Missouri town supports a child molester

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Darren Paden confessed to “monstrous” acts of child sex abuse, a prosecutor said, raping the same little girl at least two or three times every month starting when she was just 5-years-old and continuing for about a decade, and the Dearborn, Missouri, 52-year-old dad of seven was sentenced on Friday to 50 years behind bars.


In all, prosecutors say, Paden raped the girl between 200 and 300 times in that approximately 10-year period.

But astonishingly, in his tiny hometown of only 500 people where Paden’s parents are beloved farmers and Paden himself was chief of the town’s volunteer fire department, the convicted child rapist is being lauded by neighbors and community leaders as an “admirable” man who “holds fast to his morals.”

Several prominent people in the local community wrote letters of support to the court on behalf of Paden — even after he confessed to the horrendous sex crimes against the little girl, who is now 18-years-old. His supporters included schoolteachers, a church trustee, and the president of a local bank, according to a report on WDAF-TV in Kansas City.

As for Paden’s victim, whose identity was not publicly released — but is clearly common knowledge in the small, rural town — she says she has been ostracized by the local community, and can’t even rent an apartment once a landlord finds out who she is.

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