A Docuseries titled, In the Valley of Sin, examines when a lie is repeated so many times it almost becomes the truth. That is until the lie is finally exposed. Even if it takes a long time, the truth will always come out. The old-aged saying, if dirty lies do not come out in the laundry wash cycle, It certainly gets far worse when it comes out in the rinse.
One of Wenatchee’s darkest chapters, the infamous discredited child sex abuse cases of the mid-1990s, will be revisited in a docuseries that begins airing Sunday on Fox Nation.
“In the Valley of Sin” police will investigate and claims of a Wenatchee child sex trafficking ring that led to hundreds of arrests and convictions, several of which were later overturned.
Wenatchee, Washington, also known as “Happy Valley,” is a beautiful rural town with crisp, juicy apples in the middle of Washington state. All began to change as the Dogged family moved into Wenatchee’s peaceful aura – and reputation. In this documentary, Fox Nation dig in to explore the real story behind ‘In the Valley of Sin’ to shed some light on false claims of the child-sex ring.
Mark and Carol Doggett were accused of raping one of their children after relocating to Wenatchee in December 1994. They were sentenced to ten years in state prison. But it never happened; investigators later discovered that the Doggett children were bullied into accusing their parents of sexual assault.
However, the disclosure triggered a series of alleged crimes, resulting in discovering an alleged child sex ring known as ‘The Circle.’
‘The Circle’ only continued to worsen after Pastor Roby Roberson and his wife Connie were also arrested and charged with raping their four-year-old daughter. Police claimed they had substantial evidence against the pastor and his church congregation, and he became known as the ringleader of ‘The Circle.’
The allegation was unfounded once more, making Wenatchee look for answers.
According to the special documentary, “Wenatchee was divided. Half of the people were convinced that there was a sex fiend behind every signpost. The other half were convinced that those people thought that was crazy.”
The detective Bob Perez was responsible for leading the investigation into ‘The Circle’, whose nine-year-old foster daughter, Donna Everett, allegedly told him that her birth parents had sexually assaulted her. That makes her a central force behind these claims. Melinda, Donna’s sister, corroborated her sister’s stories of being victimized.
Later, these claims were revealed to be false — putting Bob Perez at the center of a fake news scandal that rocked Wenatchee.
Perez’s wrapped investigation led to the incarceration of 43 parents for sexual abuse allegations reaching 29,726 and placing many of their children in foster care. It was considered the largest sex ring in American history at the time. But it wasn’t true because none of it happened.
Now, a six-hour documentary series called ‘In the Valley of Sin’ tells the stories of families who were wrongfully accused and showed how they overcame these harrowing accusations.
Wenatchee police detective Bob Perez led the sex abuse investigations in 1994-1995.
42 people arrested, 28 were convicted, and 18 saw their cases dismissed or overturned on appeal after an investigation found Perez coerced suspects into making false confessions and coached testimony from witnesses.
Perez had two key victims in his foster care at the time, both of whom later recanted allegations of sexual harassment by parents and multiple acquaintances.
The “Perez Bill” forbids parents, guardians, or foster parents who are law enforcement officers from investigating sexual abuse allegations of children under their custody and was passed by the state legislature in 1999.
The law also requires caseworkers to keep near-verbatim records of disclosure interviews. It requires each state’s 39 counties to write guidelines for investigating child abuse cases.
In 2004, Perez said, “If I were an investigator charged with investigating the cases today, I’d do it the same way.” He left the department in 1997 and passed away in 2013 at the age of 60.
Insurers for the city of Wenatchee paid out more than $4 million in settlements to defendants.
As per Fox News, episodes of “Valley of Sin” should last about 45 minutes and will tell the tale of a single family who’s been affected by these false allegations and the repercussions that have pursued them for more than two decades.
Nancy Grace, a FOX Nation host, and legal analyst addresses the Wenatchee case on her daily show, Crime Stories, with Nancy Grace and on other FOX News Media platforms in conjunction with the release of the series. In her commentary, Grace will dive even deeper into the story’s details and examine the evidence and testimony that eventually unraveled the cases.
Grace said in a statement to the world, seeing a lack of justice hurts her as a crime victim and former felony prosecutor. “What any wrongfully accused person has to go through will never really be forgotten. It stays with them, in them, from that day forward, just like every other survivor of a violent crime.”
The Wenatchee Police Department was not involved in the making of the series. “They approached us, and we declined,” said Capt. Edgar Reinfeld added as no one in the department had direct knowledge of the case.
“Childhood should be carefree, playing in the sun; not living a nightmare in the darkness of the soul.” ? Dave Pelzer.
4 Responses
Quite shocking. Nancy Grace is narrating this docuseries ? What a shocker. She almost always screams everyone is guilty as standard routine
In the 1980’s it was the McMartin Preschool scandal fake news , non apologetic rail road of completely innocent people
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/McMartin_preschool_trial
Surprised that Nancy Grace is hosting this injustice. Have to see this docuseries when it airs
I truly believe that anyone who lies should go to jail themselves.