Sherry Johnson recently detailed her horrible experience of being forced to marry her rapist when she was only 11-years-old (her rapist was 20), in effort to protect her rapist from facing criminal charges. Her experience is further explained:
…A government clerk in Tampa, Fla., refused to marry an 11-year-old, even though this was legal in the state, so the wedding party went to nearby Pinellas County, where the clerk issued a marriage license. The license [which was examined by New York Times Reporter Nicholas Kristof] lists her birth date, so officials were aware of her age.
Kristof turned up several shocking details during his research into child marriage in the United States:
“In fact, more than 167,000 young people age 17 and under married in 38 states between 2000 and 2010, according to a search of available marriage license data by a group called Unchained at Last, which aims to ban child marriage. The search turned up cases of 12-year-old girls married in Alaska, Louisiana and South Carolina, while other states simply had categories of “14 and younger.” … A great majority of the child marriages involve girls and adult men. Such a sexual relationship would often violate statutory rape laws, but marriage sometimes makes it legal.”
