The Associated Press
Updated: 6:11 p.m. ET May 3, 2006


ROSEVILLE, Mich. - A suburban Detroit woman who police say was married to three men at once and scamming them all was ordered Wednesday to stand trial on felony polygamy charges.

Douglas Rice, one of the the three husbands, said he met Kyle McConnell on the Internet last summer and married her a few months later in a civil ceremony. According to police, she had a trail of as many as 15 husbands in her past.

"She told me she only had been married once, but I found out I was only one sucker in a bunch," Rice said.

McConnell, 46, was sentenced in April to 22 months to 10 years in prison trying to defraud another husband, Richard McConnell. Prosecutors said she passed bad checks written to Richard McConnell and his family that were drawn on the bank account of yet another husband, Len Battaglia.

"We don't know exactly how many men she has conned, but she has a talent for finding lonely men, marrying them, and stealing their money," St. Clair County sheriff's Detective Tim Donnellon told The Detroit News. "By the time these poor guys would find out what was happening, she would split and move on to the next guy."

Defense lawyer Robert McClellan said, "There are two sides to every story." He declined further comment.

It's an unusual case and there's a lot of information still being uncovered, said Macomb County assistant prosecutor Therese Tobin.

"In polygamy cases, usually it's a man who is married to more than one woman," Tobin said. "In my 12 years here, I don't remember there being a case involving a female polygamist. I haven't even heard of such a case."

A felony polygamy charge carries a maximum of four years in prison.
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COMMENTS
Statistics show that women are being convicted of crimes that once were the domain of men only.

In the above case, we have polygamy. Florida's Eileen Wernos was executed as the first female serial killer. Suddenly we have more than a few female child rapists following in the footsteps of May Kay Letourneau. What I find interesting and disturbing is the difference in public and legislative reaction to the rapes. First of all, a man having sex with a 13 year old girl would have the proverbial legal 'book' thrown at him in court and would have the immorality, cruelty and violent aspects of the rape in the forefront (rightly so) So far, the females have the 'love' and 'relationship' aspects of the crime in the forefront and face far less punishment than male perpitrators. One Florida judge pronounced one female rapist as "...too pretty to go to jail."

If women want to share the crime, the legal system should ensure that they share an equal punishment, pretty or not.

LOLROTFL. Did some judge really say that, V? And he's still on the bench? Aiiieeeeee.......

Sorry! My mistake! Her lawyer said it, not the judge.

http://news.tbo.com/news/MGBPQFJACGE.html

I knew a female bigamist. No one told on her, although I was sorely tempted. In her case it was not the normal type of bigamy. She is Portuguese and married in Portugal, then moved to here and divorced her husband in the court here, but the divorce wouldn't be legal in Portugal, she hadn't been through the process there although she did eventually, but not until after she re-married here. I am sure that sort of thing happens over and over again.

Bigamy aside, more women in jail seems to be a very widespread phenomenon ... I assume that it's somehow linked to growing equality.