Man guilty of abusing 15-year-old

PALMER — For conducing a weeks-long sexual relationship with a 15-year-old girl, a jury has convicted a 44-year-old man of 11 counts of sexual abuse of a minor.

Stanley J. Edenfield had been charged with 12 counts of second-degree sexual abuse of a minor. Prosecutors dropped one of them before trial. On Thursday, the jury convicted him of the 11 that were left. Usually each charge relates to a separate specific act committed.

“We are thankful to the jury for their hard work in reaching what we feel is a just verdict based on the evidence presented at trial,” Assistant District Attorney Melissa Wininger-Howard wrote in an email shortly after the verdict. “We believe the jury’s decision was based in part on the strength of the victim’s testimony in this case. We commend the victim not only for her bravery in coming forward to report the crimes, but also for her courage in facing the defendant and testifying at trial.”

Edenfield had been a friend of the girl’s family, often going to local bars with the girl’s parents.

The illegal relationship started soon after his relationship with his girlfriend ended.

Edenfield would pick the girl up after her after school activities or stop by the house for their sexual rendezvous.

Text messages presented to the jury included ones in which Edenfield expressed a great deal of turmoil over what he was doing to the girl. He said he couldn’t control himself, but would try to wait three years for her to reach adulthood.

At trial, the girl told jurors that he pleaded with her not to tell anyone, that he would go to jail and lose his kids. Bringing in the authorities would just hurt people, she was told.

“He wouldn’t be allowed to come around anymore and he would lose everything,” was how the girl described his pleas at trial.

Edenfield’s record, at least in Alaska, contains no other felony convictions.

If he has no felonies in other states, the sexual abuse of a minor charges he was convicted of will each carry a penalty of between five and 15 years in prison.

Contact Andrew Wellner at 352-2270 or andrew.wellner@frontiersman.com.