Former Gov. Matt Bevin attempted to defend his decision to pardon a man convicted of raping a 9-year-old by falsely saying that the physical evidence exonerates him.
The Kentucky Republican, a close ally of President Trump, was voted out of office in November. Near the close of his term, he began a slew of controversial pardons, one of those was for 41-year-old Micah Schoettle.
Last year Schoettle was sentenced to 23 years in prison for raping and sodomizing a 9-year-old girl but was released on Dec. 9 by the governor a day before he left office.
Defending his decision on WHAS on Thursday, Bevin told the radio host he didn’t believe the child’s claims of sexual assault.
“There was zero evidence,” Bevin said, noting that the victim’s sister was also present during the alleged rape. He said the sister denied the claims of abuse.
“Both their hymens were intact. This is perhaps more specific than people would want, but trust me. If you have been repeatedly sexually violated as a small child by an adult, there are going to be repercussions of that physically and medically,” Bevin said.
Using the condition of a hymen as an indicator for sexual assault is not backed up by science, Dr. George Nichols told the Courier-Journal. Nichols worked as Kentucky’s chief medical examiner for two decades and later started a child abuse evaluation system at a children’s hospital.
“Rape is not proved by hymen penetration,” Nichols explained. “Rape is proved by phallic penetration … where the vaginal lips meet the outer surface of the vagina.
“He not only doesn’t know the law, in my humble opinion, he clearly doesn’t know medicine and anatomy,” the doctor added.
Forensic Science International, a peer-reviewed journal, found that in childhood abuse cases only 2.1% of children had visible hymen lesions. Other research also shows that an examination of the hymen is not a reliable indicator for rape.
The prosecutor in Schoettle’s case, Kenton County Commonwealth’s Attorney Rob Sanders, said that Bevin is “ignorant of the medicine and science in child rape cases.”
“Even the defense experts testified they would not expect to find an injury in the victim’s sexual assault exam,” Sanders said. “This was the subject of an eight-hour court hearing Matt Bevin obviously never watched.”
Schoettle was not the only convicted child rapist that Bevin pardoned. Prior to discussing his case, the radio show host asked the former governor how he could palate setting a convicted child rapist free and why he couldn’t just leave it to the next governor to handle.
“Which one, though? Because there were a couple of people that were accused of that whose sentences I commuted,” Bevin responded.
