Part 6: Sexual molestation trial pits 6-year-old against stepfather

"It was really sad," his mother said recently. "He was very upset."

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PART 6 OF THE SERIES

The little boy later took the stand and did a lousy job of telling the jury what his stepfather had allegedly done to him. According to Matthew and his mother, Ronald Chafin of Jonesboro had repeatedly sexually molested him - anally raping the child and periodically putting sticks, beer bottles and his adult hand in the little boy's anus.

Tapes of the 1988 trial reveal that in front of the judge and jury, the child was nervous and distracted and, when asked about bottles and anal sex, whispered his response. After three days of testimony, the judge directed a verdict of not guilty.

Mr. Chafin calls the allegations absurd and says his former wife brainwashed her child. Despite his acquittal, he says today that he has been permanently scarred by the charges.

"I can't be damaged any more than I already have been," he said recently. "It was scary. You can't believe it's happening to you. One morning you're married with a wife and kid, and the next thing you know this is happening."

But the case of Matthew goes beyond the separation of fact from fiction in the face of sexual abuse allegations. It offers an inside view of the trauma that often permeates a courtroom in such cases. Perhaps more than anything, Matthew's story underscores the court's insensitivity to child witnesses.

During the trial, Matthew was seated directly facing Mr. Chafin. His psychologist, Dr. Barrie Alexander - an expert in child molestation - was not allowed to tell the court what the little boy had told her, despite a recently passed state law that permits such testimony. His mother's testimony was also limited.

The verdict was directed by Judge Joe C. Crumbley, chief judge of the Clayton County Superior Court, who told the jury the state had failed to prove venue "beyond a reasonable doubt." In court parlance, that means Assistant District Attorney Daniel J. Cahill had failed to show that the alleged crime had been committed in Clayton County.

But under the law, "slight evidence of venue is all you need," Mr. Cahill said recently. "I thought that was the least of my worries in that case."

Today, some jurors say they were stunned by the judge's abrupt decision to end the trial.

"I was very disturbed when he brought us back into the courtroom and said there was no case," said Phillip C. Bohan, a regional director for Eastern Airlines. "I was appalled."

Even if the judge had not directed a verdict of not guilty, Mr. Cahill says the state's case was weakened by the judge's refusal to allow most hearsay evidence, even though the prosecutor and others contend state law permits such testimony.

Recognizing children's limitations, the Georgia Legislature passed a general hearsay exception for children in 1986. That exception allows the testimony of people to whom a child may have disclosed abuse - people such as Dr. Alexander, a licensed psychologist who has treated several hundred sexually abused children in the last six years.

She had begun seeing Matthew in June 1987 and continued seeing him up to the trial in April 1988. But jurors would hear very little from Dr. Alexander that day in Clayton County Superior Court. Nor would they get a full report from the Grady Memorial Hospital pediatrics resident who had examined the boy.

"It was definitely the worst experience I've ever had as an expert witness in the courtroom," Dr. Alexander recently said.

Judge Crumbley said the admission of hearsay would have been a violation of state law. "Georgia law basically says that the hearsay exception can only come in if the child is available on cross- examination," he recently said.

The child not only was available, he testified twice. "He has to be available for meaningful cross-examination," the judge said. "This child could not talk."

A Confrontation Between Mother, Stepfather 

Before she married Mr. Chafin, Judy Hanson had been married and divorced twice. Matthew's father was a man she'd had an affair with. They were never married.

In court, J. Dunham McAllister, her husband's attorney, would ask her if she'd ever used a vibrator for sexual gratification. Did she presently own one? When did she last have one? The questions had the intended effect.

"I don't guess it had anything to do with it, but it sure didn't look good," said John H. Roseberry, a juror.

Ms. Hanson is a small, thin, articulate woman with the dark hair of her son. A registered nurse who often works with terminally ill patients, Ms. Hanson describes herself as overly trusting.

Her former husband calls her "selfish" and "crazy" - "a paranoid schizophrenic and a sociopath." "Until somebody stops her, she's going to ruin more lives," he said.

In high school, she had chased Ronnie Chafin, a success-oriented, intelligent young man who sometimes arranged free band concerts at nursing homes. They married more than a decade later, just after Matthew had celebrated his second birthday.

Ms. Hanson says she became concerned about her 4-year-old son in October 1986 when he walked into their bathroom in Clayton County with a tube of K-Y jelly and told her it was for use in one's anus. She asked her husband how the child would know such a thing; he suggested he'd learned it at the doctor's, where anal temperatures were usually taken.

"I said OK, and let it drop," Ms. Hanson said. Seven months later she went to Alabama for a weeklong course in polarity therapy, a therapeutic massage she has learned to help alleviate the pain of some of her sicker patients.

In court, Mr. McAllister would ask a number of questions about the therapy. "The sphincter muscle has to relax to insert something," he recently explained. "If she teaches people to relax, she is better equipped to get the proper relaxation from that child than my client."

While she was in Alabama, Ms. Hanson left her son with friends. There were things that worried her, she said. One was that Matthew had been having increasingly severe nightmares. Another was a sudden recollection that she had always insisted doctors take his temperature under his arm.

By week's end, she says, she was in a panic. "I thought I was crazy. It was just a gut feeling more than anything."

When she returned home, she threw open the door and confronted her husband. "What the hell have you done to my son?" she screamed. "What the hell have you done to Matthew?"

It was one discussion she would be allowed to relate to the jury. According to Ms. Hanson, her husband stood up and responded, "No, you can't accuse me of that. I've been too careful. I swear I've never raped him."

Psychologist: 'A Lot Happened to This Child' 

In recounting the story today, she says his response confirmed her fears. But members of her family did not at first believe her. They would later change their minds. Initially her parents "were fixing to lock me up," she says. According to family members, Ms. Hanson was not the most reliable or stable person.

But the boy's father and his wife say they had also been concerned about Matthew's behavior - his violent outbursts and his anxiety whenever they changed their baby's diaper.

"He'd hover over me, asking very pointed questions," his stepmother said recently. "Now thinking back on it, it kills me."

Mr. Chafin calls the allegations preposterous. "I was falsely accused, period," he said. "What she [Ms. Hanson] has done is bogus. All she did was lie. I didn't do anything. I loved that child, period, as if he was my own."

About a week later, as Matthew was getting ready for bed, Ms. Hanson asked him if his stepfather had ever hurt him.

"Yes, Mommy, he put his hand and bottles and other things in me," she said he told her. She says she sat on the bed and rocked him as the two cried. "I said, 'I'm so sorry, I'm so sorry.' I just sat there and held him. That's all I could do."

Ms. Hanson said that a few days after Matthew made his allegations, she took her son to Grady. Dr. William Robert Smith would later testify that Matthew's "rectal sphincter was very lax and allowed extremely easy passage"; that the muscle tone was decreased and "abnormal." But he would not get to tell the jury how it might have gotten that way. Mr. McAllister successfully objected at almost every turn.

Mr. Chafin described the physician's testimony as ineffectual. "The doctor didn't say anything," he said. "Mildly dilated, big deal."

The day after she took Matthew to Grady, Ms. Hanson says, they went to see Detective Hank J. Derbyshire of the Clayton County Police Department. He would be the only one permitted by the judge to testify about what the child had said to him.

The testimony was graphic. In a meeting at the department, the detective said, Matthew had told him that in addition to anal intercourse, Mr. Chafin had put sticks and beer bottles in his anus.

A man with six years of investigating more than 150 child molestation cases, Detective Derbyshire said recently that the boy's description was too explicit, too detailed for a child that age unless he'd had firsthand experience. Furthermore, he said, Dr. Smith, a man also experienced in child molestation cases, had told him that the condition of the child's anus was a clear sign of sexual abuse.

About the same time, Ms. Hanson says, she also made an appointment for Matthew to see Dr. Alexander, a psychologist in private practice with Cliff Valley Psychologists.

"He said his daddy, Ronnie, had done things to hurt him," Dr. Alexander recently said. "Using the anatomically correct doll, he said Ronnie stuck his hand in his bottom. He said, 'It didn't feel good and he made it hurt.' Later he got more graphic."

In January 1988, Matthew told Dr. Anderson that the defendant had shoved a beer bottle up his anus and anally raped him, she said. According to the psychologist, the child walked into her office one day and began drawing pictures that he then asked her to compile in a book. Because he was so young, he told her what he wanted her to write as titles for the pictures.

"He was drawing me pictures of the abuse," she said. "He drew pictures of a beer bottle, hand, penis." She said he also told her what title he wanted her to give the book. "What Happened to Me When Ronnie Was Doing Stuff" was what he named it.

"It was about as bad a case of sexual abuse as I've seen, and I've seen a lot of cases," Dr. Alexander said recently. "A lot happened to this child."

But the jury would never hear the title of the book or her expert opinion about what had happened. Mr. McAllister objected, arguing " . . . these drawings . . . were obtained not in a sense of let's find out what happened, but in a sense of let's see what it will take to get this child to say what we need for the prosecution of this defendant."

The judge would admit the book into evidence. But he would agree that the cover should be removed and the words inside whited out because they were in the psychologist's handwriting, not the boy's. It was a decision that would deliver a critical blow to the state's case.

Outside the courtroom, Matthew held his mother's hand and stared at the floor, his mother said. "He wouldn't talk," Ms. Hanson said. "He just stayed real close to me."

But she was not allowed to go with him into the courtroom because she was a witness in the case.

"Be a big, brave boy," Mr. Cahill recalls telling the child, ushering him to the witness stand. He was very scared, the prosecutor said.

Mr. Chafin recalls a different scenario. "I think he was wanting to come give me a hug," he said.

Matthew was put on the stand twice, first to prove his competency as a witness, then to answer questions about the alleged abuse. (This year, the Georgia Legislature abolished the competency requirement for children.)

'He Flipped Out When He Saw the Book' 

As he testified, Matthew sat to the right of the judge, directly facing Mr. Chafin, who was about 10 feet away. "He did OK in the competency hearing, but he didn't do quite as well in front of the jury," Mr. Cahill said. "I had a hard time focusing his attention. He was nervous, not really listening to me, staring at Mr. Chafin, not really talking a lot."

According to Mr. Cahill, it was the changes in his book that upset the child the most. "He flipped out when he saw the book in court," Mr. Cahill said. "He just wouldn't speak without the book. And then when we brought it in, he was really upset."

For Mr. Cahill, it would be a turning point in the case. "Twenty some hours of work went out the window," he said. "Somehow I think the defense knew it would fluster him to have things whited out."

According to audio tapes of the trial, however, Matthew did manage to say a few things in court.

"What is all of this here?" Mr. Cahill asked Matthew, showing him the book.

"This is what Ronnie did," he said in a high, little voice, adding, "Who took the words away?"

"Who made the pictures?" Mr. Cahill asked him. "Did anyone ask you to do this?"

"No, I just wanted to," Matthew said. "So I wouldn't have to tell anybody. Could show you. Could show all them."

On cross-examination, Mr. McAllister sought to prove that Matthew's mother and the psychologist had coached him into doing the drawings.

"This document that's been marked as S-1, who told you to draw something?" he asked the child.

"I just wanted to draw something," Matthew replied.

"Listen very carefully," Mr. McAllister said. "Who told you to draw these pictures?"

"I thought of doing it."

"When you first saw Dr. Anderson, you didn't do these drawings, did you?"

"I don't think. You'd have to ask my mother."

"Did your mother talk to you about doing these drawings?"

"I don't know. I kind of forget real, real quick."

''So your mother talked to you about the drawings, and then after she talked to you about the drawings, you went back to see Dr. Anderson, is that right?"

"I think so."

Mr. Cahill resumed questioning the boy. "Does Mr. McAllister scare you?" "He doesn't look like Ronnie, so he can't scare me," he replied, adding, "That shouldn't be whited out."

"Referring to the picture, why do you frown?" Mr. Cahill asked.

"This is when he did it to me."

"What is this right here?" Mr. Cahill asked.

"This was the bottle."

"What is the bottle for?"

Matthew whispered his response. "He stuck it in me," the child said.

"You have to tell us," Mr. Cahill said. "Did you tell somebody what this bottle was for?"

Silence.

"Let's go to the next page. Forget about what was written on there. Whose hand is that?"

"Ronnie."

"Did that hand ever touch you?"

"Mm-hmm."

"Where did it touch you?"

Again the child whispered. "Private part."

Mr. Cahill flipped to the next page. "Can you tell them what that is?" he asked the boy. It was a particularly graphic picture.

"You tell 'em," Matthew said.

Motion Made for Directed Verdict of Acquittal 

Mr. Chafin says today that his stepson was brainwashed by his mother. "The child was coached," he said. "Think about coaching. I tell you what you're going to say. And a 5-year-old child who's afraid of his mama's whipping and spanking will say whatever she wants him to. That's why when the child got into the courtroom, he didn't say much of anything. It was a circus and it was a farce."

In court, Mr. Cahill would have to do somersaults to keep up with Mr. McAllister. At one point, the 31-year-old attorney, then only one year into his job as a prosecutor, almost broke down in tears.

"At this point I am almost thoroughly confused," Mr. Cahill told the judge. "Everything I've said has been objected to in this case."

Not long after that, Mr. McAllister moved for a directed verdict of acquittal.

"When you get down to the bottom line, you've got a child who under the supervision of a mama and a psychologist has drawn a book and, as a result of that, says that he was touched in his private parts," he said. "We have no evidence whatsoever that is admissible properly before this jury that says that the defendant did anything."

One of the four grounds for his motion was lack of venue. Mr. Cahill argued that circumstantial evidence clearly had been provided. Matthew had testified that he, his mother and the defendant had lived together at his grandmother's house (the house of Mr. Chafin's mother). Ms. Hanson later provided the Clayton County address.

According to a 1980 ruling by the Georgia Supreme Court, "Venue is a question to be decided by the jury, and its decision shall not be set aside as long as there is any evidence to support it."

But after a review of the court reporter's transcript, the judge decided venue had not been proved.

"I realize the state has done the very best you could to prove a negative - that the child was not molested outside of Clayton County," he said to Mr. Cahill. "But I don't think that has been done beyond a reasonable doubt."

It was over. "I think most of us just sat there with our eyes popped out," said Bobby R. Cline, a juror.

Defense 'Did a Much Better Job,' Juror Says 

As soon as the judge explained to the jury what had happened, Mr. Cahill left the courtroom and took the rest of the day off. "I felt sick about the case," he said.

Many of the jurors would blame the young, inexperienced prosecutor for not measuring up to the aggressive tactics of his opponent, Mr. McAllister. "The defendant's lawyer did a much better job of presenting his case," said Mr. Roseberry.

For his part, Mr. McAllister defends his client and the way the trial was handled. "If I sound hostile, it bothers me when the state wants to take a child's testimony - one that you can't even understand - and based upon that, they want to put an innocent man in jail for 20 years," he said recently.

Mr. McAllister maintains that the exception to the hearsay rule, passed by the Georgia Legislature three years ago, is unconstitutional. Asked how 24 other states have enacted a similar hearsay exception with few if any challenges, he replied, "In my opinion, it's because the public and the bar feel the Constitution is not as important as the outcry of child abuse."

Mr. Chafin is back living in his mother's home, working as a real estate broker. He says he wants to put the past behind him, but he hints he may take further action against his former wife.

"Anybody who knew me and who knew what was going on knew it was ridiculous," he said. "Nothing happened. That's why I got off. If something happened to that child, she's in charge of it. It's not all over. I'm not finished with her."

Today the jurors say they don't know how they would have decided the case, al though several said they were convinced the boy had been molested.

For Matthew, distance from the trial has helped, family members say. The nightmares have stopped as has some of the bizarre behavior. "Now we're beginning to see the sweet little boy again," said his paternal grandmother.

But the experience has left its mark on them all, she said. "It's nerve-chilling to me. You just never feel that you are going to be involved in anything like this."