Retired army general who raped daughter since age 3 pleads guilty in exchange of lighter penalty after 30 years
PRINCE WILLIAM COUNTY, VIRGINIA: A retired two-star army general who was accused of repeatedly raping and molesting his young daughter in the 1980s has pleaded guilty to some of his charges in exchange for a suspended sentence. Maj. Gen. James Grazioplene first came to the attention of army officials in 2015 after his daughter Jennifer Elmore reported that he had raped and molested her throughout her childhood, starting from the age of three, reported CNN.
The military subsequently launched an investigation, and while the crime had taken place more than three decades ago, found evidence that corroborated Elmore's claims. They uncovered letters written by her mother, Ann Marie Grazioplene, throughout the 1980s which detailed the abuse. "All the while I was playing housewife, he was taking perverted liberties with my child," she wrote in one of the letters in 1986. In another, she wrote, "Jim has ... made an attempt at sexually molesting Jennifer. She was sleeping, thank God, and I caught him before he got started."
The evidence was enough to move toward a trial in a military court in 2017, but the path to justice was not straightforward. Two weeks before the trial was set to begin, the top military appeals court pointed to a five-year statute of limitations existed for sexual assault in the military, if the assault occurred before 2006, and said the prosecution could not go forward.
It was a decision that went against precedent that had been 30 years in the making, but Elmore did not give in. She fought to have the case heard in the commonwealth of Virginia, where the crimes occurred and where there is no statute of limitations for a felony offense.
A grand jury in Prince William County took her side and, after four months of investigation, indicted Grazioplene on three specifications each of rape, incest, and indecent liberties.
This past week, Elmore, who celebrated her 49th birthday recently, delivered a powerful victim impact statement and recalled to the court the abuse she had suffered at the hands of her father. "At 3, he led me to the dark, dirty basement of my grandmother's house and put me on the washing machine and pleasured himself while molesting me," she said. "At 8, he bought me a piano and insisted on taking me to piano lessons, all so he could park and take whatever sick pleasures that he so desired. The same horrors occurring as he regularly insisted on bathing me. It took me until college to be able to use a bar of soap."
"He stripped me of my dignity, my innocence, my value, my childhood, and my voice. All of the things that a father is supposed to protect at the expense of his own life. I will spend a lifetime putting back the shattered pieces you left behind."
Grazioplene, who has been in jail for around 18 months, did not meet his daughter's eye even once and pleaded guilty to the aggravated sexual battery at the hearing. After his impending release, he will have to serve 20 years of probation.
Elmore said this was a bittersweet moment. "Today was a win," she told CNN. "But I'm extraordinarily sad. The way I feel right now is like an orphan." Her lawyer, Ryan Guilds, said the general's sentence was "a reflection of the fact that Jennifer cares more about the truth than the punishment."