LEXINGTON | Authorities are searching a rural property near Bates City, Mo., looking for bodies, as well as buried jars of written memories of anguish and horror allegedly left years ago by sexually abused children.
Indications are that “an individual or individuals were killed,” Lafayette County Sheriff Kerrick Alumbaugh said Wednesday as law enforcement personnel swarmed over a farm once owned by one of five men arrested the day before.
Investigators also expect that even more than the five alleged victims of the decades-old “mock weddings” will come forward. Court documents indicate the case involved rape, sodomy and bestiality, Alumbaugh said at his Lexington office. Investigators see a “strong possibility” of more victims, he said.
Five members of the Mohler family, a 77-year-old father and four of his middle-aged sons, were arrested Tuesday on multiple charges of forcible sodomy and rape after a woman related stories of her and other children being forced to line up on a bed on their knees and each being assaulted by the men.
The victim also alleged the girls wore special dresses and had flowers in their hair for their “weddings.” After hers, she was led to a chicken coop located on the farm where she said the senior Mohler put a blanket over the door and said: “You all have fun.”
The woman said she was forced to have an abortion before the age of 12.
Two men from Independence were charged — Burrell Edward Mohler Sr., 77, and Burrell Edward Mohler Jr., 53. Also charged were Jared Leroy Mohler, 48, of Columbia; Roland Neil Mohler, 47, of Bates City; and David A. Mohler, 52, of Iowa. All five were in the Lafayette County Jail on cash bonds ranging from $30,000 to $75,000.
The arrests came several weeks after the woman alleged in mid-August that the abuse occurred between 1988 and 1995, according to online charging documents. “It was a very horrendous crime, and we took it very seriously at that point,” said Alumbaugh.
Court documents said five of the woman’s siblings, now in their twenties and thirties, had come forward with information supporting her allegations.
The men were charged with 14 felonies, according to a patrol news release. The charges include forcible sodomy and forcible rape with a child less than 12 years old and use of a child in a sexual performance. The sheriff said he expected more charges to be filed.
Authorities could be seen today probing the soil and using machinery to dig close to a house at the intersection of Old Church and Concord Church roads, south of Bates City. The farm neighbor said the Mohler family left that property about 10 years ago.
Cpl. Bill Lowe of the Missouri Highway Patrol said several acres of land at the location about 20 miles east of Kansas City would be searched. Lowe said the victims allegedly buried glass jars around the property, filled with messages “about what was happening to them.”
Those alleged to be victims were said to be four girls and a boy and all were under the age of 12 at the time of the alleged abuse, he said.
“Right now what our main focus is the glass jars and trying to locate them,” Lowe said. “Those jars have that information.”
He said crews were using dogs to assist in the search on the former Mohler property. A neighbor of the farm recalled when the Mohlers resided there and said they largely kept to themselves.
Alice Mohler, the wife of Burrell Mohler Sr., died in December 1991. Her obituary indicates the family had moved from Independence to near Bates City in 1973. The Bates City neighbor said they left about 10 years ago.
Brian Burnes of The Star and he Associated Press contributed to this report.
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