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Duchesne man charged with family abuse 'as bad as it gets'
By Geoff Liesik
Published: Friday, Nov. 6, 2009 11:06 p.m. MST
A Duchesne County man has been arrested in what investigators say is a case of domestic violence that is "as bad as it gets."
The 38-year-old man is accused in court records of beating his wife with everything from a board to his work boots, threatening to kill her if she "didn't act right" and raping her twice.
He also allegedly stomped repeatedly on his son after the boy ate a piece of cheese without permission.
"It's been a war zone in their home," said Duchesne County Sheriff's Sgt. Wade Butterfield, who called the investigation "gut-wrenching."
"I've told my kids as they've been growing up there's no such thing as monsters," the sergeant added. "I've been lying to them, because there are monsters. This guy is a monster."
The Deseret News is not naming the man in an effort to protect the identities of his alleged victims.
Butterfield said deputies investigating an assault complaint against the man in mid-September were provided with an eight-page narrative by his wife. The document outlined abuse the woman said she and the couple's five children endured at least weekly over the past 17 years.
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"Literally there were too many incidents of domestic violence and child abuse to even separate," the sergeant said. "It was as bad as it gets. We're just very, very fortunate that somebody didn't lose their life."
During an interview in October, the woman told authorities she "lived a life of complete servitude" since marrying her husband in 1992, charging documents state. She said she was expected to have sex with her husband whenever he wanted, day or night, and if the "sessions" didn't work out the way he planned, she would be beaten.
"She said she didn't want to have sex with him at all because of the beatings," court records state. "She claimed that she was in pain all the time because she didn't have time to heal between beatings."
Butterfield said he was able to identify two specific instances where the man's alleged conduct constituted rape, including once with a broom handle.
"She reported that right after that happened, and before she could care for herself, that he made her cower with her face in the corner until she had permission to leave the corner," court records state.
The couple's children, ages 9 to 17, were not immune from abuse either, Butterfield said. The woman and her children told investigators that the man would keep track of the family's food, including counting how many slices of cheese were in the refrigerator. Butterfield said when the youngest child ate a slice of cheese in 2008 without his father's OK, he was thrown across a hallway by his hair, knocked to the ground and stomped on by the man, who was wearing heavy work boots.
(The woman) said she grabbed a two-by-four and hit (her husband) with it to get him to stop," court records state. "She said when she did this, he took (the board) from her and beat her with it."
Butterfield interviewed the man for three hours Thursday and said the man corroborated some of the allegations made by his wife. He acknowledged rationing food, the sergeant said, but said it was because "they were poor and the kids were wasteful," and alleged that his wife's alcohol use and poor parenting led to many of the problems in the home.
"He tried to minimize and play the denial game," Butterfield said, "but in the end he recognized that there was violence in his home and that things were completely out of control."
The woman and her children have left Duchesne County and are doing well, according to investigators, considering what allegedly took place in their remote home.
"She's healed up, and the weight of the world is off her shoulders," Butterfield said. "She doesn't even look like the same person that I interviewed a few weeks ago."
The man is scheduled to make an initial court appearance Monday in 8th District Court for two counts of rape, both first-degree felonies, and one count each of aggravated assault and child abuse, both second-degree felonies. He is being held in the Duchesne County Jail in lieu of $160,000 bail.
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