Hundreds of Missouris 15-year-old brides may have married their rapists

Hundreds of Missouri’s 15-year-old brides may have married their rapists
BY ERIC ADLER March 11, 2018 05:30 AM Kansas City Star

District Court Judge Gregory W. Moeller peered down from the bench, aghast.

“I was horrified by the case,” the Idaho judge recalled recently.

In front of him, ready for sentencing, Keith Strawn — a father, 6-foot-3 with black-framed glasses the color of his boyish haircut — stood sad and penitent.

Strawn thought he had been doing right by his 15-year-old daughter, Heather, only to realize too late what a massive mistake he had made bringing her to Missouri — the easiest place in America for a 15-year-old to wed.

From 1999 to 2015, more than 1,000 15-year-olds married in Missouri. Of those, The Star’s review of data shows, more than 300 married men age 21 or older, with some in their 30s, 40s and 50s. Assuming they had premarital sex, those grooms would be considered rapists.

http://www.kansascity.com/news/state/missouri/article204292464.html