 8 month old babies or fetuses were sacrificed; of being forced to have sex with animals while her mother joined in; of being present at 850 Satanic rituals which included about 25 infant sacrifices; of becoming pregnant, being tied down to the table, aborted with a coat hanger, and watching the Satanists chop up the fetus and eat it. But she was unable to remember any of the words to the Satanic chants, or even whether she stood or sat during the almost 1000 rituals. Julie and Erica both recalled having become pregnant and having abortions. They claimed that they had scars all over their body from the years of abuse. Julie accused one of her father's friends, Jim Rabie of abusing her. She was unable to recall any tattoos or scars on his body. But Jim has a "rope like, 3 inch [wide] keloidal [large, red] scar" across his chest - the result of a massive electrical shock that nearly killed him 20 years earlier. Julie said that she never changed clothes in the school locker room and always wore a T-shirt over her bathing suit, because she was so self-conscious about her scars. A medical exam showed no evidence of abortions and no marks on either daughter except for Ericka's small scar which was caused by an operation to remove an ovarian cyst (some sources say inflamed appendix).
The prosecutors hired Dr. Richard Ofshe to help them with the case. Dr. Ofshe is a world-class memory researcher, and a specialist in the tactics of coercion. He has studied Chinese Communist brainwashing techniques and recruitment methods of political groups and religious sects. He began to suspect that Ingram was delusional; so he designed a test: he confirmed with Ingram's son and two daughters that at no time had their father forced them to have sex with each other. He asked their father whether he had done such an act. He also denied it. Dr. Ofshe then asked him to go back to his cell and think about it. Ingram did this; he entered a trance like state, generated a detailed scenario about how he might have forced his children to have sex with each other, composed a multi-page confession, and signed it. This proved to Dr. Ofshe that Ingram was delusional.
There is a second independent proof that Ingram's recollections were not real memories. When he described one of the abuse scenes, an interrogator asked him what time the rape took place. In his mind, he "zeroed in" on one of the perpetrator's arms and read the time off of his watch dial. Data simply cannot be obtained from old memories in this way. (Recall a family event last year where many people were present; now try to zero in on someone's watch and read the time). Ingram's "memories" were simply fantasies created to satisfy the interrogators; they were unrelated to real events.
The prosecution decided to ignore all of the Satanic evidence and simply charge Ingram with 6 charges of rape. Ingram entered a plea of guilty in order to minimize his daughters' pain. He was convinced that he must have abused them as they described, even though his memories were unclear.
The prosecution proudly proclaimed that they had uncovered "the first ritual abuse investigation that has been confirmed by an adult offender involved directly with the offenses in the nation's history". Jim Rabie and Ray Risch, two of his poker friends, were released from jail after having been incarcerated for 158 days. Charges against them were dropped. The reason given was that Ingram's two daughters were too traumatized to testify. The men still live in Olympia, but many of the townsfolk considered them to be guilty. The charges can be picked up again at any time, within the state of limitations. Jim Rabie had a business in which he supplied lobbying services in support of law enforcement; it went bankrupt.
Unfortunately, by the time that Dr. Ofshe issued his report which showed that these memories were false, Ingram had already confessed to the crimes. When Ingram finally figured out that his "memories" were of events that did not happen, he attempted to reverse his plea. But laws in Washington state prevent a person from changing a guilty plea.
Paul Ingram has written several letters to his church: the Church of Living Water. He asked them to meet with members of the Ingram Organization which is trying to have him released from prison. He has not received a reply.
In 1994, Lawrence Wright wrote a riveting series of articles about the Ingram case in the New Yorker magazine; these were subsequently published in book form. (1) He received an award from Northwestern University for his reporting. Carol Burns, a resident of Olympia WA has created a documentary videotape of the case (2)
The Washington State Pardons Board heard a submission from Ingram, his son, memory experts Dr. Elizabeth Loftus & Dr. Richard Ofshe, the Sherrif of Thurston County, Gary Edwards, and author Lawrence Wright. They will probably reach a decision in 1996-SEP on whether to recommend to Governor Mike Lowry that he pardon Mr. Ingram. At this time, he remains in prison in Delaware. Being a former police officer, he would not have been safe if he were incarcerated in a Washington State prison. He spends his time teaching literacy to other prisoners, and revamping the Delaware correctional facilities' computer systems.