photo credit: jim d’entremont
National Center for Reason and Justice ─ NCRJ
For immediate release: February 25, 2022
Contact: Bob Chatelle mgr@ncrj.org
Ohio DA dismisses all charges against Joseph Allen, one of the last people falsely imprisoned in 1990s daycare abuse panic
On February 25th , Lorain County Judge Chris Cook granted a new-trial motion for Joseph Allen and his co-defendant, Nancy Smith. District Attorney J.D. Tomlinson then requested that charges be dismissed, and the judge granted his motion. This case is finally over.
In 1993 Smith, a 37-year-old white bus driver for the Lorain Ohio Head Start Program, was accused of taking a four-year-old girl to the house of a man named Joseph, where the child was allegedly physically and sexually abused. The mother contacted other parents and went to the media, causing a panic. More accusers emerged. Eventually Allen, an uneducated working-class Black man who did not know Smith, was arrested. No reliable evidence was produced, but both defendants were convicted and given long prison sentences.
In 2009, a judge reviewed the evidence and acquitted both. The DA appealed, and in 2013 Allen was sent back to prison, while Smith remained free. In all Smith was incarcerated for 15 years, Allen for 24.
In Granting the motion, Judge Cook said: “All of the evidence submitted in support of the motion for a new trial is new evidence…[the evidence] is compelling. The Grondin affidavits present a pattern of sinister manipulation by Margie [Grondin] to manufacture allegations of sexual abuse of children by Smith and Allen for Margie’s own financial gain.”
After the motion for new-trial was granted, DA Tomlinson directly addressed Smith and Allen: “I apologize to you, especially for what was done to you and your families, as a result of this ill-conceived prosecution. On behalf of the state of Ohio, I wish for nothing but the best for you and your loved ones. I hope that in the future, only happiness and good fortune will follow you.”
Both Smith and Allen made emotional statements after charges were dismissed. After her thanks to those who helped her, she also had something to say to her accuser and to her prosecutor: “To Margie Grondin, who orchestrated this horrible alleged crime that never happened and the other parents who thought that it was OK to follow suit with her, that one day you will answer for this…and to Jonathan Rosenbaum, my hope and prayers are that you will answer for this wrongful persecution that you put me and many others through and hopefully God will forgive you. But I want you to know I’ve never known such evil until that day 27 years ago, and it changed my life forever.”
The nonprofit National Center for Reason and Justice brought the case to public attention in 2002 and has been contributing to Smith’s and Allen’s legal, financial, and emotional support ever since. “We are overjoyed that Nancy and Joseph are both free,” said NCRJ Executive Director Bob Chatelle. “But we will not stop fighting until they are fully exonerated and compensated for the terrible wrong the state of Ohio perpetuated against them.”
The NCRJ works for rational, science-based child-protective policies and restorative approaches to serious harm. It fights against false accusations of harm to children and seeks to repeal draconian policies affecting those convicted of sexual crimes, a class of people widely shunned even by many who otherwise passionately defend civil and human rights. The NCRJ has been instrumental in securing freedom in other important cases, including Bernard Baran of Pittsfield, Massachusetts, The San Antonio Four, and Victor Rosario, of Lowell, Massachusetts.
For more information, visit www.ncrj.org
