a california town torn apart by tails of horrific crimes. >> you were accused of aboosing your sons? >> more than 40 arrests. even parents accused by their own children in chilling detail. >> the kid you looked after when he was a baby? >> accused me of molesting him. >> parents paraded into court one by one. >> when you know that nothing happened and you believe in your system, then you can't believe that you're going to go to

prison for it. >> but go to prison they did. >> not just guilty. guilty as to count i, guilty as to count ii, guilty as to count iii, and you're going oh, my god. >> years later revelations would turn on its head. >> what happened to these children? >> this is haunting. >> yeah, it was. >> testimony of children sent dozens to prison. have their words as adebts set anyone free? >> in this hour. secrets and lies. >> it was hot as the summer began, but then every summer is hot in bakersfield, california. triple-digit, blazing heat. in the summer of 1984 heat rose in washs around the dereks still pumping the full century after oil was first found pooled under

the dessert here. john stoll was about to start a new life. >> i met ann. she was younger. >> you were married right away? >> yes, sir, we did. almost right away. >> it was quick? >> yeah, too quick. big mistake. i was looking for something that wasn't there. >> by the summer of '84, john and ann were divorced. he was 40 and feuding with his ex-wife over their 5-year-old son, jed. how did you feel about that boy? >> really just amazing. he was the most important thing in my life at that point. >> since the day his son was born, stoll had considered himself the more stable parent. they shared custody. though jed lived mostly with her. >> i would get him every other weekend, so i would want to have a good time. we went whale watching and went

out on a boat. i would take him places and do things with him. >> father and son, creating memories that would last a lifetime. but then trouble. john's wife accused him of being a bad influence. >> she felt that i was trying to turn jed against her. >> at the time, john stoll was an oil field worker. a foreman, in fact, in an oil town like bakersfield that was a respected job. he had a steady paycheck, nice house and perhaps most important, a possession that made him immensely popular with his neighbors and friends. he had a swimming pool. in a town where heat wave could describe the weather for the entire summer, stoll's pool became the centerpiece of his social life. friends and their kids were constantly dropping in. his son jed was encouraged to bring pals over during his weekend visits. children stoll didn't even know were running in and out of his home half dressed changing into their swimsuits. then in early june, an officer dropped by.

said he was following up on a complaint filed by stoll's ex-wife. >> they said that she made a report that jed was -- jed and another little boy had a sexual encounter of some kind. >> while they were at your house? >> yes, sir. >> what would jed have been doing with some other little boy at your house? >> they were in the shower together, okay? >> how old were they? >> 5. both of them. they were just little kids experimenting, i guess. i didn't even really get into it with them. that was it and i moved on. i figured the more you make out of it, the bigger deal you make out of it, the more they're going to think it's a big deal. >> but it turned out to be a very big deal. just days after that first visit by police, they came again. and this time it was a raid. >> and they threw the search warrant on the table.

>> what are you thinking as the police come in the house? >> i mean, i'm just dumbfounded. i have no idea, absolutely no idea why they would be here. and i'm going, what the hell is this? i mean, i'm just -- you know, and they said, we need to question you downtown. >> so then you get into an interrogation room downtown. and what did they tell you? >> they said that i was going to be arrested for child molestation. whew. and that's when they told me that they spoke to jed and jed said i molested him. >> your son, whom you were so close and had all that fun, the kid you looked after when he was a baby -- >> accused me of molesting him. >> but it got worse. in the next few days, five more children surfaced, first and second graders, claiming they had been molested too. raped by john stoll. he had no criminal record, but with six kids ready to testify

against him, stoll's conviction seemed all but assured. so the prosecutors offered stoll what appeared to be a generous plea bargain. what deal did they offer you? >> 12 years. >> why didn't you take it? >> i'm no child molester. >> or so he said. but then john stoll's son jed and five other little boys took the stand and gave humiliating testimony before a judge and jury. the children hung their heads and answered yes or no to explicit questions about horrific acts of molestation. you're down there sitting at your table in the courtroom listening to your son. >> yeah. >> what was that like for you? >> devastating is a good word. it really hurt. >> detectives never found any physical evidence of a crime. but the heartbreaking testimony of six little boys was all the evidence prosecutors needed. stoll was found guilty. >> not just guilty.

as to count i, guilty. as to count ii, guilty. as to count iii, guilty. and you're going, oh, dear god. >> how long did they sentence you? >> 40 years. >> that seems like a distant memory to john stoll now. it was way back in 1984. but still he insists he is innocent. >> never, ever in my life could i imagine someone could be convicted for something they didn't do. >> oh. there is, by the way, another rather important thing that you should know. the investigation had shown that john stoll had not acted alone. not by a long shot. prosecutors told a horrified city that they had discovered entire rings of sick sexual perversions, dozens of adults targeting their own children. it seemed something evil was bubbling up in the scorching heat of bakersfield. coming up, who else would be accused? >> there was people sleeping under the beds, on the tables, under the table. >> all accused of the same thing? >> all child molesters.

>> how did one california town become the center of an alleged child sex ring when "secrets and lies" continues. [ monitor beeping ] [ sponge ] you've suffered some real damage. cheesy crusting. 3rd degree noodle trauma. the prognosis is bleak. you may need to soak overnight. nurse...! dawn power clean? it'll never work. [ female announcer ] dawn power clean with micro-scrubbing enzymes can give you the power of an overnight soak in just 5 minutes. [ sponge ] i give you a sparkling clean bill of health. it's a scientific miracle! [ female announcer ] dawn does more. [ sponge ] so it's not a chore.

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playing at a swimming pool on a hot summer day. ah, the innocence of childhood. and it was hot in bakersfield, california, in the summer of '84. john stoll let friends and neighbors bring their kids over to his pool, which he thought was a nice thing to do. but if you believed the investigators, the prosecutor, and the children who testified against john stoll, including his own son, he was not innocent

at all. found guilty of molesting children. >> i'm sorry, but i'm no child molester. >> john stoll protested his innocence, but authorities claimed otherwise. stoll used his swimming pool as bait, they said, an operation so successful prosecutors argued that stoll was more than just a calculating molester. but the mastermind of a depraved sex ring that preyed on young children. margie grafton was a friend of stoll's, and at that time a young mother with two little boys. you knew john stoll? >> yes, yes. one of the girls that i had worked with, it was her boyfriend. and we started doing things on the weekends for the kids. we would go different places but we would always end up at the pool, you know. >> tell me about margie grafton. >> she's this nice person and i

liked her boyfriend tim. and we got along well. >> and your kid played with her kids? >> mm-hmm. jed would only come on the weekends, he didn't have any little buddies but he knew don and allen. so i would say, margie -- >> bring them on over? >> yeah, come on over. and then it started visiting, and then it's overnights. you know, can we stay the night? sure. what the heck, yeah. no problem. >> what was your first inkling that something was wrong? >> the day i came home from work and my kids were gone. >> children gone? her boyfriend had been baby sitting, she said. >> he said some people came and took my kids. i said, who? he said, cps workers. >> child protective services? >> yes, yes. we had no idea why they took them. we walked over to the courthouse to clear it up. >> and when she got there, arrested. she and her boyfriend just hour ch other in thbooking room.

>> they took my fingerprints and put me in a cell. i had never been to jail before and there were people there that were in for murder. >> grafton and her boyfriend were put on trial at the same time as stoll, as well as a fourth person. grant self, a convicted child molester who was renting stoll's poolhouse at the time the allegations were made. while he did occasional contracting work with stoll, stoll says he knew nothing of grant self's past. did you know him very well? >> never met the man before he came to work. he was sleeping in his car and said he needed a place to stay, and i told him, well, you could stay in the pool house for a couple weeks until you found another place. >> did you worry about the kids around him or have any reason to? >> why would you think something like that? i mean seriously, why? i mean now i'm seeing child molesters under rocks, but i

didn't think about it. >> prosecutors accused them all. stoll, self, grafton, and her boyfriend, of raping boys from 5 to 8 years of age. and one of the star witnesses was grafton's 7-year-old son, donald, who took the stand and said not only that stoll had molested him, worst of all, he told the jury, his own mother had forced him into orgies. you were accused of sexually molesting your own son? >> yes. just the thought that everybody in the world thought that i had done that was devastating. it was devastating. >> and what was going on inside while you heard those things? >> i couldn't believe that they said it. when you know that nothing happened and you believe in your system, then you can't believe that you're going to go to prison for it. >> but you went to prison. >> yeah.

guilty, guilty, guilty. yes. >> convicted of crimes so heinous, she received a murderer's sentence. >> i was given 48 years. >> 48 years? >> 48 years. and no contact with my children. >> ever? >> ever. i couldn't call them, i couldn't write them. >> a heavy sentence. but that seemed to be just what bakersfield and the rest of the country wanted. when grafton and stoll were sentenced, child molestation, a crime kept hidden in years past for wont of shaming the victim, had burst forth from a dark closet into the national spotlight. >> you're charged in indictment "a" -- >> in many ways prosecutors were breaking new ground and started uncovering what they believed to be organized molestation rings from minnesota to massachusetts.

the case that captured the nation's attention in 1984, though it eventually fell apart, was the mcmartin preschool trial in los angeles county. that case broke just weeks before stoll's. but just 100 miles away in bakersfield, where john stoll lived, it was different. the story came in just under the national radar, and yet it was even bigger. in bakersfield, during the mid-'80s, the district attorney ed jacobs investigated not just one molestation ring or two, or even three. he and his staff eventually prosecuted eight separate sex abuse rings. all within this tight-knit community, a tiny fraction of the size of los angeles. what dark force was at work? authorities came to believe the sex rings were part of a much larger satanic cult. tips led them to alleged grave sites in search of child sacrifices, but no bodies were found. still, hundreds of suspected molesters were investigated, dozens prosecuted.

>> at one point, this was a 12-man cell. there was people sleeping under the beds, on the tables, under the tables. >> all accused of the same thing? >> all child molesters. it was just like this great upheaval of child molesters. two cells full of them. >> and there in jail, while awaiting trial, stoll befriended an inmate whose case was almost identical to his. though jeff modahl had been accused of belonging to one of the other alleged child sex rings, modahl's 10-year-old daughter, carla, had testified her father, along with his friends and family, had molested her. but modahl, like grafton and stoll, said the stories were lies. you know it's a famous story that everybody is in jail, they all say they're innocent. >> sure. but we were. >> nobody believes -- >> sure. and i can understand that. that's okay. i mean, i finally realized that nobody believes this. >> perhaps because in court the children gave such graphic accounts of how they had been

raped, ritualistically sodomized by parents and neighbors. why would they give such damning testimony, putting their own parents in prison if it weren't true? coming up, is it possible some or even all the children lied? how could that happen? >> here are some adults that knew that this was bull. >> a stunning turn of events when "secrets and lies" continues. progresso. it fits!

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in the summer of 1984, accusations of child molestation were widespread throughout the country. and in california, john stoll was found guilty by a jury of his peers. but still, he professed his innocence.

>> here are some adults who knew that this was bull [ bleep ]. there was some adults that knew, keith, i know they knew and they left it go. >> john stoll, margie grafton, jeff modahl and many of the other parents allegedly connected to the bakersfield sex rings were alarmed when they compared notes during their trials. the children who had testified against them said stoll sounded almost like they were reciting from a script. what they said was so similar. but when stoll was sent off to prison to serve that 40-year term, he had no proof, no evidence to support his suspicion. still, he spent his first years in prison often in solitary confinement in a mind twisting rage. >> the first five years in prison i was in and out of the hole. >> why did you get in the hole? >> i had an attitude. >> for stoll, changing that attitude meant finally shutting his mind off from the world beyond these walls and giving up any hope that someone outside cared about him or his claims of

innocence. and then, years later, stoll got word that margie grafton and her boyfriend had been set free. their convictions thrown out. had she been able to prove what both had believed at trial that the children's stories were made up? well, no. instead, grafton's lawyer discovered that a psychiatric analysis had been performed on both margie grafton and her boyfriend tim, and from that analysis it was determined that neither one of them had a sexual inclination toward children. but this very important bit of evidence was ruled inadmissible by the judge at trial. and while margie and tim sat in jail for years and years, an appeal arguing that the psychiatric analysis should have been allowed in court made it all the way up to the california supreme court, which ruled in their favor and ordered their release. how long were you incarcerated? >> almost eight years. i missed my kids for years.

i missed their childhood. i didn't get to watch them grow up. i didn't get to watch them lose their teeth or do the little plays in school or anything like that. >> but for stoll, there was no such exonerating evidence. and normal for him, remained his 6 x 9' prison cell. in 1995, stoll was transferred to a new prison, a dangerous time in an inmate's life as he fights for position in the cell block hierarchy. >> '95, i'm walking across the yard and i see this huge guy and he goes, john. i said, whoa! >> it was stoll's old friend, big tough jeff modahl. shuttled from one prison to the next, the two hadn't seen each other since their convictions ten years before. as the two friends swapped stories, stoll learned of a stunning development in modahl's case. shortly after he was convicted,

modahl's daughter, carla, had actually admitted that she had lied. here's the letter she wrote to her dad in 1985. dear dad, it says, i lied in court. i'm sorry for lying about this, dad. i'm so sorry. when we found carla modahl years later, she told us the same story. she had been fooled by a social worker and a prosecutor into testifying against her dad. at the time of the trial, she was living in a foster home she said, and wanted desperately to be reunited with him. what did you think would happen if you didn't tell them what they wanted to hear? >> i thought i would never go home or see my dad if i didn't say it. >> but if you told them that he had sexually abused you, they let you believe that you would be able to go home? >> yes. >> and see your dad? >> yes. >> and he wouldn't go to jail? >> yes. >> instead, he was given a

48-year sentence. and when carla at age 10 took her letter to court and begged to have her dad released, it didn't work. >> they didn't believe me. >> they only believed that story. >> what i said the first time. >> 14 years later in 1999, there was another strange twist in the modahl case. exonerating evidence surfaced. a medical examination given to carla shortly after her dad jeff was arrested said there is no evidence at the present time of sexual molestation. that information was never shared with the jury. modahl's conviction was overturned and he was released from prison. by the time he was set free, jeff modahl had spent 15 years in prison. when you got out of jail, what did you do? >> the most humiliating thing when i got out of prison, got out of jail, i had no place to go. i didn't have a home. i didn't have -- i had no place

i knew where i was even going to sleep that night for sure. i didn't have clothes. i wore a paper suit, made out of paper. to walk out of that county jail. and you want to talk about humiliation? >> again, for stoll, there was no exonerating evidence. no money for lawyers either. and so in prison, he remained. prepared to spend his life inside and had no idea that the departure of his friend jeff modahl would set in motion dramatic events and disturbing revelations. including some from the victims themselves, now grown men. coming up, do you know if john stoll ever molested any of those kids who went to that house? the children who testified doomed him to prison. now grown, they speak out. when "secrets and lies" continues. ♪

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i'm melissa rehberger. here's what's happening. newt gingrich is getting a big endorsement. the account union leader" says he could bring an innovatish forward looking strategy to the white house. and thousands of protesters remain in tahrir square tonight. more than 1,600 candidates are on the ballot. now back to "secrets & lies." >> during the peak of the so-called bakersfield sex ring scandal, more than 40 people were arrested and dozens were convicted. most sentenced to long prison terms. but as years went by, 22 of those convictions were overturned.

still, prosecutors insisted these people were guilty. and all the while two things remained unchanged. the d.a. who oversaw the prosecutions was still in office and john stoll was still in prison. jeff modahl, after his release in 1999, tried to throw a lifeline to his old friend. >> it's important to realize that john stoll had no record before this started. >> modahl's attorneys contacted this group of lawyers with the california and northern california innocence project. >> we began looking through the trial transcripts. >> each of the children were inconsistent with their own testimony. many admitted during the trial that they were lying at times. >> what really struck me is john was so open about his whole story, that it had the ring of truth about it. >> can you really tell? some people are awfully good at answering questions about that. >> we're not naive about innocence and guilt. if it's a case we decide to commit our limited resources to, it's got to be a good case. >> we each came to our own

opinion and shared oh, my god, he's innocent. we've got to get him out. >> but what would the alleged victims of stoll's sex ring have to say about that? one by one stoll's lawyers tracked them down. remember little donny grafton? margie grafton's son? he testified in 1984 that stoll and his mom forced him into orgies. didn't they? >> she never did anything wrong. >> donald grafton, now grown, says it never happened. he tells us authorities pressured him to lie. >> i was just tricked into lying to put my mom into prison. >> in other words, if you said what they wanted you to say, you would get your life back? >> yeah. >> you'd get your mother back? >> go back to normal. >> did john stoll ever molest you? >> no. >> do you know if john stoll ever molested any of those kids who went to that house? >> i never saw it. i never heard about it. i never even thought about it. >> i went swimming there a few times. a handful of times. >> this is ed sampley.

he was 8 when he testified stoll had assaulted him. >> sometimes just out of the blue it would come up, for whatever reason i'd think about it. >> this was haunting? >> yeah, it was. >> haunting because sampley, one of stoll's alleged victims, says the man never touched him. >> this man was totally innocent. it's hard to understand how i could fabricate a lie like that. >> then there was this young man who has asked not to be identified. he also testified against stoll. >> i knew i was lying, but they told me i had to. >> do you remember how you felt in court saying those things? >> scared. >> scared of what? >> scared of losing my parents. scared of the police. >> forced to lie as young children? exactly what stoll had been saying for years. so with this ammunition, his lawyers applied for a writ of habeas corpus, essentially asking for another day in court to present their new testimony.

months passed, the wait seemed interminable. and then finally the decision. motion granted. a judge would rehear the case against stoll. no cameras were allowed during the testimony. but outside the courtroom, those little boys, now men, described circumstances in 1984 which they said were surreal. terrifying. so how did all this stuff get started? >> the sheriffs came to my house and told my parents that other kids had seen stuff happen to me. >> what kind of stuff? >> that sexual acts occurred between me and john stoll and i had seen stuff happen between john stoll and other children. >> that's a lie? >> yeah, they were asking -- telling me i had to lie. >> donald grafton was 7 at the time he says he was pressured to testify against stoll. >> i knew i was forced to lie but i still -- i gave in.

>> for these boys, the story was the same. after first being visited by this social worker, velda morillo, seen here in an old training tape. she came to their homes with the sheriff's officer, but she asked most of the questions they told us. took them to a room away from their parents and told them she knew they had been molested by stoll after swimming in his pool. the more they denied it, they told us, the more she seemed convinced they were hiding something. grafton says he and his brother were put into foster care until they cooperated. sampley says he felt badgered by morillo and the officer. in the end, more than a 7-year-old could handle. >> they wouldn't go away. >> so how could you make it go away? >> if i told them that something had happened. >> and they kept asking over and over the same questions and all i kept saying is nothing ever happened. >> but you changed your story? >> yes. >> why? >> because if not, i could get in trouble.

>> sampley and the others say they were finally told what to say. not only by social worker morillo, but also by a prosecutor. >> they did coach us totally. they made us go over stories over and over. >> children, manipulated says sampley, by powerful authority figures. now as adults, they took the stand and proclaimed john stoll innocent. grown men reverted to little boys. they exhumed humiliating guilt riddled memories. they sat up on the stand and they looked down at john stoll in the courtroom and they begged for his forgiveness. >> to see him sitting up there, tears running down looking over at me telling me how sorry they were. i apologize, john. oh, man. >> but if the young men thought their new testimony would make everything better and get john stoll out of prison, they weren't so sure once the case was heard. for one thing, ed jagels, the

district attorney from the 1980s, re-elected time and again, continued to insist that stoll was guilty. the prosecutor now trying the case, deputy district attorney lisa green, challenged their testimony. >> she called us liars, and i felt bad. you know, here we were redeeming ourselves and making it right and she calls us liars. and that's just terrible. >> she didn't seem to care about the truth. >> trying to say now you're lying when back at the trial you were telling the truth? >> yeah, now i'm a liar. back then when i was 6 when i didn't hardly know the difference, i was telling the truth. >> there was some thought in the prosecutor's mind that these people who had recanted were actually now lying about -- >> to what end? to what end? what would they possibly gain from stepping forward?

now, she implied that they -- that they anticipated gaining money, that they were going to sue and get rich off of this. >> part of the lawsuit, you bet. >> first of all, that meant each of them independently came up with this idea. because when we asked them about the case, they recanted. >> well, maybe you suggested they might want to sue. >> we suggested it? >> how would that conversation go? we would sit down and say there's this guy in prison and we know he molested you a bunch of years ago, but why don't you come in and help us get him out of prison. but then maybe you can come in and sue the government and say that you lied because they made you lie. it doesn't pass the laugh test. >> but now can the one piece of testimony which could be more important than all the rest, stoll was hoping his own son jed would also tell the court that he too had been forced to lie back when he was a little boy 6 years old. now stoll watched a grown man take the stand. >> that's the first i had seen him, you know. >> in how long? >> 20 years.

and i was really proud of him. he actually turned out okay. >> proud? the son stoll says he was so proud of got up on the stand and stood by his testimony from 20 years before. he told the court he was sure his father molested him. >> when jed said that he thought i molested him, that just -- that's a killer. that hurt so bad. that hurts. i mean, he thinks something happened. and maybe after all those years of hearing it something did happen, maybe he believes it. >> how do you feel about him? >> about jed? i love him. he's my son. i'm sorry he feels that way, but

i didn't molest him. >> our interview had come at the conclusion of that court hearing. the result, partly because of what jed had said, was anything but certain. >> thanks, everybody. >> thank you. >> appreciate it. >> now as the interview ended, stoll was led away to await whatever his fate might be. freedom or more years in prison as a confirmed sex offender. whom would the judge believe as he weighed his decision? coming up -- >> the ruling on the petition for a writ of habeas corpus is as follows -- congratulations.

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decision day in the retrial of john stoll. what the judge rules will determine stoll's fate. back to prison as a sex offender or out as a free man. >> the ruling on the petition for a writ of habeas corpus is as follows -- >> from the start it looked bad for john stoll. the judge pointed out some inconsistencies in the boy's 20-year-old recollections. >> a judge talked about everything that was bad about our case. >> the judge also pointed out that not only had stoll's son jed testified that his father molested him, jed also said no one put words in his mouth or forced him to say things that weren't true. and the judge never considered the allegation that a prosecutor coached the boys. but then, 18 minutes into the ruling, the judge suddenly shifted direction in stoll's favor, ruling that the

interviewing techniques used by the social worker and the sheriff's officer were improper and resulted in unreliable testimony of the child witnesses. >> the petitioner's motion is granted and the judgment rendered against the petitioner is vacated. >> and with those simple words, john stoll was a free man. all charges thrown out. after 20 years in prison, on may 4th, 2004, in blinding light and blast furnace heat, john stoll was free to go. it was his 61st birthday. 20 years lost and now a modern day rip van winkle. >> i made my first cell phone conversation ten minutes ago. >> what was that like? >> whoa, that was -- everything is overwhelming, you know what i mean? everything is wow. >> that night, his lawyers took him out to dinner. the last time stoll dined out,

ronald reagan was hoping to become a two-term president. >> i am a candidate and will seek re-election to the office i presently hold. >> what kind of dressing on your salad? >> oh, my. >> you get choices now. >> come on in. >> two of his attorneys set him up in their guest house. >> sure beats a prison cell, doesn't it? >> he got a computer, a cell phone, an ipod and in a matter of days, shot ahead a generation. >> it scanned every song in here. >> the family he once had is long gone. his own son refuses to see him. but john stoll discovered he does have family. the lawyers who set him free. >> it's just like family. it really is family. >> we gained a family member. he's just a great guy. >> as for the boys, now men, who say it was their lies that put stoll in prison -- >> they didn't do anything. they were children. certainly can't be mad at them.

i find the people i'm mad at is who told them that story? i sat in my cell many a night thinking what the hell did they do to get all of these children to tell this outlandish story? >> and as those boys looked back at stolen childhoods and broken families, it was hard to know who in the end was more damaged. >> me and my dad after that just became distant. >> why? >> he didn't want to get accused i assume for the same thing. >> knowing how easily a life can be destroyed by false accusations, ed sampley makes sure he leaves the house when his daughters bring friends over to play. >> i consciously made an effort to try to be normal and not have those feelings of being scared. >> to be around kids? >> yeah, but it's really hard. i'm working on it. >> donnie grafton has the same fears with his own children.

>> i have a hard time with my kids sitting on my lap, the boy. the girl, she's not allowed to sit on my lap. i don't -- won't change diapers i don't -- won't change diapers for the girl. my kid rubs my leg and i smacked his hand. >> carla modahl bounced from one foster home to the next, took to the streets, got addicted. >> i have a lot of suicide attempts on my life from the guilt that i've carried. a lot of guilt. >> you were 10. it wasn't your fault. >> i may have been 10, but i knew right from wrong. >> to this day, the d.a. stands by the convictions. he declined our request for an

interview, issuing instead a few months after stoll's release, this statement standing by the conviction. my office remains convinced, based on the evidence presented at the 1984 trial and 2004 evidentiary hearing that the children were, in fact, molested by john stoll. the sheriff's officer who interviewed the kids feels the same way. social worker velda morillo declined to comment. and stoll, though finally free from prison, can never recover his lost life or the time he lost with his son. >> that's the one thing i cannot get away from. i cannot help but think about that. because that was my son. you know, that's really the hardest. jed's the hardest. >> i notice you said "that was my son." >> yeah. it was my son, yeah. >> a lost son, no job, 20 stolen years. which makes what happened 24

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after 20 years of sitting in prison, knowing he was an innocent man, john stoll finally got his day in court and was set free in the spring of 2004. but all those years of lost time, where would he go? what could he do? well, it's been a restless few years for stoll.

years in which he's wandered the country, looking for something that felt like home. he went to nebraska, spent some time with his old cellmate, jeff modahl. >> i made some pretty nice friends that i don't mind their company at all. and john stoll is very much one of them. >> jeff modahl sued and received a small settlement after his release. he bought a farm in eastern nebraska, nearest neighbor a good mile or two away. daughter carla lives just down the road. modahl invited john to come and stay with him. >> the guy i spent a lot of years with. >> we sure did. whether we liked it or not. >> whether we liked it or not, yeah. >> and now, the only other man in the world who had any idea what the other was feeling. >> it will be a good time to decompress because i can't talk to people at home. i mean, they're loving people and they really want to help but they just don't know. so now i have an opportunity to talk to somebody who does know.

>> after staying a while, stoll made his way down to rural oklahoma. >> very nice people here. >> there were old friends there who had stuck with him through all the trouble. john and cathy martinez had made a room available. but there was an unsettling truth behind the kindness of friends. if not for them, stoll would very likely be living on the streets. >> i got out at 61 and had a $742 social security check. what in the world do you do with that? >> have you been able to get a job anytime in the last couple of years? >> that's been really hard, because they ask have you ever been arrested for a felony, and i can say no. but it says, have you ever been in prison and i got to say yes. if you weren't convicted of a felony but yes, you're in prison, explain that one. and that's always -- >> and accused of molesting children, that's got to be tough for anybody to get past. >> sure. >> even if you didn't do it. >> i understand. i understood perfectly. it just hurts. >> still, in his drifting limbo, dependent on others for food and

shelter, stoll is ever thankful for his freedom. >> hear the birds? pretty nice. and there's a big beautiful stream down there. and john's son and i go fishing. >> the one person you're not able to go fishing with is your own son. >> yeah. yeah. a loss of 20 years. i can put that away but i can't put jed away. you know, that's always there. because one day i went out fishing, we were having a good time and all of a sudden i get in a terrible funk because i thought about jed. i thought man, he could be sitting over there. and it just really kicked my butt. and when i first got out of prison, i thought about jed all the time. now i try not to, because it just hurts and i try not to. but it's pretty hard to forget your son. >> and then, quite unexpectedly, stoll was summoned to attend another legal proceeding. investigators for the california attorney general had been

looking into stoll's case. and it was determined that he had indeed been wrongfully convicted and was entitled therefore to restitution, $100 for every day in prison. a package that over those 20 years added up to more than $700,000. what are you going to do with that $700,000? >> i figure if i invest it wisely, $700,000, i could be pretty darn comfortable. >> but john stoll could end up being more than just comfortable. on august 16th, 2005, he filed a $50 million civil suit against kern county. county officials say they will aggressively defend the case. but could he ever be truly compensated for a lie launched all those years ago? >> if i can reconcile with my son and be with jed to take him fishing, they could have the money. >> you would give it back? >> for your son? yeah, in a minute. in a minute.