Famous Cases: The McMartin Preschool Trial 

By Noah Bolmer 

The McMartin Preschool trial stands as a pivotal moment in the study of how criminal proceedings can be destabilized by cultural anxiety and flawed investigative practices. Beginning in the early 1980s, the case drew national attention as allegations of child sexual abuse at a California preschool expanded into claims of ritualistic activity and conspiratorial networks. The sheer scale of the prosecution, involving hundreds of children and multiple defendants, transformed what might have been a localized investigation into a prolonged spectacle. For those engaged in expert testimony, the trial illustrates the consequences of introducing untested methodologies into evidentiary processes, particularly in the interviewing of children and the handling of psychological evidence.  

Background 

The events leading to the McMartin Preschool trial began in 1983 in Manhattan Beach, California, after a mother accused a teacher, Ray Buckey—the son of school owner Peggy McMartin Buckey—of sexually abusing her son. The police response was unusually expansive: letters were sent to hundreds of parents advising them to question their children about possible abuse. This action transformed a single allegation into a community-wide investigation. 

As the inquiry progressed, children were interviewed repeatedly by therapists and investigators. The sessions produced a growing body of allegations, ranging from claims of molestation to elaborate stories of hidden tunnels, animal sacrifices, and flights in hot-air balloons. These accounts, though lacking corroborating physical evidence, became the foundation for charges against seven members of the McMartin family and staff. 

The New York Times reported: 

Ten years of torture and sexual abuse at a suburban preschool scarred ”a whole generation of children” during hundreds of molestations, according to allegations disclosed today by prosecutors and grand jury testimony [. . .] Citing the transcripts, Judge George revoked bail. 

The case moved into the courts with extraordinary scope. Pretrial hearings stretched on for years, narrowing the number of defendants but maintaining the central charges. By the time the trial formally began, it had already become the longest and most expensive criminal proceeding in U.S. history. The narrative of the prosecution was built almost entirely on the testimony of children, shaped by the investigative methods of the era, and the trial’s trajectory was defined by the tension between those accounts and the absence of physical or corroborative evidence. 

The First Trial 

By the time the case reached trial in 1987, the scope had narrowed considerably from the original charges. After years of preliminary hearings, only two defendants remained: Ray Buckey and his mother, Peggy McMartin Buckey. The prosecution’s case was set to rely almost entirely on the testimony of children who had attended the preschool, supported by the investigators and therapists who had conducted the interviews. 

The courtroom was prepared for an unusually long and complex proceeding. Jury selection itself stretched over months, reflecting the difficulty of seating jurors in a case that had already drawn national attention and intense local scrutiny. The New York Times reported: 

Finding jurors to serve in high-publicity criminal cases has never been easy, but the demands placed on those who will eventually decide charges that children were molested at the McMartin Preschool will be extraordinary. 

The jurors may have to serve up to two years, must have excellent memory and will be warned not to talk about the case with anyone, even a spouse. 

To help find such people, Judge William R. Pounders summoned 500 prospective jurors to the Los Angeles Superior Court recently and stressed that this was no ordinary trial. ”The trial is somewhat unusual because we estimate it will take a year to present evidence to the jury, and in the worst situation possibly, if things go wrong during the trial, it might take a year and a half, possibly even two years,” he said. 

The prosecution organized its presentation around dozens of child witnesses, each recounting alleged incidents of abuse, while the defense prepared to challenge the methods by which those accounts had been elicited. The trial opened with the expectation that the state would demonstrate a pattern of systematic abuse within the preschool, using the children’s testimony as the central evidence. The defense strategy was to highlight the absence of physical corroboration and to question the reliability of the investigative process. With these opposing frameworks established, the first trial began as a contest over credibility and methodology rather than material proof. 

Primary Experts 

The prosecution’s case leaned heavily on Kee MacFarlane, the therapist from Children’s Institute International who conducted many of the child interviews. She introduced anatomically correct dolls and structured questioning techniques, presenting them as tools to help children disclose abuse. Her testimony was intended to explain why children might initially deny abuse but later provide detailed accounts, and to frame the investigative process as reliable despite inconsistencies. 

On the defense side, the most prominent figure was Dr. Michael Maloney, a psychiatrist who reviewed the interview tapes. Maloney focused on the mechanics of the sessions, pointing out how interviewer speech dominated the exchanges and how repeated, leading prompts shaped children’s responses. He argued that the methods used were not neutral fact-finding but instead risked producing narratives influenced by suggestion. 

Kee MacFarlane 

Kathleen “Kee” MacFarlane entered the McMartin proceedings as the lead therapist from Children’s Institute International (CII), where she directed the Child Sexual Abuse Center. She had trained as a social worker after initially pursuing fine arts, later earning her master’s degree in social work. By the time of the trial, she was recognized for developing and promoting the use of anatomically correct dolls in child interviews, a technique she argued helped children communicate experiences they could not otherwise verbalize. 

At trial, MacFarlane testified extensively about her methods and the rationale behind them. Her performance in court was marked by a confident defense of the techniques, even as the defense pressed her on the suggestibility of children and the leading nature of her interviews. MacFarlane maintained that the children’s disclosures were genuine and that her methods were necessary to overcome denial and fear. She became emblematic of the prosecution’s approach: presenting child testimony as credible despite inconsistencies and framing investigative innovations as essential tools rather than liabilities. 

While direct was brief and focused on her credentials, cross-examination would dissect her taped interviews, and in particular, her use of anatomically correct dolls: 

Defense: ‘If you have a good memory like all the other kids.’ Isn’t that putting pressure on [the interviewed girl]? 

MacFarlane: I’m not asking [her] to comply with my statement….

And another doll representing defendant Raymond Buckey:

Defense: ‘I think we should beat up Mr. Ray. . . . What a bad guy! Don’t you think he’s a bad guy? He’s not gonna do this any more to kids, is he?’ Did you encourage [the interviewed girl] to beat up the Ray doll?”

MacFarlane: In a manner of speaking, yes.

Defense: Just taking the act of a child beating a doll, do you feel there is a difference in interpreting what is going on when a child beats a doll of their own volition, as opposed to a child beating a doll at the suggestion of an adult?

MacFarlane: It can be different. It can be the same. It depends on the child. . . . It may be the same, whether they’re invited to do it or whether they do it on their own.

MacFarlane’s presence in the trial was not limited to technical testimony; she became a public face of the case; her methods scrutinized both inside and outside the courtroom. The reliance on her interviews meant that her credibility was inseparable from the prosecution’s evidentiary foundation, and her testimony set the stage for the defense’s counterarguments led by Dr. Michael Maloney. 

Dr. Michael Maloney 

Dr. Michael Maloney was the defense’s primary expert witness in the first McMartin trial. His role was to scrutinize the videotaped interviews conducted at Children’s Institute International, particularly those led by Kee MacFarlane. Maloney approached the tapes as a clinical observer, focusing on the structure of the sessions rather than the content of the children’s allegations. 

In court, Maloney testified that the interviews were dominated by adult speech and leading prompts, with children often pressured into agreement rather than offering spontaneous disclosures. He noted that the interviewers frequently repeated questions until children produced the desired responses. A practice he argued compromised the reliability of the testimony. Maloney described the sessions as examples of interviewer bias shaping the narrative, rather than neutral fact-finding. On direct, he stated: 

Yes, I came to several after watching perhaps five or six tapes in their entirety. One conclusion was that the interviews were clearly led by the interviewer rather than focused on the child, or the interviewee. And the other was that the vast amount of verbiage, or words said, were said by the interviewer, not by the children. Another observation was that these children indeed could talk and did seem quite willing to talk at the outset of the interview, and there did not appear to be a need for that kind of approach. In fact, that kind of an approach would be counterproductive in the sense that the interviewers were saying too much, and providing too much information, what I would refer to as a ‘stage setting.’ 

His testimony provided the defense with a systematic critique of the prosecution’s evidentiary foundation. By dissecting the tapes, Maloney highlighted how the investigative methods themselves introduced contamination into the record. He did not attempt to interpret the children’s accounts directly but instead concentrated on the mechanics of how those accounts were elicited. This approach positioned him as the methodological counterweight to MacFarlane, challenging the legitimacy of the prosecution’s central evidence. 

Later, he also raised suspicions regarding when recordings started: 

I would like to add, however, in a number of these tapes, there is something going on. You don’t see a picture of a child walking in, and an examiner walking in and sitting down. They are already in process, so something could have happened before. I don’t know what. But when they are sitting down in this phase, they are drawing a picture of the person, frequently out-lined by the examiner. 

Expert Dynamics and Trial Progression 

The first McMartin trial was defined by the interplay between MacFarlane and Maloney. MacFarlane’s testimony sought to normalize the investigative methods used at the CII, presenting the dolls and repeated questioning as necessary tools to overcome children’s reluctance. Maloney’s testimony, in turn, dissected those same interviews, pointing out how interviewer dominance and suggestive prompts compromised the reliability of the disclosures. The courtroom became a forum where methodological credibility was tested, with each expert positioned as the embodiment of their side’s evidentiary strategy. 

This dynamic shaped the rhythm of the trial. The prosecution leaned on MacFarlane and her colleagues to sustain the narrative of systematic abuse, while the defense relied on Maloney’s critique to erode confidence in the investigative record. The jury was asked to navigate not only the children’s testimony but also the competing frameworks offered by the experts, each presenting a different lens through which to interpret the evidence. 

As the trial moved forward, the sheer length of proceedings and the volume of testimony underscored the difficulty of resolving those competing claims. Months of testimony from children, therapists, and investigators were counterbalanced by the defense’s methodical challenges. By the time the first trial wound toward its conclusion, the evidentiary contest between MacFarlane and Maloney had become the central axis around which the case revolved, setting the stage for the jury’s deliberations and the eventual retrial. 

Media Climate and Public Reaction 

From the moment the allegations surfaced, the McMartin case was amplified by newspapers and television in ways that shaped how the public understood it. Local outlets in Southern California reported the most sensational details from the children’s interviews—claims of underground tunnels, bizarre rituals, and flights in balloons—without the kind of skepticism that might have tempered the narrative. National coverage quickly followed, presenting the case as part of a broader crisis of hidden child abuse in America. 

Television segments often featured Kee MacFarlane demonstrating anatomically correct dolls, explaining how they were used to help children disclose abuse. This made her not just a courtroom witness but a recognizable figure in the national conversation. The visibility of her methods reinforced the sense that the case was groundbreaking, even as critics began to question whether the techniques were reliable. 

Peggy Buckey was attacked by an angry parent: 

In February….I very stupidly took a small pair of scissors [for protection] and I let my dogs in the house and I went out to the back. [ . . .] This guy threatened me that he would harm my mother. He took scissors and [. . .] cut me all over. He said if I told anyone he would get my mom.  

Public opinion fractured as the years passed. Early on, many parents and community members accepted the allegations as credible, given the authority of investigators and therapists. But as the trial dragged on and no physical evidence emerged, skepticism grew. Commentators began to frame the case as emblematic of a cultural panic, while others continued to insist it revealed the hidden dangers of child abuse. 

By the time the first trial ended, the McMartin proceedings had become a cultural touchstone. The press had transformed the case into a symbol of both vigilance and excess, ensuring that the retrial would unfold under the weight of public scrutiny already shaped by years of sensational coverage. 

The Second Trial 

After the first trial ended with Peggy McMartin Buckey acquitted and a hung jury on most charges against Ray Buckey, prosecutors chose to retry Ray alone in 1990. This second proceeding was deliberately narrower: fewer witnesses, fewer charges, and less reliance on expert testimony. The prosecution attempted to streamline its case by focusing on a smaller set of allegations, avoiding the broader ritual-abuse narrative that had dominated earlier years. 

Despite the reduced scope, the retrial failed to secure a conviction. Jurors found the children’s testimony inconsistent and unconvincing, especially without physical evidence to support the claims. In August 1990, Ray Buckey was acquitted on all remaining counts. With that verdict, the McMartin Preschool saga came to an end—seven years of investigation and prosecution, two full trials, and no convictions. The case left behind damaged reputations, traumatized families, and a lasting cautionary tale about the dangers of hysteria-driven prosecutions. 

Conclusion 

The McMartin trials closed with a sobering recognition: professional authority can falter when it is pressed into service for public anxiety. Methods that were once hailed as breakthroughs in child psychology and forensic interviewing proved vulnerable to suggestion and bias, and their weaknesses became clear under courtroom scrutiny. The case showed how fragile testimony becomes when elicited through techniques that prioritize belief over verification. 

What endures is a recalibration of practice. Investigators became more deliberate in how children are questioned; courts demanded greater rigor from expert witnesses, and the broader culture grew wary of letting fear dictate procedure. The legacy of McMartin lies in this shift toward caution and methodological discipline, a reminder that expertise must be grounded in evidence if it is to withstand the weight of collective panic. 

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