Posted on 07/25/2003 10:39:04 AM PDT by nickcarraway
Authorities accuse couple of illegal incestuous union
A Mobile County grand jury has said that a Theodore husband and wife may really be father and daughter and ought to be tried for incest.
Carrol Eugene Ferdinandsen, 53, and Alice Faye Ferdinandsen, 30, were arrested Thursday and charged with incest and fraud in connection with their May 2 marriage in a civil ceremony in Mobile County. They were indicted in June.
According to Mobile County court records, Alice was the third child of Carrol and Shirley Faye Ferdinandsen, and her mother filed for divorce when Alice was only 4 months old. Her mother said Thursday that she later met and married Charles Stewart, who Alice listed as her father on her marriage license application.
Up to that point, Alice had used "Ferdinandsen" as her last name, according to court records.
Incestuous marriages are forbidden in all states, in part due to fears about genetic mutation and child abuse. They still occur, though rarely, according to a survey of news articles from around the country.
The Ferdinandsens could not be reached for comment Thursday. They were still being held in the Mobile County Metro Jail, with bond set at $8,500 for each, officials said.
Family members said they had heard about the marriage and disapproved of the relationship.
"My father is completely convinced that she's not his daughter, no blood relation at all," David Ferdinandsen, who said he is Carrol's son and Alice's older brother. He's tried to discourage his father from the relationship, he said, but his father won't listen.
Alice's mother, whose last name is now Crayne, said Carrol is definitely Alice's father. She didn't meet Charles Stewart until Alice was 3 or 4 years old, she said.
"I told her she was stupid for marrying her own daddy," Shirley Crayne said. "I told him he was crazy and stupid. I told her I didn't ever want to hear from her again."
Crayne started crying during an interview Thursday. It hurts so bad, she said, because Alice is her youngest child and she worked hard taking care of the children when they were young.
After the divorce, the couple's three children were placed in foster care, David Ferdinandsen said. They were there for five years, he said. They went to live with their mother, and later moved in with their father, he said.
Crayne said Alice sometimes called Carrol "Daddy" and sometimes just "Carrol."
Crayne said she would scold her daughter when she used her father's first name.
During the 1980s, Carrol and Alice went to Illinois, staying for months, David Ferdinandsen said. When they returned, Alice went back to school, he said.
According to Mobile County Circuit Court records, Carrol pleaded guilty to second-degree rape in 1989. The records do not identify the victim and prosecutors could not be reached for comment Thursday. He spent a year in jail.
Alice moved to Texas, where she got a boyfriend and a job at a hamburger stand, her mother said. But in the mid-1990s, Carrol came looking for her and she ended up moving back with him to Theodore, according to her mother and brother. They've been together ever since, relatives said.
Crayne said she never heard that Carrol claimed that Alice wasn't his daughter until just a few years ago. Now Alice believes it, too, she said.
Do you recall the story of King David?
As early as 14, I beleive, but any marriage of under-18s requires parental consent.
State laws against bigamy, same-sex marriage, adult incest, prostitution, masturbation, adultery, fornication, bestiality, and obscenity are likewise sustainable only in light of Bowers’ validation of laws based on moral choices. Every single one of these laws is called into question by today’s decision; the Court makes no effort to cabin the scope of its decision to exclude them from its holding. See ante, at 11 (noting “an emerging awareness that liberty gives substantial protection to adult persons in deciding how to conduct their private lives in matters pertaining to sex” (emphasis added)). The impossibility of distinguishing homosexuality from other traditional “morals” offenses is precisely why Bowers rejected the rational-basis challenge. “The law,” it said, “is constantly based on notions of morality, and if all laws representing essentially moral choices are to be invalidated under the Due Process Clause, the courts will be very busy indeed.” 478 U.S., at 196.2
http://supct.law.cornell.edu/supct/html/02-102.ZD.html
Refresh my memory, please.
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