Wisconsin sex trafficking victim, 19, faces life in prison for killing man who raped and sold her
KENOSHA, WISCONSIN: A teenage girl, who shot and killed a man who allegedly raped her and trafficked her for sex, could now face life in prison. This comes after a judge rejected the defense's argument that her actions were justified by a state law that protects victims of sex trafficking.
Chrystul Kizer, 19, was arrested in June last year after she shot Randy Volar, 34, in the head twice at his home in Kenosha, Washington, set his body on fire, and then fled the scene in his BMW, according to the Washington Post.
The authorities eventually tracked the vehicle down to Milwaukee and linked it to Kizer, who confessed to the murder during questioning by the police.
However, the case is not as open and shut as it seems. Kizer stated that she was one of Volar's sex trafficking victims and that she killed him in self-defense after he drugged her and tried to rape her.
In an interview from jail, she told the Post that she had met Volar when she was 16 and he was 33 after she responded to an ad he posted on the now-closed Backpage.com, a site that served as one of the country's largest marketplaces for prostitution.
She said she told him she was 16, and then he began grooming her by buying expensive gifts and giving her money with the expectation that she would have sex with him.
Eventually, Kizer said he began selling her through Backpage.com to other strangers and that he would drive her to hotel rooms for meet-ups and then take the cash that she earned.
The teen claimed she tried to slowly distance herself from him as her relationship with boyfriend Delane Nelson became more serious. This, however, angered Volar. On June 5, 2018, the night of the murder, she said she went to Volar's home after a fight with her boyfriend and carried a .380 pistol he had given her for self-protection.
She said they were drinking and watching movies when he gave her some kind of a drug that made her feel "weird". He then forcefully trying to get on top of her and have sex with her.
Kizer said she didn't remember retrieving the pistol, but that the noise it made when she pulled the trigger was still crystal clear and "like a pop".
While the 19-year-old's story changed several times during her interviews with detectives, she did finally confess that she killed him because she "got upset and was tired of Volar touching her".
Her claims that Volar had sexually abused her were supported by a cache of evidence which police had collected against him while investigating a complaint from a different teenage girl, who said he had been paying her for sex and filming it.
When the authorities searched Volar's home, they found computers and other devices with photos and videos of him having sex with girls who appeared to be as young as 12, as well as a bank account with $1.5 million.
He was arrested on charges of child enticement, using a computer to facilitate a child sex crime and second-degree sexual assault of a child, but was released the next day without posting bail and remained free until Kizer killed him.
District Attorney Michael Graveley, whose office was in charge of prosecuting Volar, has charged Kizer with first-degree intentional homicide and homicide, and allegedly tried to withhold evidence against the 34-year-old from the defense team.
Graveley argued that the teen planned the murder, pointing to text messages she sent to friends as well as a social media post she made two hours before Volar's body was found which she captioned, "My mugshot".
Kizer's lawyers attempt to apply an "affirmative defense", which allows victims of sex trafficking to be acquitted of certain charges if they can prove they were being trafficked, was rejected by Judge David P Wilk.
She is currently in jail awaiting trial and faces life in prison if convicted of her charges.