LAST SPRING, AS PASTOR ROBERT ROBERSON HANDED out groceries from the food bank at his Pentecostal church in East Wenatchee, Washington, a SWAT team surrounded the building, then handcuffed the minister and took him in for questioning. At the same time, Roberson's wife Connie was called out of a class she was attending at Wenatchee Valley College and arrested. Their daughter, four-year-old Rebekah, was taken by Child Protective Services, placed in foster care and subjected to intense recovered-memory therapy; the Robersons--who were imprisoned for 4 1/2 months--have not seen or talked to her since.
The Robersons were accused by 11-year-old D.E.--the state's chief witness, who just happens to be the foster daughter of Wenatchee's sole sex-crimes investigator, Robert Perez--of myriad acts of child abuse, allegedly carried out not in furtive encounters but in bizarre sex parties at their church. Lurid reports describe orgies and ritual sacrifice on the altar, with Roberson and his congregation of perverts shouting "Hallelujah!" after what D.E. calls "the wild thing."
Maybe the Robersons, who go on trial this week, did run the Church of Unspeakable Acts. But a growing number of citizens, initially relieved that a despicable evil was being rooted out of their midst, have become alarmed by Detective Perez and his allies in CPS, who see abuse around every corner of this quiet community of 24,000 in the foothills of the Cascades. In the nearly two years since Perez began his work, D.E.'s memory has borne as much fruit as the town's apple orchards. Most people were sympathetic when she first accused her parents, who are now serving sentences for abuse. But she has subsequently fingered more than 80 other adults, including the Robersons, and Perez has recruited several other children to corroborate her charges. These were made in unrecorded conversations with Perez and in one tour around town, during which D.E. accused a large swath of the population and pointed to 23 places as sites of her attacks. As a result of what came to be known as "the drive-by," 3,200 charges of child abuse were lodged against one woman alone. Kathryn Lyon, a public defender who has investigated the charges and written a 250-page report, says, "Perez has abused the children in order to persecute the adults. Anyone can see he's dangerous."