Atypical Sexual Abuse in Childhood

This study focuses on the analysis of some cases of atypical collective sexual abuse (called RA or ritual abuse). These cases of abuse are characterized by the presence of tales of bloody satanic rites, bizarre disguises animal related game with a sexual background, psychological and sexual violence, protracted intimidation conducted by abusers of children to prevent these events not to tell by their parents. The fundamental objective was to compare the prototypical cases of ritual abuse as the case of McMartin Preschool (“the case 0”) in California and the case of an Italian preschool. For the comparison we have used scientific articles about the McMartin case and the proceedings of the trial of the Italian case. These official documents were consulted with a particular attention to the psychological construct statements grid, taking into account the role played by the legal and para-legal in the event, the different legal systems in the two nations and the contribution of the media in giving processes a distorted public dimension. It will be discussed more thoroughly the content of the stories of children comparing it with literature Satanist looking coincidences between rituals described by young victims of ritual abuse with the ritual traditions of Satanism. The many ideas taken from scientific sources taken into analyses have not proved sufficient to clarify the dynamics of the various processes related to the ritual abuse given the countless variables involved throughout the evolution of the legal proceedings in which there have been mistakes by the courts that compromised the integrity of the evidence collected in the investigation. To avoid these errors is therefore necessary to extend the study of the psychological factors related to cases of ritual abuse taking into account the legal framework in which these events branded as mass hysteria evolve.