Remembering What You Would Rather Not Remember

Trey Smith

I want to discuss a particular aspect of the Jerry Sandusky trial. In one article from Reuters, it is pointed out "that discrepancies in victims' testimony stressed by defense attorney Joe Amendola, such as differing dates and the number of sexual encounters, were to be expected given the pressures the men were facing on the stand."

This IS the job of the defense team. Inconsistency in testimony -- in police statements, before the grand jury and in the current trial -- CAN show dishonesty or deception. A defense lawyer wouldn't be worth his or her salt if they didn't pursue this tack.

That said, it is never easy for us to recall specifics of acts and events we would rather not remember at all. This human predilection is compounded by the fact that most of the alleged acts of sexual abuse occurred years previous when the alleged victims were children.

When I worked as a Child Abuse Investigator, I too was on the lookout for inconsistent statements as I tried to determine if the reports of alleged abuse were to be substantiated or not. For the most part, this was a different situation. The abuse was alleged to have taken place within days to a week or so before my initial investigation. Consequently, if the abuse was true, it should have been fresh in the mind of the abused. Inconsistent statements often provided a tip off that things might not be as they first appeared.

Sometimes, though, the allegations had to do with longstanding abuse -- alleged wrongdoing that might span years. In these cases, inconsistent statements were to be expected based on the simple fact that most abuse victims don't chart their abuse on calendars or in diaries!

Who can blame them! It's not the kind of memory abuse victims desire to keep front and center. In so many cases, abuse victims try to shove ugly memories down a hole in the hopes that they will never resurface again. Sadly, this strategy rarely works as bits and pieces -- frequently, out-of-context -- keep bobbing to the surface.

To illustrate what I'm referring to here, I ask readers to think back to a bad situation or circumstance that occurred, at least, 10 years ago. It could be when you first learned that a relative or friend was diagnosed with cancer or when you discovered that your significant other was cheating on you.

In thinking back to this time, do you recall the day of the week it happened? How about the time of day? Was it cloudy or sunny? Where were you when you first heard the news? Were other people present and, if so, who were they? Do you remember exactly what you were wearing? Do you recall the first words out of your mouth?

To be certain, a lot of those questions seem really trivial, but they are the kinds of things defense lawyers zero in on. Sometimes inconsistent memories of minutia point to larger inconsistencies and can be the first salvo in unraveling a big untruth. At other times, they don't mean that much.

In the Sandusky trial, the jury will decide what the inconsistencies of the various alleged victims mean, if anything.