STE. GENEVIEVE COUNTY, Mo. _ A Ste. Genevieve man has been charged with 15 felonies, including statutory rape and statutory sodomy, for crimes he allegedly committed about 20 years ago involving underage female relatives.
Charging documents say Henry G. Leland, 63, allegedly raped and sodomized the girls and forced them to touch him and be touched over the course of several years in the early and mid-1990s.
His ex-wife, Sandra Cissell, 60, is also facing 15 similar charges. The charges say she "aided and encouraged" her ex-husband in the crimes.
Leland went to prison after he confessed to inappropriately touching one of the girls in 1996, according to court documents. The allegations at the time didn't include the more serious crimes he is now accused of.
The case was recently reopened after Ste. Genevieve Sheriff's Department deputies re-interviewed multiple alleged victims.
According to the probable cause statement, one of the girls told police she was less than 10 years old when Leland allegedly began to molest her almost daily.
The girls would fight back and be beaten for not complying with the sexual acts, according to the documents. Despite reporting the abuse to Cissell, the girls _ who are now adults _ told police she didn't stop it and, at times, forced the girls in the car when he drove them to an abandoned home to abuse them.
The abuse began when the family lived in Jefferson County, and continued after they moved to Ste. Genevieve, authorities say.
Last fall, Leland confessed to police that he has a son with one of the victims, and that he believes a child of another victim could also be his.
He suggested to police, according to the probable cause statement, that he thought the statute of limitations meant his crimes weren't punishable.
"I don't know if (Cissell) knew at first about this one, but let's look at reality," Leland said to police when a deputy asked whether the Cissell helped facilitate any of the abuse against one alleged victim. "As time went on, don't you think she was intelligent enough to figure this out?"
The probable cause statement also lays out a series of physical abuses from Leland and Cissell in an attempt to force the girls to either comply with the acts or to stay silent.
