A Declaration of Innocence
MY HUSBAND IS INCARCERATED IN A TEXAS PRISON FOR AN OFFENSE THAT NEVER HAPPENED. THE MASS HYSTERIA SURROUNDING THE DAY CARE CASES AND THE REPRESSED MEMORY FAD MADE THIS POSSIBLE.
Our sons and their wives succumbed to the false science of now discredited "memory recovery" techniques used by so-called mental health professionals. They accused my husband of things that could not be further from the type of man he had always been.
He and I served the youth of our community by countless hours of volunteer work for the P.T.A, Little League Baseball, Youth Football, and High School Booster Club involvement. We both held offices in those groups and dealt with thousands of children. Over the many years we were involved there was never a hint of scandal about inappropriate behavior with children. Indeed, many of those kids were adults by the time of the trial volunteered to come forward as character witnesses for Bruce.
From the beginning great efforts were made to cover the actions of those who created this myth. Our sons had always been very close to us and communicated daily even when they were grown. Suddenly they were not allowed to speak with the parents who loved them all their loves and raised them the best way they knew how. They never came face-to-face with their father to ask if these things were true. It would seem that this would have been the least they could have done before making an extremely zealous move to have their father locked in prison.
We still love our sons with the same love God builds in to parental hearts. We fear for their souls if they do not recant the horrible lies that caused this madness. I believe it was the week before Mother's Day in 2001, I for the first time had a real telephone conversation with my eldest son. I did tell him I had found in my heart to forgive him and his brother for what they did to me and their dad, yet the one thing I personally had been unable to forgive them for was what they had done to their own children. God will be their judge…may He forgive them. It could be said, "They know not what they do." But that is no longer true…the world has been made aware that the techniques used to get my grand-children to say all those false things is nothing more than brainwashing.
Only a radical fringe of the mental health professionals in this country cling to the ideal that those memories they "recovered" were real. The mainstream studies have proven memory in small children is extremely easy to manipulate. The professional organizations for Psychologists and Psychiatrists have discredited the techniques used on our daughter in law and our grandchildren as bogus and harmful in the extreme.
An old proverb said, a man who would ride a tiger should consider first how to dismount without being eaten at the end of the ride. Those who make these accusations come under the obligations inherent with acceptance of financial aid from the victim's funds established from tax money. The system never wishes to admit error so even people who discover they made mistakes in their accusations cannot recant for fear their original testimony will be held as perjury against them. Actually that is not totally true. My husband and I would have to press those charges and we would never do such a thing.
An old uncle of mine said, "it is hard to stay mad for that long". It seems my sons have proven him wrong with the influence of the professional "victims groups" out there. A professor of Psychology at Sam Houston State University told her class at the prison where my husband is incarcerated that she and her husband attended some of the Victim's Groups meeting after the loss of their daughter to a heinous crime. They agreed when on the way home from one of the meetings that they could not stay angry as long as those folks were doing. They agreed that it was not healthy to their own minds to dwell forever on hating the ones who did that crime. They decided to let the incarceration of those perpetrators be handled under the laws of Texas and to move on with their lives.
My eldest son this past year attacked us again because my website discussed the facts of this case as recorded in public records. They do not ever want the world to know the lies that were told in that courtroom.
The pretense of his "victim's complaint" to the prison system was that my husband had "Established and was operating a business" while in prison. This due to that on my website I had some of my husbands many beautiful paintings for sale. After many telephone conversations with various officials with T.D.C.J. and them agreeing that he had no access to the Internet they refused to back off what resulted in them giving my husband a "major" case. Bruce was severely punished for this and lost a number of privileges he had earned by keeping an absolutely clean disciplinary record for the ten years he was there at the time. One of the privileges was the loss of one of the "contact visits" we share each month. Now only two are allowed and the rest of the weekends we visit with a wire screen between us. We miss the hugs and kisses we are allowed at the beginning and end of the visits and the handholding allowed during the visit.
In fact what we did violates no rules of T.D.C.J. or laws of the state but we have no recourse to the courts because Bruce's sentence negates the accumulation of "good time" since he has no guaranteed discharge date that includes good time and work time that he accrues. It is at the whim of the Parole Board that he may be granted parole. Others punished under this same "rule" do have recourse to the courts and the ACLU is assisting in their cases.
When the warden discussed the case with Bruce very little was said about the sale of the items. Many highlighted areas of our site and others were brought into the discussion and the content of the website with regards to Bruce's innocence seemed to be the focus of the inquisition.
High-ranking officials of T.D.C.J. and members of the Texas Legislature have advised me that the first amendment guarantees me the right to express myself in this website as long as there is no libelous statement made. We will no longer offer his craft items for sale however. What a shame! He is in hopes of getting back into the craft shop soon, finally so I suppose we will continue to donate some of his paintings to various organizations for fund raising and give some as gifts. Surely no one could find fault in that?
We are grateful for the support of so many friends who have fought this same fight after bogus practitioners of bad therapy procedures, which created false memories, duped their loved ones. Please keep us in your prayers as God works this out.
Carol A. Perkins
2004
Carol A. Perkins7019 St. Highway 75 South #12
Huntsville TX 77340
(936) 662-7333
caperkins@suddenlink.net