GUILTY France - 17 people charged in Outreau child sex ring, 2000

A wide range of local people were implicated by the Delays, as well as by the other couple at the centre of the case, their next-door neighbour David Delplanque and his partner Aurelie Grenon, and the children involved.

The Delays, Delplanque and Grenon had confessed to raping the Delay couple's four children in Outreau, northern France from 1995 until 2000, when social services raised the alarm.

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A French appeals court on Thursday overturned the conviction of six people accused of participating in a pedophilia ring in northern France five years ago, unraveling one of the most mismanaged criminal cases in recent memory and leaving the nation asking how the court system could have gone so awry...

The case was based on wide-ranging accusations by a woman in the northern town of Outreau after children told a teacher they had been abused in her home. The six people had been convicted even though she recanted her allegations against them during the trial. Of the 18 people she had originally said were involved, 7 were acquitted following her recantation and one committed suicide in detention before the case went to trial...

The case was marred by deep doubts from the beginning, said Yves Jannier, France's attorney general, speaking to the appeals court on Wednesday, a day before the ruling. He noted that an investigative report by the police in July 2002 found "more doubts than certainties" in the accusations, but said, "No one had enough critical sense to stop the machine."

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