FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

NEW WEB SITE EMPOWERS THERAPY CLIENTS, HOLDS THERAPISTS 
RESPONSIBLE FOR DANGEROUS "MEMORY RECOVERY" TECHNIQUES

http://www.StopBadTherapy.com provides information to prevent 
psychotherapy malpractice and to help its victims and their families.

SAN FRANCISCO, Calif. (December 2, 1998) - An Internet web site can 
make you rich, but can it reform the mental health industry?  
StopBadTherapy.com, a new Internet web site launched today, seeks to 
reform the mental health industry by requiring informed consent for 
mental therapy and warning consumers about the risks of therapies 
which haven't been tested for safety and effectiveness.
        "Too many lives and innocent families are being shattered by 
so-called memory recovery therapy and other forms of mental health 
malpractice," says Eric Krock, the web site's creator. 
"StopBadTherapy.com provides:

- educational information to empower mental health consumers and 
  prevent tragedies
- legal referrals and state licensing board contacts to help those 
  already victimized
- legislation to reform the mental health industry, and 
- point-and-click templates which make it easy to email your elected 
   officials and demand change. 

Memory recovery therapy is the toxic waste of the mental health 
industry, and this site will shut the polluters down."
        The new Internet web site, http://www.StopBadTherapy.com/, 
takes direct aim at the controversial use of techniques such as 
hypnosis and "guided imagery" in attempts to "recover memories" which 
a therapist believes the client has "repressed." Last year in the 
U.K., the Royal College of Psychiatrists advised psychiatrists to 
avoid using such techniques. In the U.S., recent multimillion dollar 
damage awards and settlements in lawsuits against psychiatrists have 
highlighted claims by former clients that the techniques produce 
"false memories" of abuse which never happened. To address these 
problems, StopBadTherapy.com provides:

- an online 40 question checklist for evaluating your therapy 
  reprinted from Beware the Talking Cure by Terence Campbell, Ph.D.
- contact information for professional licensing boards in all 50 
  states to enable former clients and their families to file 
  complaints of unethical or incompetent practice 
- contact information for attorneys willing to represent victims of 
  psychotherapy malpractice 
- legislation to reform the mental health industry by requiring 
  informed consent for mental health practices, and point-and-click 
  form letters to email elected officials asking for passage of this 
  legislation
- true stories of bad therapy and false memories told by clients and
  their families
- excerpts from the books Victims of Memory by Mark Pendergrast, 
  Suggestions of Abuse by Michael Yapko, Ph.D, and Second Thoughts by 
  Paul Simpson, Ph.D.

        Deborah David, who developed false memories of sexual and 
satanic ritual abuse while in therapy, says "I and my family were 
the victims of a therapist who used untested, unsafe, and 
unscientific techniques called 'repressed memory therapy.' 
California's Board of Behavioral Sciences, the people who are paid by 
tax dollars to monitor therapists and protect consumers, dismissed my
complaint by claiming 'there was no enforceable standard of practice'
for repressed memory therapy and did nothing to protect the public.
It is time psychotherapists are held to the same accountability as  
other industries are when selling goods and treatments to the 
consumers of this state.  Licensing boards must also be accountable 
to the consumers instead of protecting therapists who practice 
therapies that have never been shown to be safe and effective. 
StopBadTherapy.com is a wakeup call to the boards that consumers will
no longer allow their tax dollars to be spent on protecting 
irresponsible psychotherapists while they harm more innocent people."
        Carol Marks, MFCC, who practices in California, says "I've 
been startled and ashamed at so many of my colleagues' misuse of 
therapeutic practice. Whatever happened to 'First do no harm' as a 
guiding principle of treatment? Psychotherapists who practice 
recovered memory therapy have created mental illness in the very
patients they purported to help."
        Experts and psychotherapy malpractice victims nationwide are
hailing today's public launch of StopBadTherapy.com as a milestone in 
the movement to reform the nation's mental health industry. Noted 
memory researcher Elizabeth Loftus, Ph.D., Professor of Psychology at 
the University of Washington at Seattle, says that "Research shows 
that under the right circumstances, false memories can be planted in 
some people, even for events that would have been upsetting had they 
actually happened. StopBadTherapy.com is a unique effort to bring to 
public attention the risks of some therapy techniques, and to 
hopefully minimize faulty diagnoses and false accusations.   We all 
have an interest in preventing future tragedies."
        Michael Yapko, Ph.D., author of Suggestions of Abuse, adds 
that "My work highlights the disturbingly large number of mental 
health professionals who treat their patients on the basis of often 
idiosyncratic personal beliefs and misinformation.  Specifically, 
those therapists who hold basic misconceptions about human memory,  
hypnosis, and the power of suggestion are potentially harmful to 
their patients through their ability to influence them to adopt 
similarly erroneous and even dangerous ideas about the origin and 
meaning of their symptoms. StopBadTherapy.com will help to educate 
both therapists and the public and thereby help prevent future 
tragedies of therapeutic malpractice."
        R. Chris Barden, an attorney and licensed psychologist who is
President of the National Association for Consumer Protection in 
Mental Health Practices, says that "Although our ongoing litigation 
and education efforts continue to be powerfully successful, 
legislation requiring informed consent and safe and effective 
treatments is also needed to protect mental health consumers from the
dangers posed by incompetent therapists.  StopBadTherapy.com will 
assist the mental health reform movement by educating the public and 
helping concerned citizens contact state and federal legislators."
        Pamela Freyd, Ph.D., Executive Director of the False Memory 
Syndrome Foundation, says that "This site provides a wealth of 
information for people interested in the topic of false memories and 
the therapeutic techniques that carry a heavy risk of causing them. 
It provides a central location for the public to obtain information 
about the licensing and monitoring of professionals by state 
regulatory boards."
        Mark Pendergrast, author of Victims of Memory, says that 
"StopBadTherapy.com provides a comprehensive, valuable one-stop web 
site for information on the recovered memory phenomenon.  Countless 
psychotherapy clients have been led into false memories of sexual 
abuse that harm their mental health and destroy their families.  When
people enter therapy, they are, by definition, in a vulnerable state.  
It is reprehensible to encourage the search for mythical 'memories' 
with pseudoscientific methods.  StopBadTherapy.com is a vital 
resource for all who seek to understand this phenomenon."
        Beth Rutherford, who developed false memories of incest and 
abortions during therapy but has since reconciled with her family, 
says that "Those of us who are victims of False Memory Syndrome 
initially go to a therapist for different reasons.  For me, it was 
job stress. For others it may be a painful divorce, a death in the 
family,  marital problems,  problems with a child, a tragic 
pregnancy, etc.  But one thing is certain, we never walked into the 
therapist's office with the idea that we had been sexually abused.  
Unfortunately however, we all left with that idea." Her sister 
Lynette adds that "This can happen to anybody. We had the perfect 
family ... I wouldn't have believed it myself, if I wasn't in it."  
Despite the "memories" of incest and abortions which Beth Rutherford 
reported while in therapy, a medical examination after she returned 
to her family showed her to be a virgin, and her father had had 
a vasectomy when she was four years old.
        Author Charlotte Vale Allen emphasizes the harm which 
psychotherapy malpractice and the false memories it creates are doing
to actual victims of incest. "I spent almost fifteen years getting 
Daddy's Girl published and traveling internationally to bring public
awareness to an issue of signal importance, primarily to children.  
Then, to my horror, I learned that my 'outing' of incest had become 
the basis for a multi-million dollar industry of generating memories 
of abuse that never happened. Now I'm working again to make people 
aware that in all the debate about whether or not 'recovered 
memories' could be real--and I firmly believe they are not, as none 
of the incest victims I've encountered in more than 30 years have 
forgotten anything--the children who actually are being abused have 
been all but forgotten."
        Krock says he was motivated to create the site after his 
sister developed false memories while in therapy that their 
grandparents headed satanic cults and that both he and she were the 
victims of violent abuse as children. Krock says that his sister sent
accusing letters to him and other family members two and a half years
ago and has refused contact with the family ever since. "It's too 
late to save my family from the agony of False Memory Syndrome, " he
says, "but it's not too late to save yours. Write your elected 
officials today and demand that mental health consumers be guaranteed
the right to informed consent. Remember, your family may be next."
        Tana Dineen, Ph.D., author of Manufacturing Victims: What the 
Psychology Industry is Doing to People, notes that memory recovery 
therapy is only a specific example of the general problem of mental 
health malpractice and therapy performed without informed consent. 
"Recovered Memory Therapy is undeniably under attack as serious 
damages to individuals, families and the court system are being 
recognized. However, what the public needs to recognize that what 
has been exposed is `just the tip of the iceberg.'"