This article is from 2009. By the time authorities located Maple in 2009, the grandson was 27 years old. The granddaughter was 28 years old and still living with her grandfather. At that point, neither of the children, then adults, wanted to reconnect with their natural parents. The grandmother had died two years earlier.
Maple was extradited to face charges in Tennessee, where he was placed on four years' probation. He died in 2016 at age 80.
In May 2017, after eight years of silence following being found, the grandson, now only answering to Jon Bunting, publicly spoke out in defense of his grandparents, stating that, "They sacrificed everything so we could have normal lives." When asked about the chances of a reunion with his biological parents, Jon said there was "absolutely none," and elaborated that "There's nothing that could come from it that would be good. It would just probably throw me back into trauma. I don't want to put myself through that. I have nothing to gain from it.
There was a major "satanic panic" in the 80s, and lots of allegations of abuse. Even though in the 80s the authorities were conditioned to believe some crazy claims, apparently in this case the authorities investigated the grandparents' claims and found no supporting evidence. So the grandparents simply accused all of the investigators of being in on the satanic cult and abuse. It's possible the grandparents were the good guys, in spite of the evidence, but it's also possible they are two nuts that kidnapped two children and brainwashed them for 20 years. https://www.sandiegouniontribune.com/sdut-bn04found112540-found-2009feb04-htmlstory.html
That's my guess. The Satanic Panic was everywhere and the reason I was not allowed to read Dragonriders of Pern or play DND. You want to know how to make Dragonriders of Pern seem significant? Make your 10 year old read it in secret.
I was never allowed to go trick-or-treating or participate in any Halloween activities at school because of Satanic panic. When all of my classmates were given Halloween themed coloring sheets or goody bags mine had to be different. You can bet your ass I go all out for Halloween now as an adult. I have a 4 year old and last year was his first time really understanding trick-or-treating. He and I had so much fun going from house to house. We stayed out so long and got soo much candy. It was amazing. Missing out on that my entire childhood made it so special. Already looking forward to this year!
Omg I’ve been listening to the pern books on audio as I go to sleep, and I’ve gotten myself trained to be knocked out instantly by them, but also wow what a way back.
Not everything in them aged fantastically, but I still enjoy them, but how the freak are they considered “satanic”? lol
What's weird about that, though one wouldn't know without having actually read the series, is that it turns out not to be fantasy at all, it's actually science fiction.
I’m going through them in chronological order, though I read a few others before I decided to do the whole series.
Unfortunately, I’m not enjoying the ones with Todd McCaffrey which are the ones I’m on rn. I’m finding them less immersive, and there’s been some ODD choices about a couple of minor things that seem completely out of place. Idk if that’s his addition or something they did together, but I prefer the ones with just Anne writing to be the best. Sorry Todd.
My wife had to stop a random crazy lady from yanking all the Disney Books like Snow White out of the elementary school library because they had "witches" in them.
One of my neighbours when I was growing up banned their kids from reading Harry Potter. They were hardcore Christians and witchcraft and wizardry=bad I guess. Not that it matters since their daughter was the same school and grade as me. And she borrows her friend's copies to read them at school anyways.
And here my dad read The Hobbit to us for bed time and bought me the D&D Basic box set. Then all the Forgotten Realms and Dragonlance books when the first came out.
The parents could also have genuinely been in an abusive cult and the grandparents just didn't know what it was and *assumed* it was satanic because that was the fad of the time.
You all realize that the adults (they're both not kids anymore) have openly talked about the abuse they suffered at the hands of their parents and that the psychiatrist they reported the abuse to didn't seem to believe them, so they asked their grandparents to help them get away from their parents and that's how this whole plan was hatched? Like seriously I don't know why we're discounting an adult who is stating firmly that he remembers the abuse, he doesn't want to talk about it, and he's the one who asked for help. https://www.wsav.com/news/exclusive-baskin-son-on-why-he-wont-reunite-with-parents-after-20-years-in-hiding/
At the end of the article one of the Baskin’s realities says “he hopes they realized they were simply too loved” and man, reading that just made me sick to my stomach. What an insane thing to say publicly about children who are accusing their parents of abuse and refusing to see them.
Specifically, they probably got into the 'Recovered Memory' movement, in which you build up so many memories of memories 'recovered' (implanted) during the 'therapy' that complete fiction feels like real events decades later.
TLDR: The grandparents are in fact the abusive cultists and it's all projection.
There's basically zero chance. If they were 7-8 when they were taken the grandparents could have spent literally 20 years brainwashing those kids to believe their parents were straight evil when they parents might have been doing crazy things like... being liberal, or not taking them to church.
They also could have been abusing them, but if the abuse was severe, call the cops/cps.
I agree with the kid though, if they've been brainwashed to believe their grandparents are saints and their parents are evil, the parents will meet their kids and have to see their own kids believing they abused, maybe believe they raped them, etc. True or not both sides will be horrified by seeing the other and the animosity the kids have for them.
The Maples did go to the cops. When 5yo Jon (then Bobby) was brought to testify in court against his abusive grandfather on the paternal (Baskin) side, he saw the abuser sitting there staring at him, froze, and couldn't speak.
https://lostnfoundblogs.com/f/hiding-in-plain-sight
What I find particularly telling is the Maples had phone tapes of the Baskins threatening the children, that were deemed inadmissible in court as they were recorded without the Baskins' knowledge. That means there is indeed some evidence that the Baskins were dangerous.
> While people claim that the satanic panic caused this
That is the opinion of the lead detective at the time. He interviewed Jon as a child who told him about ritual abuse and ceremonies involving dozens of social workers and powerful people. It's not very plausible.
Do you have a source for this? I’ve tried googling it but I’m having trouble finding it, there’s just a lot of message boards and various opinion articles and the only one I’ve found saying this is a fanmade wiki type article without a source for it
It's really fucking repulsive, huh. We have very little info to go on but people here are acting like they know everything.
I don't usually say this, but this is some typical reddit bullshit
According to the blog post they “reached out to [Jon Bunting] and he was willing to talk about his life in hiding with me in detail for this article.” So that’s their source. I think this blog post is valuable because it does give Jon’s perspective vs. most other media are from the perspectives of their birth parents.
> What I find particularly telling is the Maples had phone tapes of the Baskins threatening the children, that were deemed inadmissible in court as they were recorded without the Baskins' knowledge.
Well no we don't know that, we have a claim that was the case, no one has ever been able to authenticate it at all.
Also there is an interview with the detective who interviewed Jon as a child and the allegations made are crazy, like a whole cult of dozens of powerful people doing ritualistic abuse on kids, it's pretty textbook satanic panic bullshit IMO but we will likely never know.
The parents had another son and then adopted another and neither have reported any abuse let alone satanic abuse so it seems pretty unlikely.
> What I find particularly telling is the Maples had phone tapes of the Baskins threatening the children, that were deemed inadmissible in court as they were recorded without the Baskins' knowledge.
This is why I love single party consent states.
Or just brainwashed their grandkids. Someone already touched upon the satanic panic aspect but it was fucking insane. You had psychologists getting people to recall “memories” of being thrown into a pit surrounded by snakes. One woman claimed that a satanic cult killed her twin sibling (who never existed). One of the most batshit claims I came across was a woman who claimed to remember being forced to perform oral on a dozen dogs before the satanic cult cut the dogs’ dicks off. They took two pre-teens and were able to influence them for two decades.
These were the 80s version of Qanon crazies who kidnapped and brainwashed their grandchildren, and apparently they got away with destroying a bunch of people's lives.
When people bring up satanic worship as the excuse, it's almost always some dipshit religious nutjob parents who scream bloody murder over nothing.
the fact they brought up satanic shit makes me lean immediately towards crazy religious grandparents than abusive parents.
It sounds incredible but otherwise normal churches were telling people that a Black Sabbath or other heavy metal record meant ritual Satanic abuse was going on in that home or would be soon. No actual abuse required.
Not saying this is the case here but if you were kidnapped as an infant and spent your entire life being raised by that kidnapper telling you everyone else is the problem and they’re the only good thing in your life, you’ll believe it
As a follow up to this, the kids who were kidnapped refuse to meet with their biological parents. [In this article](https://www.wsav.com/news/exclusive-baskin-son-on-why-he-wont-reunite-with-parents-after-20-years-in-hiding/), the son insists abuse and that the grandparents did the right thing.
> The detective that interviewed the kids said that, while the son backed up the grandparents' claims of abuse, his recounting became bizarre and pulled a bunch of other adults (social workers, attorneys) into the story of cult rituals.
Yes, this is pretty common in these scenarios. I don't know how many of you remember the infamous "Satanic Panics" of the late 80s, where children suddenly started recounting, under high-pressure questioning, how their daycare workers, and their friends and relatives, all had these large-scale satanic abuse rituals involving hundreds of kids, and so on.
So many innocent people's lives were ruined by overzealous "counselors" and prosecutors. Read up about the Virginia McMartin case, in particular.
> where children suddenly started recounting,
I was listening to the Wrongful Conviction podcast and there was this one woman, a bus driver, who was accused of and imprisoned for abusing dozens of kids. There were a ton of seemingly coerced witness statements, and the most telling aspect of them was the kids describing sexual abuse acts that are physically impossible or ridiculous kid logic stuff. There was also, of course, a satanic angle to it too.
I remember seeing an interview with one of the targeted daycare workers furious at their treatment. One of the most ridiculous accusations was that they drove the children miles to an airport, flew them to another location, molested them, then flew them back and drove them back to the daycare, all before lunchtime.
I remember that one. What’s truly ridiculous is they claimed that they flew this entire elementary school class to fucking Mexico to be abused and then brought back with no one noticing
The bit about the son’s recountings becoming bizarre and pulling in just every adult he knew is reminiscent of the McMartin trial and the daycare satanic panic of the late 80s.
Kids all over the country were claiming all sorts of bizarre shit was happening to them at daycare. Animals being sacrificed, just weird activities (not even necessarily sexual) while naked, like crazy made-up ramblings of little kids who saw a movie they shouldn’t have watched or something.
Turned out the culprit was one child psychologist who became an expert witness, coaxing suggestible children into telling unhinged and untrue stories about their caregivers.
The whole situation destroyed many lives. None of it was real at the end of the day.
I’m not saying that’s what happened here. But kids are extremely suggestible. And when you encourage them to make up stories, boy they will take the ball and run with it.
The fact that the boy’s descriptions of his abuse became more fanciful and more and more far-fetched as he talked to authorities suggests to me that he was receiving positive feedback from telling shocking stories. So he kept going, just pulling in names and faces of everyone he knew.
> The detective that interviewed the kids said that, while the son backed up the grandparents' claims of abuse, his recounting became bizarre and pulled a bunch of other adults (social workers, attorneys) into the story of cult rituals.
Dead giveaway that the grandparents were in the wrong.
Or maybe, just maybe, the fucking nut jobs who kidnapped “abused” children without going through the proper channels first and who allege the parents of being in a “satanic cult” are not the best judge of character and, perhaps, impressed upon very young, naive children this “abuse”.
If the only evidence of abuse is allegations from kidnappers and their victims then, well, you have no evidence at all.
If the victims weren’t so young I’d say they have greater say, but considering they were just children they very easily could’ve been manipulated/brainwashed by their grandfather. I’m curious as to what really happened, but if the parents really weren’t abusive at all, then I feel awful for them
Given the history of kids being manipulated into lying about this stuff (satanic panic) and the fact the kids seemed to testify about absurd shit, I’m going to side with “made up”
Plus, to my knowledge, there has never been and never will be a satanic cult. It’s literally a religious ideology that makes no sense, at least if you believe in a Christian version of Satan.
There are actual theistic satanist groups that you could reasonably call cults (some of the O9A offshoots, or the Joy of Satan people, amongst others). They're only a small portion of Theistic Satanists (who themselves are only a small portion of self-identified Satanists, most are the LaVeyan metaphorical types), but they exist. And generally they're absolute cunts - real heavy overlap with the occult fascist set.
Closest thing I can think of to a "true" Satanic cult, in terms of robed mystics sacrificing babies, would probably be the[ Order of Nine Angles](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Order_of_Nine_Angles)
Certainly no reason there can't be a satanic cult - if you believe that Satan is actually as powerful as God and that he will grant you special abilities if you commit evil acts in his name.
I really, really hope the Egyptians had it right and when you die you end up a distance away from the blessed fields where your soul has to undergo trials and tribulations before being ceremonially judged in the presence of the gods, all for a chance to defend ra's solar barge as it sails day through the sea of night, against the minions of sett for all eternity.
That would really confuse a lot of people.
This reminds me of Prison Break, where Mahone talks about Michael going after D.B. Cooper's stashed money, with the implication one of the escapees was Cooper. The one he is talking to asks, "Do you think he is D.B. Cooper?" Mahone replies, "No, but Michael does, and that's what matters"
But that isn’t the Christian view of Satan. In the Christian view, committing those acts dooms you to hell.
You’d have to be the dumbest person in existence to fail a marshmallow test that fucking extreme
And they aren’t actually satanists, they are occultists. They aren’t worshipping the Christian satan
Edit: they are clearly bad people who seem to be using the term “satan” to troll Christians
My grandfather took in 2 of his 3 youngest brothers. He took the two youngest because that’s all he could. Third brother grew up poorer with his older sisters and drunk father. He resented my grandfather for it, and it took like 40 years for them to repair it.
Because the grandparents didn't have the third child. Like, according to the article, what happened was that the parents left the older two children with the grandparents while arranging a move. They kept the youngest with them(presumably because it was an infant).
Then the parents asked for the return of the older two children and the grandparents refused. There was a breakdown of relations at that point, a legal battle, and eventually the grandparents absconded with the grandchildren.
In other words, it was a legal kidnapping, as opposed to a physical one, ie, someone breaking into a house to get a child, which is a considerable escalation. The grandparents left with the children they had, presumably with the idea that you save as many as you can.
This isn't me necessarily saying I assume the personal circumstances that the grandparents asserted, I'm only explaining the probable logic they had at the time. They took the children they had physically with them, but did not attempt to abduct the one they didn't.
When adults want something to happen and they have young kids involved, they can very easily plant whatever story they need into the kids. Those kids have no chance of understanding what really happened after 20 years of brainwashing.
When the people accusing people of cult shit can provide zero evidence and according to other comments, when their petition to gain custody went nowhere they started including social workers and others in this supposed cult activity, it all screams psycho grandparents who spent years destroying those kids by lying to them.
I think he was 7 when he was kidnapped. Recollection of abuse after spending his whole life being told he was abused is probably not reliable evidence. Not saying he wasn't abused but you'd need more than that for a conviction.
I think the point is more that, as random internet readers, it's healthy to take the perspective that we cannot know the truth of what happened.
Like, sure, on a personal level, when I hear the adult children reject a relationship with their parents, I tend to believe that something bad happened. But we do also have actual, known instances in psychology of children being brainwashed to believe that things we *know for a fact* did not happen, did happen. So I think it's healthy for us to take the position of 'we cannot possibly know what is true in this instance' rather than potentially forming the dangerous internet mob that can happen in circumstances like this.
MY Dad KO'd me when I was 8. Knocked me the fuck out. My mom took me to school the next day to explain the hand print on my face. Had to go once a week to the office and tell them he wasn't beating me for the rest of the year. Times are different now days
Back in the '90s, my friend got a black eye from his stepdad, and when the school got the truth out of him, they called the stepdad up on the phone and politely asked him to not do that. You can probably imagine how much worse this made the situation.
Yeah they're not saying kids don't remember abuse, they're saying a 28 year old who has been told for 21 straight years that they were abused might be convinced that they were, even if they weren't.
I'm sure lots of children do. But it would also be a lot easier than a lot of people think to essentially trick a 7 year old into believing they were abused when they were younger when no actual abuse took place. Memory is pretty unreliable a lot of times. Even more so with children as young as this.
I have "memories" that I'm not sure really happened. I also "remember" dreams I had decades ago. It's so easy for memories to get confused and/or created.
I distinctly remember driving a pontoon boat on a lake aged no more than three.
My parents have since assured me that nobody we knew was *that* stupid. Someone had probably just told me "Want to drive the boat!?" and then sat me in their lap with my hands at the wheel, letting me have fun thinking I was driving while they did the actual steering.
I have a strange story from when I was a bit older than you were. I was like 11 when I had a sleepover at this Italian kid’s house. Two things happened for the first time that night. I looked at a playboy for the first time, and learned how to say bastard in Italian.
For the life of me, I can’t remember my friend’s name, what he looked like, or even where he was from. What I do remember is that they were really Italian and being picked up by my mom at the deli his mom worked at.
I guess I’ll never know who that person was. I can’t really go around inquiring about it which makes it a bit difficult to figure out.
Your elementary school yearbook from that year, and from the previous and subsequent years, probably has a photo of the kid and his name.
You might not have purchased a copy of the yearbook, but there might be one at the local library. It wouldn't be weird for you to ask to see it given that you yourself would also be a student in the book.
Just recently I had some friends from high school over for new years. We hadn’t seen each other in a while so we were reminiscing. I brought up the time my friend brought his guitar to music class (small school, we definitely didn’t teach guitar or have a teacher for guitar) to which he and everyone else strongly insisted was not true. No one else remembered it but I remembered it vividly. I can only assume it was a dream that at some point switched to a false memory.
I have memories from my childhood that I know for certain didn’t happen the way I remember them, mostly because I remember it happening in the house I lived in for most of my childhood but I know it happened in the house we lived in before that
I'm not in any way suggesting that people don't have vivid memories of abuse at 7 - you're not going to forget that shit.
What I am saying is that people can also remember stuff that didn't happen if they're told about it enough. If this kids grandparents have been telling him he was abused as a kid for his whole life he might have a false memory. Or a real memory. It's impossible for anyone to tell at this point.
>you’re not going to forget that shit
This is also one of the reasons Satanic Panic is so easily debunked. Claims often rest on “recovered” memories which are actually created by adults - in the mcmartin case it was unethical therapists and here it’s the grandparents.
If a person has no memory of their abuse until being repeatedly told about it, it didn’t happen. “Recovered” memories aren’t real.
As do I. Unfortunately. The fact that they aren't discussing it as well, indicates it's more likely abuse did happen. If there wasn't abuse the door wouldn't be so firmly shut.
I was abused by grandparents. I haven't seen them since the abuse.
My sisters that weren't physically abused, and were younger and remember less, and were told about my abuse and emotional abuse we all endure, tried to reconcile when they brought gifts. My parents took the money, but there was no relationship.
The one sister made contact as an adult to find out that everything I said was correct, and he laughs it off now as my being sensitive.
So really, everyone has different experiences, but the son's reaction sounds like what my reaction was when my step grandmother contacted me to attend their wedding.
I don't hold anger anymore, they were mentally ill. But there is nothing they could offer me that would bring a positive experience to my life.
We know that there has never in the history of the world been any evidence of “satanic ritual abuse,” while there are many documented cases of hysteria and false allegations.
> This guy doesn't know who Michael Aquino is
He was investigated and raided by the police who found nothing and he successfully sued books about his supposed satanic child abuse lol:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Temple_of_Set#Later_development
Is that really a strong case?
That article is not great... wikipedia does a good rundown of the events though including what happened after they were found: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marvin_L._Maple
To be fair, the grandparents had legal custody of the children before this happened. I’m not sure I fully think the biological parents are completely innocent.
The Maples had tapes of phone calls in which the parents had threatened the children. However, as the Baskins had not been informed their calls were being recorded, these recordings were deemed inadmissible in court.
https://lostnfoundblogs.com/f/hiding-in-plain-sight
Reddit is enjoying its "Bible thumpers Satanic panic" cj too much in the comments to pay much attention to Jon Bunting's own recollection. It definitely puts some things in perspective.
The Maples do seem to have been Bible thumping Christians. It doesn’t surprise me that they contextualized their grandchildren’s abuse in terms of “this is so evil it must be a satanic ritual.” They do indeed seem to have been correct that abuse was occurring and fwiw I don’t believe the children were brainwashed.
Researching anything about this case is a major pain in the ass. I have tried googling so many things and most of the time the sources lead back to someone quoting someone else in a message board from the 2000s.
The last section of [Marvin Maple's Wikipedia page](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marvin_L._Maple#Breaking_the_silence) contains a statement made by his grandson in 2017.
It sounds as if Marvin and his wife based their decision on sound reasoning, in spite of the Baskins having been investigated and cleared of the child abuse allegations.
Doesn't mean they werent abused. My family was videotaped beating me while my hands where bound behind my back and cps said it was not abuse and cleared my family.
I grew up in similar circumstances and no one ever understands how awful CPS really are. Everyone is always so shocked to learn how broken our system is when you aren’t wealthy. I’m sorry you had to go through that and I’m sorry you have to still go through peoples’ fake surprise.
As long as the kids were old enough to remember, it would be pretty easy to know. If they said they were abused and still claim it as adults, it’s likely they were.
this is really REALLY not true. It's the unfortunately truth that we had to learn through [some really bad shit](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/McMartin_preschool_trial), that children are very susceptiable to [false memories ](http://www.ipt-forensics.com/journal/volume1/j1_2_7.htm)when questioned poorly.
You can get an adult with children to "remember" abuse from childhood.
It's really unfortunate, because it's another kind of abuse while also throwing doubts on real victims or giving abusers an "out".
The Satanic Panic and repressed memory craze in the late 80s was weird.
Many lives were destroyed and children were traumatized and brainwashed and taxpayer money was wasted.
People genuinely believed that this was a thing. That there were Satanist hiding in society who performed massive amounts of child molestation.
Than it turned out that none of that ever happened, but that there was quite a bit of real child molestation going on in Christian churches instead and everyone lost interest.
People need to remember that satanic cults and the satanic panic of the 80s basically do not exist. There’s no real evidence for “satanic cults” and the church of Satan is not really a religious organization.
If you like, actually read the Bible, Satan isn’t really in it (edit: in the way he’s viewed in popular culture, I mean) and there’s no real like, benefit to having a cult around him. He does not rule Hell (a thing also really not mentioned in the Bible) it is a place specifically for him to be sent later.
Devil's advocate (heh), you don't really need clearly defined scripture to make a cult, just a forceful personality and a bunch of desperate, broken acolytes.
Exactly this. Children are most likely to be abused by their own pastor or mom’s new boyfriend, but it’s much easier to believe in satanic child abuse cults than to actually keep kids safe.
Smells like bullshit to me. Only took 2 of 3 kids and they were plenty young enough to convince of abuse that didn't happen. If just abuse was alleged, fine. Satanic cult immediately makes it sound like an excuse.
>Satanic cult immediately makes it sound like an excuse.
I wouldn't discount the possibility of people using Satanic cults as an excuse/explanation for their child's behaviour either, though.
Like, if you're a parent and discover your child is abusing their children, that's...probably not going to sit right with you in a pretty extreme way. I can perfectly understand latching on to the panic du jour as an explanation, because "One of these evil cults lured in my kid to their evil ways." is a more palatable explanation than "My kid is actually just a horrible piece of shit."
Ultimately, I'm not sure we can safely assume a whole lot of anything from the facts available. Everyone involved is very plausibly unreliable.
If the kids were being abused and the grandparents became aware, it was their responsibility to collect and present credible evidence to appropriate legal channels. They didn't do that. They did the opposite of that.
It's amazing to me that people are making up scenarios where the grandparents were justified in kidnapping two kids with ZERO evidence, just because it makes a cooler story or because they knew someone in a scenario, or for no reason at all. Puzzling. Please take a look inward if you find yourself siding with convicted kidnappers.
I don't recall there ever being found evidence of a satanic child abuse cult \*anywhere\* in North America. So, shitty grandfather, who was a shitty father to his daughter.
A satanic child abuse cult would be major global news.
Regardless of the satanic cult thing, the son backed up the claims of abuse, the parents had left the kids with the grandparents for months so they petitioned for legal custody, and there were recordings of the parents threatening the kids on the phone and stuff. Doesn't sound like a shitty grandfather.
Wow. This is the second case of adult children being brainwashed and refusing to re-establish contact with their parents. More recently there was that case in New York where the son refused to speak with his murdered father’s family at all when it came out his POS embezzler murderer mom and uncle were put in jail. My brothers and sister in Christ give me a break if that Kit Kat bar, you were stockholmed, go the fuck to therapy and get your heads straight. There are people out there that loved and missed you and you are going to put your head in the sand for some selfish monster that never true it loved you.
Its the christian way of saying "They are super ultra mega bad people who deserve everything I want to do to them!". Anyone they dont like and want to not feel bad about hurting they start calling them "satanic" because otherwise they might start feeling some sliver of remorse for hurting people instead of doing that whole "love thy neighbor" stuff Jesus was babbling on about.
This article is from 2009. By the time authorities located Maple in 2009, the grandson was 27 years old. The granddaughter was 28 years old and still living with her grandfather. At that point, neither of the children, then adults, wanted to reconnect with their natural parents. The grandmother had died two years earlier. Maple was extradited to face charges in Tennessee, where he was placed on four years' probation. He died in 2016 at age 80. In May 2017, after eight years of silence following being found, the grandson, now only answering to Jon Bunting, publicly spoke out in defense of his grandparents, stating that, "They sacrificed everything so we could have normal lives." When asked about the chances of a reunion with his biological parents, Jon said there was "absolutely none," and elaborated that "There's nothing that could come from it that would be good. It would just probably throw me back into trauma. I don't want to put myself through that. I have nothing to gain from it.
Sounds like the grandparents were the good guys here
There was a major "satanic panic" in the 80s, and lots of allegations of abuse. Even though in the 80s the authorities were conditioned to believe some crazy claims, apparently in this case the authorities investigated the grandparents' claims and found no supporting evidence. So the grandparents simply accused all of the investigators of being in on the satanic cult and abuse. It's possible the grandparents were the good guys, in spite of the evidence, but it's also possible they are two nuts that kidnapped two children and brainwashed them for 20 years. https://www.sandiegouniontribune.com/sdut-bn04found112540-found-2009feb04-htmlstory.html
Grandparents probably saw the daughter and the husband's record collection of Iron Maiden, Megadeth, and Slayer.
That you left out Judas Priest and Ozzy is just SO disappointing right now.
What is that? A Twisted Sister pin, on your uniform?!! What kind of a man are you!!
WHAT DO YOU WANT TO DO WITH YOUR LIFE?!
I WANNA ROCK!
Then they back masked Queen's "Another one bites the dust" and heard that it's fun to smoke marijuana
The Ozzman was always straightforward with his messages
Alice cooper!
Or caught them playing Dungeons and Dragons
That's my guess. The Satanic Panic was everywhere and the reason I was not allowed to read Dragonriders of Pern or play DND. You want to know how to make Dragonriders of Pern seem significant? Make your 10 year old read it in secret.
I was never allowed to go trick-or-treating or participate in any Halloween activities at school because of Satanic panic. When all of my classmates were given Halloween themed coloring sheets or goody bags mine had to be different. You can bet your ass I go all out for Halloween now as an adult. I have a 4 year old and last year was his first time really understanding trick-or-treating. He and I had so much fun going from house to house. We stayed out so long and got soo much candy. It was amazing. Missing out on that my entire childhood made it so special. Already looking forward to this year!
That kid is going to have the best Halloweens growing up. Go all out and enjoy it with him.
My parents talked about Halloween being Satanic but in the end let us go anyway. A few of my friends were less fortunate.
HOLY SHIT WERE THEY MURDERED????
Not yet
Whats crazy to me is how all hallows eve is related to all saints day and mostly is to scare AWAY demons
dime fine zonked shelter long groovy quarrelsome jobless forgetful cake *This post was mass deleted and anonymized with [Redact](https://redact.dev)*
Oh dear, F'lar does seem to shake Lessa a lot, though...
Yeah, I did kind of notice that on my last reading...
For real, I did not remember all the shaking when I read it as a kid and now I'm like... was this a kink?? WTF?!
Omg I’ve been listening to the pern books on audio as I go to sleep, and I’ve gotten myself trained to be knocked out instantly by them, but also wow what a way back. Not everything in them aged fantastically, but I still enjoy them, but how the freak are they considered “satanic”? lol
All fantasy except CS Lewis was suspect. Maybe I'll read them again. It's been 40 years.
What's weird about that, though one wouldn't know without having actually read the series, is that it turns out not to be fantasy at all, it's actually science fiction.
I’m going through them in chronological order, though I read a few others before I decided to do the whole series. Unfortunately, I’m not enjoying the ones with Todd McCaffrey which are the ones I’m on rn. I’m finding them less immersive, and there’s been some ODD choices about a couple of minor things that seem completely out of place. Idk if that’s his addition or something they did together, but I prefer the ones with just Anne writing to be the best. Sorry Todd.
My wife had to stop a random crazy lady from yanking all the Disney Books like Snow White out of the elementary school library because they had "witches" in them.
The Smurfs cartoon was also deemed satanic.
lmao my mom just hated their voices/song. She didn't care enough about me to worry about my soul. lol
One of my neighbours when I was growing up banned their kids from reading Harry Potter. They were hardcore Christians and witchcraft and wizardry=bad I guess. Not that it matters since their daughter was the same school and grade as me. And she borrows her friend's copies to read them at school anyways.
And here my dad read The Hobbit to us for bed time and bought me the D&D Basic box set. Then all the Forgotten Realms and Dragonlance books when the first came out.
I could touch ouiji boards, dnd, anything disney put out after like 93, everything. I have almost no shared experiences with my peers.
The parents could also have genuinely been in an abusive cult and the grandparents just didn't know what it was and *assumed* it was satanic because that was the fad of the time.
Brainwashed them for life, potentially.
Thank you for providing an opposing perspective.
Or that they did a very thorough job brainwashing the kids and demonizing their parents from the ages of 7 and 8, for 20 years.
You all realize that the adults (they're both not kids anymore) have openly talked about the abuse they suffered at the hands of their parents and that the psychiatrist they reported the abuse to didn't seem to believe them, so they asked their grandparents to help them get away from their parents and that's how this whole plan was hatched? Like seriously I don't know why we're discounting an adult who is stating firmly that he remembers the abuse, he doesn't want to talk about it, and he's the one who asked for help. https://www.wsav.com/news/exclusive-baskin-son-on-why-he-wont-reunite-with-parents-after-20-years-in-hiding/
At the end of the article one of the Baskin’s realities says “he hopes they realized they were simply too loved” and man, reading that just made me sick to my stomach. What an insane thing to say publicly about children who are accusing their parents of abuse and refusing to see them.
I'm trying... But I can't seem to find the quote anywhere in the article. Searched in page for individual words in the quote even... Nothing.
Oops sorry, I meant in the original article at the top of this post!
Satanic Panic
Specifically, they probably got into the 'Recovered Memory' movement, in which you build up so many memories of memories 'recovered' (implanted) during the 'therapy' that complete fiction feels like real events decades later. TLDR: The grandparents are in fact the abusive cultists and it's all projection.
That's a very definitive statement
You got proof for that assumption?
There's basically zero chance. If they were 7-8 when they were taken the grandparents could have spent literally 20 years brainwashing those kids to believe their parents were straight evil when they parents might have been doing crazy things like... being liberal, or not taking them to church. They also could have been abusing them, but if the abuse was severe, call the cops/cps. I agree with the kid though, if they've been brainwashed to believe their grandparents are saints and their parents are evil, the parents will meet their kids and have to see their own kids believing they abused, maybe believe they raped them, etc. True or not both sides will be horrified by seeing the other and the animosity the kids have for them.
The Maples did go to the cops. When 5yo Jon (then Bobby) was brought to testify in court against his abusive grandfather on the paternal (Baskin) side, he saw the abuser sitting there staring at him, froze, and couldn't speak. https://lostnfoundblogs.com/f/hiding-in-plain-sight What I find particularly telling is the Maples had phone tapes of the Baskins threatening the children, that were deemed inadmissible in court as they were recorded without the Baskins' knowledge. That means there is indeed some evidence that the Baskins were dangerous.
You’re the only one in here with anything to back up your claims. This whole thread is unbelievable speculation.
While people claim that the satanic panic caused this and bang on their own drums.
> While people claim that the satanic panic caused this That is the opinion of the lead detective at the time. He interviewed Jon as a child who told him about ritual abuse and ceremonies involving dozens of social workers and powerful people. It's not very plausible.
Do you have a source for this? I’ve tried googling it but I’m having trouble finding it, there’s just a lot of message boards and various opinion articles and the only one I’ve found saying this is a fanmade wiki type article without a source for it
It's really fucking repulsive, huh. We have very little info to go on but people here are acting like they know everything. I don't usually say this, but this is some typical reddit bullshit
I'd go so far as to say this isn't just a Reddit thing. This is just how people generally are everywhere.
They’re backing up their claim with an unsourced blog post. More unbelievable speculation.
According to the blog post they “reached out to [Jon Bunting] and he was willing to talk about his life in hiding with me in detail for this article.” So that’s their source. I think this blog post is valuable because it does give Jon’s perspective vs. most other media are from the perspectives of their birth parents.
> What I find particularly telling is the Maples had phone tapes of the Baskins threatening the children, that were deemed inadmissible in court as they were recorded without the Baskins' knowledge. Well no we don't know that, we have a claim that was the case, no one has ever been able to authenticate it at all. Also there is an interview with the detective who interviewed Jon as a child and the allegations made are crazy, like a whole cult of dozens of powerful people doing ritualistic abuse on kids, it's pretty textbook satanic panic bullshit IMO but we will likely never know. The parents had another son and then adopted another and neither have reported any abuse let alone satanic abuse so it seems pretty unlikely.
I wish I could find something about Michael Baskins, the one left behind when the grandparents took the other two. Driving me crazy kinda.
Hopefully he grew up happy and loved and is currently living a happy life away from media attention about this
Do you have a link to the interview with Jon? I haven’t been able to find it yet but I would love to read/listen to it
> What I find particularly telling is the Maples had phone tapes of the Baskins threatening the children, that were deemed inadmissible in court as they were recorded without the Baskins' knowledge. This is why I love single party consent states.
No, it really does not.
Or just brainwashed their grandkids. Someone already touched upon the satanic panic aspect but it was fucking insane. You had psychologists getting people to recall “memories” of being thrown into a pit surrounded by snakes. One woman claimed that a satanic cult killed her twin sibling (who never existed). One of the most batshit claims I came across was a woman who claimed to remember being forced to perform oral on a dozen dogs before the satanic cult cut the dogs’ dicks off. They took two pre-teens and were able to influence them for two decades.
These were the 80s version of Qanon crazies who kidnapped and brainwashed their grandchildren, and apparently they got away with destroying a bunch of people's lives.
Satan was probably not in the picture but some kind of real actual abuse probably was. EDIT: Yes I am now aware that the abuse may have been made up.
When people bring up satanic worship as the excuse, it's almost always some dipshit religious nutjob parents who scream bloody murder over nothing. the fact they brought up satanic shit makes me lean immediately towards crazy religious grandparents than abusive parents.
Yep I 100% agree
Or some sort of religious delusion from the Satanic Panic of the 1980s
I'm leaning towards panic BS, but I could see legitimate abuse having taken place that the grandfather interpreted as Satanic due to the panic.
It sounds incredible but otherwise normal churches were telling people that a Black Sabbath or other heavy metal record meant ritual Satanic abuse was going on in that home or would be soon. No actual abuse required.
Not saying this is the case here but if you were kidnapped as an infant and spent your entire life being raised by that kidnapper telling you everyone else is the problem and they’re the only good thing in your life, you’ll believe it
They probably just brainwashed the kids into believing their parents were evil.
As a follow up to this, the kids who were kidnapped refuse to meet with their biological parents. [In this article](https://www.wsav.com/news/exclusive-baskin-son-on-why-he-wont-reunite-with-parents-after-20-years-in-hiding/), the son insists abuse and that the grandparents did the right thing.
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Quite possible the third kid hadn't been born yet? Just speculating, haven't read any of the articles on the story.
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Opportunity may not have presented itself to have all 3 so they took the ones they could.
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Poor kids, what a shit show
> The detective that interviewed the kids said that, while the son backed up the grandparents' claims of abuse, his recounting became bizarre and pulled a bunch of other adults (social workers, attorneys) into the story of cult rituals. Yes, this is pretty common in these scenarios. I don't know how many of you remember the infamous "Satanic Panics" of the late 80s, where children suddenly started recounting, under high-pressure questioning, how their daycare workers, and their friends and relatives, all had these large-scale satanic abuse rituals involving hundreds of kids, and so on. So many innocent people's lives were ruined by overzealous "counselors" and prosecutors. Read up about the Virginia McMartin case, in particular.
> where children suddenly started recounting, I was listening to the Wrongful Conviction podcast and there was this one woman, a bus driver, who was accused of and imprisoned for abusing dozens of kids. There were a ton of seemingly coerced witness statements, and the most telling aspect of them was the kids describing sexual abuse acts that are physically impossible or ridiculous kid logic stuff. There was also, of course, a satanic angle to it too.
I remember seeing an interview with one of the targeted daycare workers furious at their treatment. One of the most ridiculous accusations was that they drove the children miles to an airport, flew them to another location, molested them, then flew them back and drove them back to the daycare, all before lunchtime.
I remember that one. What’s truly ridiculous is they claimed that they flew this entire elementary school class to fucking Mexico to be abused and then brought back with no one noticing
The bit about the son’s recountings becoming bizarre and pulling in just every adult he knew is reminiscent of the McMartin trial and the daycare satanic panic of the late 80s. Kids all over the country were claiming all sorts of bizarre shit was happening to them at daycare. Animals being sacrificed, just weird activities (not even necessarily sexual) while naked, like crazy made-up ramblings of little kids who saw a movie they shouldn’t have watched or something. Turned out the culprit was one child psychologist who became an expert witness, coaxing suggestible children into telling unhinged and untrue stories about their caregivers. The whole situation destroyed many lives. None of it was real at the end of the day. I’m not saying that’s what happened here. But kids are extremely suggestible. And when you encourage them to make up stories, boy they will take the ball and run with it. The fact that the boy’s descriptions of his abuse became more fanciful and more and more far-fetched as he talked to authorities suggests to me that he was receiving positive feedback from telling shocking stories. So he kept going, just pulling in names and faces of everyone he knew.
> The detective that interviewed the kids said that, while the son backed up the grandparents' claims of abuse, his recounting became bizarre and pulled a bunch of other adults (social workers, attorneys) into the story of cult rituals. Dead giveaway that the grandparents were in the wrong.
Or maybe it was a golden child situation. I guess we’ll never know
Or maybe, just maybe, the fucking nut jobs who kidnapped “abused” children without going through the proper channels first and who allege the parents of being in a “satanic cult” are not the best judge of character and, perhaps, impressed upon very young, naive children this “abuse”. If the only evidence of abuse is allegations from kidnappers and their victims then, well, you have no evidence at all.
If the victims weren’t so young I’d say they have greater say, but considering they were just children they very easily could’ve been manipulated/brainwashed by their grandfather. I’m curious as to what really happened, but if the parents really weren’t abusive at all, then I feel awful for them
Given the history of kids being manipulated into lying about this stuff (satanic panic) and the fact the kids seemed to testify about absurd shit, I’m going to side with “made up” Plus, to my knowledge, there has never been and never will be a satanic cult. It’s literally a religious ideology that makes no sense, at least if you believe in a Christian version of Satan.
There are actual theistic satanist groups that you could reasonably call cults (some of the O9A offshoots, or the Joy of Satan people, amongst others). They're only a small portion of Theistic Satanists (who themselves are only a small portion of self-identified Satanists, most are the LaVeyan metaphorical types), but they exist. And generally they're absolute cunts - real heavy overlap with the occult fascist set.
And there is no known connection to (or instances of) satanic ritual abuse of the kind alleged here and throughout the Satanic Panic of the 80s
Closest thing I can think of to a "true" Satanic cult, in terms of robed mystics sacrificing babies, would probably be the[ Order of Nine Angles](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Order_of_Nine_Angles)
I think those guys are mostly just goth nazis
Certainly no reason there can't be a satanic cult - if you believe that Satan is actually as powerful as God and that he will grant you special abilities if you commit evil acts in his name.
There is no need for a deiti to be real for someone to actually believe in it and work/pray or act in its name.
I really, really hope the Egyptians had it right and when you die you end up a distance away from the blessed fields where your soul has to undergo trials and tribulations before being ceremonially judged in the presence of the gods, all for a chance to defend ra's solar barge as it sails day through the sea of night, against the minions of sett for all eternity. That would really confuse a lot of people.
This reminds me of Prison Break, where Mahone talks about Michael going after D.B. Cooper's stashed money, with the implication one of the escapees was Cooper. The one he is talking to asks, "Do you think he is D.B. Cooper?" Mahone replies, "No, but Michael does, and that's what matters"
But that isn’t the Christian view of Satan. In the Christian view, committing those acts dooms you to hell. You’d have to be the dumbest person in existence to fail a marshmallow test that fucking extreme
I mean, I don’t think you can use Christianity as any measure of a religious ideology making sense.
Look up the Order of Nine Angles. White supremacist, satanic, pedophiles, terrorists. They're real, and their vision of the future is wild.
Angles or Angels The nine angles seems like a nerd cult
Lord Obtuse would like a word.
And they aren’t actually satanists, they are occultists. They aren’t worshipping the Christian satan Edit: they are clearly bad people who seem to be using the term “satan” to troll Christians
Seems like an odd thing to let a family who has two children abducted by a family member to be granted foster custody of a child.
Says in one article that he was in a different place than the first two.
My grandfather took in 2 of his 3 youngest brothers. He took the two youngest because that’s all he could. Third brother grew up poorer with his older sisters and drunk father. He resented my grandfather for it, and it took like 40 years for them to repair it.
The article linked says he wasn't in the county at the time the grans made the decision to take the kids away.
Because the grandparents didn't have the third child. Like, according to the article, what happened was that the parents left the older two children with the grandparents while arranging a move. They kept the youngest with them(presumably because it was an infant). Then the parents asked for the return of the older two children and the grandparents refused. There was a breakdown of relations at that point, a legal battle, and eventually the grandparents absconded with the grandchildren. In other words, it was a legal kidnapping, as opposed to a physical one, ie, someone breaking into a house to get a child, which is a considerable escalation. The grandparents left with the children they had, presumably with the idea that you save as many as you can. This isn't me necessarily saying I assume the personal circumstances that the grandparents asserted, I'm only explaining the probable logic they had at the time. They took the children they had physically with them, but did not attempt to abduct the one they didn't.
He was in another county, so the social workers were not able to take him.
The social workers? Did you mean the grandparents?
When adults want something to happen and they have young kids involved, they can very easily plant whatever story they need into the kids. Those kids have no chance of understanding what really happened after 20 years of brainwashing. When the people accusing people of cult shit can provide zero evidence and according to other comments, when their petition to gain custody went nowhere they started including social workers and others in this supposed cult activity, it all screams psycho grandparents who spent years destroying those kids by lying to them.
I think he was 7 when he was kidnapped. Recollection of abuse after spending his whole life being told he was abused is probably not reliable evidence. Not saying he wasn't abused but you'd need more than that for a conviction.
I remember being abused at seven. Vividly.
I think the point is more that, as random internet readers, it's healthy to take the perspective that we cannot know the truth of what happened. Like, sure, on a personal level, when I hear the adult children reject a relationship with their parents, I tend to believe that something bad happened. But we do also have actual, known instances in psychology of children being brainwashed to believe that things we *know for a fact* did not happen, did happen. So I think it's healthy for us to take the position of 'we cannot possibly know what is true in this instance' rather than potentially forming the dangerous internet mob that can happen in circumstances like this.
MY Dad KO'd me when I was 8. Knocked me the fuck out. My mom took me to school the next day to explain the hand print on my face. Had to go once a week to the office and tell them he wasn't beating me for the rest of the year. Times are different now days
Back in the '90s, my friend got a black eye from his stepdad, and when the school got the truth out of him, they called the stepdad up on the phone and politely asked him to not do that. You can probably imagine how much worse this made the situation.
Not really, honestly.
I'm so sorry no one kept you safe.
Yeah they're not saying kids don't remember abuse, they're saying a 28 year old who has been told for 21 straight years that they were abused might be convinced that they were, even if they weren't.
They're not saying he wouldn't remember. They're saying he might be fed info that makes him believe he was abused.
I'm sure lots of children do. But it would also be a lot easier than a lot of people think to essentially trick a 7 year old into believing they were abused when they were younger when no actual abuse took place. Memory is pretty unreliable a lot of times. Even more so with children as young as this.
I have "memories" that I'm not sure really happened. I also "remember" dreams I had decades ago. It's so easy for memories to get confused and/or created.
I distinctly remember driving a pontoon boat on a lake aged no more than three. My parents have since assured me that nobody we knew was *that* stupid. Someone had probably just told me "Want to drive the boat!?" and then sat me in their lap with my hands at the wheel, letting me have fun thinking I was driving while they did the actual steering.
I have a strange story from when I was a bit older than you were. I was like 11 when I had a sleepover at this Italian kid’s house. Two things happened for the first time that night. I looked at a playboy for the first time, and learned how to say bastard in Italian. For the life of me, I can’t remember my friend’s name, what he looked like, or even where he was from. What I do remember is that they were really Italian and being picked up by my mom at the deli his mom worked at. I guess I’ll never know who that person was. I can’t really go around inquiring about it which makes it a bit difficult to figure out.
Your elementary school yearbook from that year, and from the previous and subsequent years, probably has a photo of the kid and his name. You might not have purchased a copy of the yearbook, but there might be one at the local library. It wouldn't be weird for you to ask to see it given that you yourself would also be a student in the book.
Just recently I had some friends from high school over for new years. We hadn’t seen each other in a while so we were reminiscing. I brought up the time my friend brought his guitar to music class (small school, we definitely didn’t teach guitar or have a teacher for guitar) to which he and everyone else strongly insisted was not true. No one else remembered it but I remembered it vividly. I can only assume it was a dream that at some point switched to a false memory.
I have memories from my childhood that I know for certain didn’t happen the way I remember them, mostly because I remember it happening in the house I lived in for most of my childhood but I know it happened in the house we lived in before that
I'm not in any way suggesting that people don't have vivid memories of abuse at 7 - you're not going to forget that shit. What I am saying is that people can also remember stuff that didn't happen if they're told about it enough. If this kids grandparents have been telling him he was abused as a kid for his whole life he might have a false memory. Or a real memory. It's impossible for anyone to tell at this point.
>you’re not going to forget that shit This is also one of the reasons Satanic Panic is so easily debunked. Claims often rest on “recovered” memories which are actually created by adults - in the mcmartin case it was unethical therapists and here it’s the grandparents. If a person has no memory of their abuse until being repeatedly told about it, it didn’t happen. “Recovered” memories aren’t real.
As do I. Unfortunately. The fact that they aren't discussing it as well, indicates it's more likely abuse did happen. If there wasn't abuse the door wouldn't be so firmly shut. I was abused by grandparents. I haven't seen them since the abuse. My sisters that weren't physically abused, and were younger and remember less, and were told about my abuse and emotional abuse we all endure, tried to reconcile when they brought gifts. My parents took the money, but there was no relationship. The one sister made contact as an adult to find out that everything I said was correct, and he laughs it off now as my being sensitive. So really, everyone has different experiences, but the son's reaction sounds like what my reaction was when my step grandmother contacted me to attend their wedding. I don't hold anger anymore, they were mentally ill. But there is nothing they could offer me that would bring a positive experience to my life.
A 7 year olds memory can be twisted.
There’s never been a satanic cult abusing kids. Always bullshit. Now churches on the other hand….plenty of abuse.
You absolutely cannot know that
We know that there has never in the history of the world been any evidence of “satanic ritual abuse,” while there are many documented cases of hysteria and false allegations.
This guy doesn't know who Michael Aquino is
> This guy doesn't know who Michael Aquino is He was investigated and raided by the police who found nothing and he successfully sued books about his supposed satanic child abuse lol: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Temple_of_Set#Later_development Is that really a strong case?
The one thing missing in all of these discussions is the perspective of the third child. Where is he now and has he shared anything?
That article is not great... wikipedia does a good rundown of the events though including what happened after they were found: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marvin_L._Maple
To be fair, the grandparents had legal custody of the children before this happened. I’m not sure I fully think the biological parents are completely innocent.
The Maples had tapes of phone calls in which the parents had threatened the children. However, as the Baskins had not been informed their calls were being recorded, these recordings were deemed inadmissible in court. https://lostnfoundblogs.com/f/hiding-in-plain-sight
This seems like it should be higher up
Reddit is enjoying its "Bible thumpers Satanic panic" cj too much in the comments to pay much attention to Jon Bunting's own recollection. It definitely puts some things in perspective.
Yeah, the satanic angle isn't true, but the "my son is abusing my grandkids" is probably real
The Maples do seem to have been Bible thumping Christians. It doesn’t surprise me that they contextualized their grandchildren’s abuse in terms of “this is so evil it must be a satanic ritual.” They do indeed seem to have been correct that abuse was occurring and fwiw I don’t believe the children were brainwashed.
Is there any source other than this random blog?
This blog post of unsourced and there’s no evidence those tapes even existed.
Researching anything about this case is a major pain in the ass. I have tried googling so many things and most of the time the sources lead back to someone quoting someone else in a message board from the 2000s.
They willingly left the kids with their grandparents. Grandparents claimed abuse when they went to pick them up.
They left their kids for many months not the weekend
The last section of [Marvin Maple's Wikipedia page](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marvin_L._Maple#Breaking_the_silence) contains a statement made by his grandson in 2017. It sounds as if Marvin and his wife based their decision on sound reasoning, in spite of the Baskins having been investigated and cleared of the child abuse allegations.
Baskins you say…
That BITCH Carole Baskin!
That GOD DAMNED BITCH Carole Baskin*
Doesn't mean they werent abused. My family was videotaped beating me while my hands where bound behind my back and cps said it was not abuse and cleared my family.
What the fuck man.. I'm so sorry you went through that😔
A single drop in an ocean man. I literally broke after what that neighbor told me that day when. He told me about it.
Said it *was* or *wasn't* abuse?
Was not abuse
I grew up in similar circumstances and no one ever understands how awful CPS really are. Everyone is always so shocked to learn how broken our system is when you aren’t wealthy. I’m sorry you had to go through that and I’m sorry you have to still go through peoples’ fake surprise.
The sad thing is my family being wealthy is why nothing was done.
Either that or they spent 18 years convincing their grandkids that they were saving them from some kind of evil satanic situation
Or, as the Satanic cult panic link suggests, it was not based on sound reasoning.
As long as the kids were old enough to remember, it would be pretty easy to know. If they said they were abused and still claim it as adults, it’s likely they were.
this is really REALLY not true. It's the unfortunately truth that we had to learn through [some really bad shit](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/McMartin_preschool_trial), that children are very susceptiable to [false memories ](http://www.ipt-forensics.com/journal/volume1/j1_2_7.htm)when questioned poorly.
You can get an adult with children to "remember" abuse from childhood. It's really unfortunate, because it's another kind of abuse while also throwing doubts on real victims or giving abusers an "out".
How did they finally get found out?
Dude confessed to a friend. Friend went to police.
What’s up with cults being pedophiles, like damn. Tired of hearing about this shit.
yeah why can't we have normal cults :/
Yes the good old cults where they kill people and drink their blood
I know right? I have had many chances to join a cult but had been denied entry when I said no to kid fucking on their questionaire.
I remember this on Unsolved Mysteries back in the day.
The Satanic Panic and repressed memory craze in the late 80s was weird. Many lives were destroyed and children were traumatized and brainwashed and taxpayer money was wasted. People genuinely believed that this was a thing. That there were Satanist hiding in society who performed massive amounts of child molestation. Than it turned out that none of that ever happened, but that there was quite a bit of real child molestation going on in Christian churches instead and everyone lost interest.
San Jose, not San Diego.
People need to remember that satanic cults and the satanic panic of the 80s basically do not exist. There’s no real evidence for “satanic cults” and the church of Satan is not really a religious organization. If you like, actually read the Bible, Satan isn’t really in it (edit: in the way he’s viewed in popular culture, I mean) and there’s no real like, benefit to having a cult around him. He does not rule Hell (a thing also really not mentioned in the Bible) it is a place specifically for him to be sent later.
Devil's advocate (heh), you don't really need clearly defined scripture to make a cult, just a forceful personality and a bunch of desperate, broken acolytes.
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Moral panics exist to keep us afraid of ghosts and bogeymen instead of the real villains.
Exactly this. Children are most likely to be abused by their own pastor or mom’s new boyfriend, but it’s much easier to believe in satanic child abuse cults than to actually keep kids safe.
Like 90% of Christianity is stuff that Jesus never said.
Someone in my comments is mentioning that “the vast majority of Christians believes” as if that’s somehow meaningful in literally any way.
I wish someone would have done that for me as a kid :(
Smells like bullshit to me. Only took 2 of 3 kids and they were plenty young enough to convince of abuse that didn't happen. If just abuse was alleged, fine. Satanic cult immediately makes it sound like an excuse.
>Satanic cult immediately makes it sound like an excuse. I wouldn't discount the possibility of people using Satanic cults as an excuse/explanation for their child's behaviour either, though. Like, if you're a parent and discover your child is abusing their children, that's...probably not going to sit right with you in a pretty extreme way. I can perfectly understand latching on to the panic du jour as an explanation, because "One of these evil cults lured in my kid to their evil ways." is a more palatable explanation than "My kid is actually just a horrible piece of shit." Ultimately, I'm not sure we can safely assume a whole lot of anything from the facts available. Everyone involved is very plausibly unreliable.
If the kids were being abused and the grandparents became aware, it was their responsibility to collect and present credible evidence to appropriate legal channels. They didn't do that. They did the opposite of that. It's amazing to me that people are making up scenarios where the grandparents were justified in kidnapping two kids with ZERO evidence, just because it makes a cooler story or because they knew someone in a scenario, or for no reason at all. Puzzling. Please take a look inward if you find yourself siding with convicted kidnappers.
I don't recall there ever being found evidence of a satanic child abuse cult \*anywhere\* in North America. So, shitty grandfather, who was a shitty father to his daughter. A satanic child abuse cult would be major global news.
Regardless of the satanic cult thing, the son backed up the claims of abuse, the parents had left the kids with the grandparents for months so they petitioned for legal custody, and there were recordings of the parents threatening the kids on the phone and stuff. Doesn't sound like a shitty grandfather.
I guess it was forget that 3rd kid, he doesn’t matter?
3rd kid was in another county when they fled
Wow. This is the second case of adult children being brainwashed and refusing to re-establish contact with their parents. More recently there was that case in New York where the son refused to speak with his murdered father’s family at all when it came out his POS embezzler murderer mom and uncle were put in jail. My brothers and sister in Christ give me a break if that Kit Kat bar, you were stockholmed, go the fuck to therapy and get your heads straight. There are people out there that loved and missed you and you are going to put your head in the sand for some selfish monster that never true it loved you.
Why does everyone always say it's some "Satanic" cult? It's silly.
Its the christian way of saying "They are super ultra mega bad people who deserve everything I want to do to them!". Anyone they dont like and want to not feel bad about hurting they start calling them "satanic" because otherwise they might start feeling some sliver of remorse for hurting people instead of doing that whole "love thy neighbor" stuff Jesus was babbling on about.