Posted on 04/03/2003 5:00:36 AM PST by tdadams
PRAIRIEVILLE, La. -- Lauren Roberts was riding in a car with her aunt, Daina Sancho, to Blockbuster one day last summer when Sancho said, "Lauren, I have something to tell you. I'm in love with I.V."
Daina was a 41-year-old mother of two. I.V., the nickname for Irwin Vincent O'Rourke III, was only 13 years old. It was a good thing, Roberts said, that she wasn't driving, because the news came as a shock.
"I told her to be careful," said Roberts, a slender 17-year-old redhead and mother of a 1-year-old baby girl. "I didn't want her to get in any trouble."
Just a few months later -- court officials said it was October or November -- Daina, I.V. and I.V.'s parents showed up at the Ascension Parish Courthouse in Gonzales, seeking a marriage license.
"I said, 'No, I'm not signing that,'" recalled Judge Ralph Tureau. "Not without knowing more about it."
The couple left. On Jan. 10, I.V.'s 14th birthday, they showed up at Mobile County Probate Court. By this time, Daina was 42. Unlike Louisiana, Alabama does not require a judge to approve marriages in which the bride or groom is under age 16. Alabama merely requires that the minor be at least 14 years old, and that both parents sign.
I.V.'s parents, Irwin Vincent O'Rourke Jr. and Mary Alice Bordelon O'Rourke, were willing to sign.
"If you've met the man of your dreams, why wait?" his father told the Mobile Register.
They were struggling to get back on their feet after suffering severe health problems and financial setbacks when they lived near New Orleans. I.V.'s father had been operations manager for the New Orleans Novelty Co., which sells pinball machines. But, he said, he suffered heart valve damage and could no longer work. He blames a diet pill for his heart problems.
In 1995, they filed for bankruptcy, according to court records. In 2001, they lost their modest brick house in Kenner to foreclosure.
In Kenner, I.V. had been an honor roll student. He'd been on a school Quiz Bowl team that finished third in the state in 2000. He was part of a Duke University program for gifted children.
"He was just always a really happy person," said Emily Osborn, who was in his honors classes in fifth grade.
He wasn't the type of boy the girls had crushes on, nor was he terribly popular, but he participated a lot in class and was never mean to people, she said.
The family moved to Gonzales, a small city about 60 miles northwest of New Orleans. I.V. met Daina through her 14-year-old son, Justin, from her first marriage, said her ex-husband, Jules Marc Sancho. Daina and Marc, married 18 years, divorced in 2000.
She met Sancho when she was 15 and he was 16, and they quickly became a steady couple, Sancho said. Their parents were active in Mardi Gras societies, and they both attended Catholic schools.
Daina dated here and there after the divorce, and had an on-again-off-again relationship with her ex-husband, said Sancho and Roberts. Sancho and Roberts said Daina started acting much younger than she was.
She started using teen slang and got a thumb ring, Sancho said. She wore youthful clothing and started listening to teen music, according to Sancho and Roberts.
"She loves my friends and my friends adore her," Roberts said, sitting on the stoop of her house one late morning in February.
Teens and others in their early 20s drifted in and out of the house, some with piercings and tattoos, all sharing an easy, lazy banter. It was close to noon, but some were just waking up. They'd been to New Orleans the night before, Roberts explained.
Daina is "out there," as in not your typical 40-something-year-old mom, said a goateed Donovan Hunter, 21, who said he goes from job to job. "But in a good way. She's like old, but one of us."
A slender woman of average height, Daina has long dark hair that she sometimes pulls back from her face into a ponytail. She works as a dental hygienist and sells Mary Kay cosmetics on the side.
In 2001, she lost her parents and sister. Her mother and father died of cancer months apart from each other, and her only sister died of natural causes, her ex-husband said.
For a while after the deaths, she lived in the home her parents had purchased just around the corner from her ex-husband. The Sanchos had joint custody of their two children.
Late last year, she bought a brick-and-stucco home in an upscale Prairieville subdivision where homes typically start at above $200,000.
Neighbor Carol Dean, who buys cosmetics from Daina, said her school-age daughters play with I.V. and Daina's children. Dean's daughters say the Sanchos have a white rat named Peaches and at various times they've seen a pet tarantula, a pet scorpion and something that resembles an iguana in their home.
Dean said she had no idea that Daina and I.V. were married. She just thought Daina was taking care of him.
Daina and O'Rourke said they tried hard to keep the marriage a secret. O'Rourke said they weren't even planning to tell her 9-year-old daughter.
"It is unusual but it's nobody's business," Daina said during a brief telephone interview. "It's nobody's business who I fell in love with."
She said she feared that the information, once known, would jeopardize her job and possibly the custody arrangement of her children.
"We happen to be on the proper side of the law," said I.V.'s father. "It's in the laws of five states. Why is it so wrong?"
Actually, only two other states -- Kansas and Texas -- allow 14-year-olds to marry with just parental consent, a search of state statutes shows. Some states allow children to marry at that age or even younger, but set conditions: he or she must be a parent or expecting a child, or the minor must obtain a judge's permission.
If Alabama hadn't allowed Daina and I.V. to marry, they would have gone to another state, O'Rourke said.
His son is mature for his age, O'Rourke said, and he felt the couple had waited long enough to be sure that marriage was the right step. Prior to the ceremony, the minister, the Rev. Frank McCloskey, took them into a separate room where he asked them questions, O'Rourke said.
McCloskey, available for weddings at the Bragg-Mitchell Mansion, said he is an ordained priest with the Old Catholic Church, a denomination that split off from the Roman Catholic Church in the 1800s. It is very small, and he said his Mobile-area congregation meets in homes and consists mostly of friends and family members.
He would not discuss the ceremony, or whether he had performed marriage ceremonies for other minors.
When I.V. is college age, Daina will be in her late 40s. When she's near retirement age, he'll be in his 30s.
O'Rourke said he believes that Daina and I.V.'s relationship will last.
If not, "Divorce is easy," he said. "If it doesn't work, it doesn't work."
The parents of the "groom" however, are horrible, horrible people.
The clergyman is beyond reprehensible.
Coincidence?
Methinks that Miss Roberts has seen her own fair share of trouble.
Could they be wrong?
However, a 14 year old is still a child, notwithstanding what the antiquated law in Alabama says, and should not be allowed to marry a 42 year old woman under any circumstances.
I love the rationalization about it not being technically illegal, that everything is just fine. This mid-life crisis mama is a pedophile, plain and simple.
Freedom, Wealth, and Peace,
Francis W. Porretto
Visit The Palace Of Reason:
http://palaceofreason.com
His wife will be 61 at that point.
Maybe one of those pedophile priests that think sexually abusing 14 year old boys is okay?
I think I might have to learn it.
Apparently the long-term effects of moon pies and Dr. Pepper are now being realized.
Why does the South do this to itself?
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