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Four women jailed for gang rape cleared of charges after 18 years behind bars

The women say it was a witch hunt of catastrophic proportions.

Four innocent women in Texas have been freed and cleared of charges after spending 18 years behind bars, for crimes they didn’t commit.

Elizabeth Ramirez, Kristie Mayhugh, Anna Vasquez and Cassandra Rivera were wrongly being convicted of gang raping two young girls more than 20 years ago.

They told Daily Mail Australia they “were victims of a hysterical witch hunt, false evidence and anti-gay sentiment”.

Their nightmare began in 1994 when the two girls who later accused them, stayed at the home of their aunt Elizabeth Ramirez, while their mother was away. Ramirez’s former girlfriend, Kristie Mayhugh, lived with her and another couple, Vasquez and Rivera, were visiting.

When the two girls, then aged seven and nine, returned home their grandmother said they were acting strangely.

The girls were allegedly playing with their dolls in ‘a sexual manner’ and one of the children claimed she had been sexually assaulted by the four women in her aunt’s apartment.

They said the women held them down and inserted various objects into them, while threatening them with a gun or knife.

All four were arrested, signalling the start of a 22 year legal battle.

Ramirez, considered the ringleader, was sentenced to nearly 40 years in prison,while the others received 15 years each.

The stories from the two children changed several times and one doctor who examined them questioned if the crimes may have been ‘satanic’, reminiscent of the Salem Witch trials.

The four women repeatedly refused offers of early parole in return for embarking on rehabilitation courses for child sex abusers.

A breakthrough in their case came four years ago, when one of the alleged victims said she was coerced into making a false accusation.

Now in her twenties and a mother herself, she retracted her statement and categorically denied she had been sexually assaulted.

The courts slowly began ordering the four women’s release. Vasquez was let out in 2012 and the others given their freedom in 2013.

The four were finally exonerated last week in an announcement from the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals.

They will share a $20 million pay-out but say the money won’t help them get their lives back.

Cassandra Rivera, now 41, told Daily Mail Australia that her biggest regret was missing out on seeing her two children grow up and “tucking them in every night”.

She’d married, had kids and divorced before coming out as gay. Her children were 7 and 8 when she was jailed.

“It is the worst feeling ever when you now you haven’t done anything and they are constantly saying you did and are a child molester.”

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