During the late 1980s and early 1990s, allegations of sexual abuse and satanic sexual abuse ravaged child day-care centers, their directors, and their staff. Many were convicted and jailed. As the psychiatric expert for the defense in the Edenton, North Carolina “Little Rascals” trial, I had access to mountains of data. As a result of my total immersion in this case and several earlier ones, I came to appreciate the massive irrational effect that mass hysteria exerts on parents, children, and professionals. Even the judicial process was affected, to the extent that only years later was the defendant's conviction unequivocally reversed, citing several basic judicial errors.