The Region : McMartin Defendant Eligible for Bail

McMartin Pre-School molestation case defendant Peggy McMartin Buckey, 59, moved a step closer to freedom when prosecutors agreed to the lifting of the no-bail hold that has kept her behind bars for nearly two years. She is still being held on $1-million bail previously set on a second criminal complaint, however, and her attorney, Dean Gits, said his client has neither cash nor property. He said Buckey may be able to raise the necessary money by obtaining equity in real estate owned by friends and supporters. In lifting the no-bail hold, Municipal Judge Aviva K. Bobb said that if released, Buckey must agree not to contact any complaining witnesses or their families, to have no contact with anyone under 12 except children who are blood relatives or accompanied by their parents, to permit no child other than relatives in her home, not to leave the state without written permission of the court and to give up her U.S. passport. No restrictions were placed on where she could live.