A woman who said she was forced to aid her husband in his rapes of two of their children was sentenced Monday to 110 years to life for her role in the crimes.
The victims of the rapes were her son, now 18, and one of the couple’s daughters, now 10. The Denver Post is withholding the parents’ names to protect the children’s identities.
The two children night after night were led by the woman into the couple’s bedroom, where they were raped by her now 60-year-old husband, according to trial testimony.
The assaults started on the boy when he was 5 and on the girl when she was 7.
The husband was sentenced in August to 200 years to life for the crimes.
The woman dressed her son as a schoolgirl with makeup before the assaults.
The daughter testified that her mother would lead her into her parents’ bedroom, cover her eyes with a washcloth, lie beside her and lift her gown as she was raped by her father.
The woman, 40, said her husband repeatedly told her that if she and the children left, he’d kill all three of them.
But Denver District Judge Herbert Stern told her Monday that she had a duty to leave.
“I think you are the victim of horrific domestic violence, but I don’t think it absolves your responsibility to protect your children and yourself,” Stern said.
“I know you feel you protected the children,” he said. “But I feel you contributed to the victimization of the children, and I believe that outweighs the horror of your own situation.
“Adults have to protect their children.”
The woman is disabled and walks with a cane. She never had sexual contact with the children.
Denver Deputy District Attorney Kerri Lombardi said the children wanted their mother sentenced to the maximum – life in prison.
Her minimum sentence is 110 years, although a parole board could let her out in 60, Lombardi said.
During the trial, both victims showed little sympathy for their mother.
“She never didn’t want me to do it,” the girl testified. “She was the one helping my dad.”
The woman told Stern she loved her children and “tried to the best of my ability” to protect them. “I tried so hard,” the woman sobbed.
The woman said that for nearly two decades her husband terrorized her – striking her with a closed fist, and slapping, kicking, violently grabbing and choking her, and hitting her with a TV remote control and shoes.
She was also shot with a “high-pressured BB gun” and made to eat soap, hot peppers and hot sauce, according to testimony.
During the trial, Jan Mickish, former executive director of the Colorado Domestic Violence Coalition, testified that male perpetrators of domestic violence are “goal-oriented” and use battering to terrorize and achieve control.
Some women think that escape isn’t an option, believing that wherever they go, their abuser will find them, Mickish said.
On Monday, Trish Thibodo, executive director of the coalition, appeared in the courtroom to support the defendant.
“We feel the domestic violence has been overlooked in this case,” Thibodo said. “She successfully kept the kids alive. She took the beatings to deflect (the father) from the kids.”
The judge said he was recommending the woman be evaluated by the state hospital and Department of Corrections. He said he will then re-evaluate the sentence but warned that he doubted it would be shortened.
Staff writer Howard Pankratz can be reached at 303-820-1939 or hpankratz@denverpost.com.
