Springfield News-Leader
The Missouri House ethics committee on Monday formally accused a Kansas City-area lawmaker of abusing his kids and recommended his expulsion.
In a 12-page report released Monday, the half-Republican, half-Democratic panel said it had confirmed allegations that Rep. Rick Roeber, R-Lee’s Summit, sexually abused two of his young children in 1990 and physically and mentally abused all four.
The committee further said that their findings revealed Roeber as “unfit to serve as a representative in the Missouri General Assembly.”
The panel lamented that Roeber’s ex-wife and the children had reported the abuse for decades ago to no avail, and made clear its desire to remedy that with lengthy excerpts from testimony it heard from Roeber’s children and notes on how he could be charged criminally.
A Missouri state lawmaker is expected to be expelled from office following a state investigation that concluded he engaged in physical, mental and sexual abuse against his now-adult children.
The ethics committee recommended that Roeber be removed from office after reviewing what it described as clear and convincing testimony and other evidence of the lawmaker’s guilt.
The report found that Roeber’s actions may be subject to criminal charges, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch reported.
The report included testimony from three of Roeber’s four children as well as his ex-wife, who accused him of abuse dating back to the 1990s. Investigators concluded Roeber sexually abused two of his children and engaged in various acts of physical and mental abuse.
Rep. Rick Roeber, R-Lee s Summit / File Photo Rep. Rick Roeber is accused of sexually abusing two of his children in 1990, when they were 9 and 5, and physically abusing two others.
Rep. Rick Roeber would be only the second lawmaker ever expelled from the House
The Missouri House Ethics Committee voted unanimously on Monday to recommend Rep. Rick Roeber be expelled from the Legislature.
The committee, made up of five Republicans and five Democrats, said evidence obtained over the course of its four-month investigation confirmed Roeber had sexually abused two of his children in 1990, when they were 9 and 5, and physically abused two others.
The allegations of sexual abuse first became public in late September, weeks before he was elected to the Missouri House.
The Kansas City Star reported that Roeber’s adopted daughter, Anastasia, said he made improper sexual advances toward her in 1990, when she was 9 years old.
She testified under oath to the committee that she felt she was “groomed by (Roeber) from a very young age… When we would ride in the car, he’d have his hand on my upper thigh just kind of rubbing it.”
She said he once took her hand and placed it on his genitals, “and I didn’t know what to do. I just froze there. I was 9.”