Deliver Us From Evil 

C H A P T E R   O N E

by

Deborah Hunter-Marsh

 

            Dead at age 75.  Praise the Lord! As his daughter, I'm free at last!  I am free!  There is one less pedophile walking the streets at night.  His obituary reads:  “Walton W. Hunter died at his home in Huntington Beach, California after a long, lingering illness.  Born October 25, 1920 in Enoch, Texas . . . Served in the Air Force. . . Served two missions for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints. . . Mormon Bishop twice for 17 years . . . Dedicated to missionary work . . .loved teaching and expounding gospel . . .counseled church members in times of stress . . .Prominent businessman . . . Hunter Motor Company.”  What they forgot to add was “Charming sociopath . . . conniving pedophile. . . master manipulator . . . controlled people with money.”

            More of his obituary:  “Loving husband to June B. Hunter and devoted father to four children:  Wayne Hunter (Utah); Rebecca Hunter-Rapp (California); Deborah Hunter-Marsh (Oregon); Cynthia Hunter-Steele (California).  Also, he was a devoted grandfather to 21 grandchildren and two great-grandchildren.” 

            That was the family, as sick and twisted as they ever were back in 1995.  You won’t hear much about Wayne, our older brother, or Cynthia, our little sister, in our book because of a little family dispute:  they don’t believe that this story ever happened.  They believe the fairytale that ours was the perfect Mormon family, where everyone was happy.  Theirs was a childhood of hot rods and after-school snacks, riotous jokes and trips to Disneyland.  Everything would still be great for them––except for those pesky sisters, Rebecca and Deborah, who keep making up outlandish lies about our father raping and molesting them and their children.  We also disagree about poor little Mom, how she cleaned up sheets from our beds without even seeing the blood or body fluids on them. Furthermore, we have been unable to agree about our mother’s part in the abuse of their grandchild, Alexander.  So we disagree a little––what family doesn’t?  If Wayne and Cynthia were writing this book, they would stomp their foot and urge us to quiet down and go away.  But it is our story and our book, and we are going to tell the family secrets.  Hopefully, this story will help other men and women who have been abused, who are too scared to speak, and have had to bear their family secrets in silence.  As my therapist Dr. Sterling Ellsworth always told me: “Ye shall know the truth and the truth shall set you free.  But first it may make you miserable!” 

            So hold on to your hats, buy a bookmark, and hide under the covers if need be, because the trip you’ll take with our story may be scary at times. It will be graphic at times, but we promise it will be true all the time. 

            As they say on Law and Order:  “We have the evidence!”