A Riverside man will likely spend the rest of his life in prison for molesting an eight-year-old girl. Fentress Maurice Wilson, 50, was sentenced to life in prison after being found guilty of statutory sodomy by a Platte County jury in June.

Wilson was sentenced to life because prosecutors proved that he had previously molested three other girls. Judge James Van Amburg ordered that the Defendant will not be eligible for parole until 2052.

Platte County Prosecuting Attorney Eric Zahnd said, “The eight-year-old victim in this case showed unbelievable courage by telling the jury what the defendant did to her.

 

“But if we were allowed to tell the full truth about his decades of abusing other children, the defendant almost certainly would not have tried his luck with a jury.”

The trial was held in two stages. In the first, prosecutors proved Wilson had sexually abused the eight-year old girl. In the second, prosecutors proved the defendant was a predatory sexual offender because he had abused the child more than once and had abused more than one child. A little-used provision of Missouri law mandates a life sentence for predatory sexual offenders.

During the second stage of the trial, three more of the defendant’s victims testified and described sexual abuse dating back decades.

Although prosecutors knew about Wilson’s abuse of other victims, the jury was not allowed to know that Wilson had abused them until after he was found guilty. Under current Missouri law, prior acts of abuse can only be used to increase punishment after a defendant has been found guilty.

Zahnd chairs the committee pushing an amendment to Missouri’s Constitution that would allow juries to know that a defendant has committed offenses in the past. Constitutional Amendment 2 is on the ballot in November.

Missouri has some of the most restrictive laws on the admissibility of prior sex acts. The federal rules of evidence and most other states allow the evidence to be admitted subject to a judge’s review.

“It is vitally important to modernize Missouri law, and I hope voters will vote ‘yes’ for Amendment 2,” Zahnd said. “It’s not right to make children like this little girl go it alone against abusers like Fentress Wilson. Had he known the jury would have known from the beginning what he had done to other children, we might have spared her the trauma of testifying.”