Documentary misses an opportunity

Bill O'Reilly's favorite actor, Sean Penn, lends his name and voice to "Witch Hunt," airing April 12 on MSNBC. The documentary, by Dana Nachman and Don Hardy, is the story of the six Bakersfield parents who were wrongfully convicted of multiple counts of child molestation in the 1980s. Many locals are undoubtedly well-acquainted with the horrific story, which features names likes Pitts, Modahl and Stoll, so perhaps there is little new knowledge to be gained from the documentary in this part of the country.

But almost three decades after the first arrests, you'd think we were due for some analysis, some historical perspective. The documentary pins much of the blame for the flawed prosecutions on Kern County District Attorney Ed Jagels. But how did he continue to get re-elected by such substantial margins, even after the prosecution's self-inflicted problems became evident? Why didn't anyone ever step forward to oppose him?

Could this only have happened in a community like Bakersfield that tends to assume guilt? Or is it a broader phenomenon?

And where was The Bakersfield Californian in all this? (Answer: Casting more and more doubt on the "molestation ring" as time went on -- something a cursory glance at newspaper archives would have revealed.)

The filmmakers had a chance to study the ingredients of community hysteria. Instead, they seem to have produced a docu-drama that leaves us only with this penetrating question: "Gosh, wasn't that a shame?"