Kristine Peasley thought she had a happy family with a daughter and husband who said he adored her from the moment they met through a personal ad five years earlier until she learned her Las Vegas marriage was a sham.
The man regularly professed his love, inundated her with flowers and even underwent fertility treatments and marriage counseling, all while living another life - with his other wife and two grown daughters - just 15 miles over the North Carolina border, according to Peasley and court papers.
When Peasley found out about the other wife in the spring of 2006, the then 43-year-old woman sought a divorce, a split of assets and a bigamy conviction. She got nothing. Her story, while peculiar, has prompted a bill in the South Carolina Legislature that would require bigamists to provide child support and property.
"It's not right that somebody can do all these things and just walk away," Peasley said. "It's emotional rape."
Because the wedding was in Nevada, prosecutors in York County dropped the bigamy charge, which could have put Harry Carson Parlier in prison for between six months and five years. Prosecutor Kevin Brackett said his office interpreted state law as making their wedding, not the marital relationship, the crime.
Peasley was shocked. She said she filed a report with Nevada authorities, but they were not interested in pursuing it.
Clark County, NV prosecutor Christopher Lalli said his office gets at least one call a month from out-of-state residents who say they married in Las Vegas and discovered later their so-called spouse is a bigamist. But it's "very, very rare" they are prosecuted, he said.
In September 2006, with their case in Family Court in South Carolina, Parlier returned to Las Vegas and got an annulment, meaning the marriage never existed and ending any of her rights to assets, she said.
Parlier, a 57-year-old senior bank executive in the Charlotte, N.C., area for decades, did not return messages left over several days on his office voicemail and cell phone. His home phone number is unlisted. His attorney did not return messages left at her Rock Hill and Charlotte offices.
In his affidavit filed in June 2006, Parlier said he responded to Peasley's personal ad after a bankruptcy that caused he and his wife of 27 years to separate. He said he unexpectedly met the "dream of my life" and acknowledged telling Peasley he was 10 years younger -"the first lie which started a web of lies."
"I was so in love with Kris that I couldn't imagine losing her because I couldn't marry her," he wrote. "So I decided to ignore the legal and moral issues and became engaged to her at Christmas 2001."
He told Peasley he was divorced, and his ex-wife was suicidal. In his affidavit, Parlier said his daughters and first wife found out about the wedding and came to their Tega Cay home. They tried to "break Kris and I up," he wrote. "I was determined not to let that happen, and thus I covered up earlier lies with more lies."
Peasley said it embarrasses her to recount her story, but she thinks it's worth it to help other South Carolinians in her situation.
How often it occurs is unknown. The State Law Enforcement Division doesn't track bigamy in its annual crime report.
Brackett said he can recall prosecuting only one bigamy case, roughly 15 years ago. Peasley's private investigator, Pete Skidmore, said he too remembers only one other client where the infidelity involved another marriage.
But no matter how rare, the law needs changed to give the victims of such fraud more power in court, said Rep. Carl Gullick, the bill's sponsor. He also plans to pursue changing the state's bigamy law to erase any question on jurisdiction.
"This is the craziest thing I've ever heard of," the Lake Wylie Republican said. "She was just kind of left out in the lurch."
The legislation is expected to be debated later this month by a House panel.
Peasley said she feels some authorities brushed aside her case as a nonviolent, bizarre tale, rather than a possible felony crime.
Parlier proposed less than three months after their first date, after asking permission from Peasley's mother. They took romantic trips, went to concerts and attended family reunions. They even talked about building a larger home and having more children, according to court filings.
Fearful of Parlier having unsupervised visits with their then-1-year-old daughter, Peasley said she took his offer to relinquish all custodial rights in return for no child support. His parental rights were officially terminated in family court last November.
"This person came into my life under false pretenses and committed fraud. He promised to love, honor, and cherish me till death do us part," Peasley said. "He just made a mockery of marriage. The damage he has done will never go away."
By SEANNA ADCOX of the Associated Press
Investigator Aaron Leveck of the sheriff's office said the
month-long investigation, initiated April 11, revealed James Moyer, 63,
has been married three times and divorced twice since 2000. The problem, Leveck said, is that Moyer never divorced a woman he married in 1993.
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