Bigamy

Bigamy, a crime normally punishable by no more than three years in prison, could send a Visalia man away for 25 years to life. It all began when Todd Givens, 30, was on trial in 1997 on drug and weapons charges. Assuming that he was on his way to prison, Givens got married so he could have conjugal visits, said his attorney, Charles Rothbaum. But a Tulare County jury acquitted Givens.

A Santa Ana police officer who was once married to three women at the same time pleaded guilty to bigamy and was fined $750, a prosecutor said Wednesday. Robert Brekenfeld, 42, was in the midst of getting a divorce from his first wife, Kendall Brekenfeld, when he was charged with the misdemeanor, Deputy Dist. Atty. Burl Estes said. He has since annulled two other marriages and remarried his third wife, Shari Brekenfeld, according to county court records.

With his head hung low before a Municipal Court judge, a Simi Valley man pleaded guilty Wednesday to a charge of bigamy for being married to three women at the same time. Lloyd Wetzel, 29, faces up to a year in County Jail for the crime, which his attorney blamed in part on a lingering mental disorder stemming from his childhood. "He is a little slow mentally," Deputy Public Defender Christina Briles said outside the courtroom after Wetzel entered his guilty plea.

A Simi Valley man allegedly married to three women at the same time pleaded not guilty Wednesday to bigamy and an extra charge of intimidating a witness by allegedly threatening to kill his third wife after she reported him to authorities. Lloyd Leon Wetzel, 29, stood glumly in Ventura County Municipal Court wearing jail blues and a downcast expression as Sandra Lemich, the wife who turned him in, looked on.

He had no job and no visible means of income. But police suspect that Lloyd Leon Wetzel married women to help pay the bills. Ventura County sheriff's detectives say Wetzel, a 29-year-old Simi Valley man, was married to three women at the same time. Now they are investigating whether he wedded them to swindle them out of their money. "There is some evidence of possible fraud--that he was getting married for financial reasons," said Det. Ronald Nelson, lead investigator on the case.

When it comes to marriage, three is definitely a crowd--and can also be a felony. A 19-year-old Thousand Oaks woman found that out Monday morning after being booked into the Ventura County Jail under the suspicion of committing felony bigamy. Sheriff's Department Det. Ron Helus said Tuesday that Sherree Ann King-Miller, had not completed divorce proceedings from her first husband, Craig Miller, 24, of Van Nuys, before marrying Raymond Davenport Jr., 26, of Moorpark.

A Santa Paula police officer fired for apparently having two wives filed a lawsuit Wednesday in an attempt to win back his badge. William Woodson, a veteran of more than 10 years on the force, lost his job in 1993 after city officials concluded that he married his pregnant girlfriend even though his divorce from his third wife was not final, city records show. Woodson appealed his firing, but the city upheld it in January.

A Glendale man accused of marrying four women without divorcing any of them said he'll plead guilty to bigamy charges because "basically, I have no case." Vernon Pierce said this week that he'll change his plea when he goes to court in Arizona on Friday. He pleaded innocent Jan. 11 in Maricopa County Superior Court to two charges of bigamy. "I'm not going to insult anyone's intelligence by putting up some mock defense," Pierce said.

Charmaine Whalen is nobody's fool. When her husband, Vernon Pierce, failed to fly out and meet her family after the couple's April 29 wedding, Whalen decided it was time to do a little poking around. Now Pierce, 33, is facing bigamy charges and Whalen, 24, is considering a job change: from bank teller to police officer. "My dream was to go into the LAPD, and I put my dreams on hold for him," Whalen said. "Now I really want to do it."

Frustrated trying to end her last marriage, a Santa Clarita woman went ahead and married her boyfriend late Friday at a Las Vegas drive-in wedding chapel before her divorce was final. Instead of honeymoon bliss, the couple spent the weekend worrying whether they were bigamists. Not to worry, a judge said Monday. "We'll take care of it," Supervising Judge Judith Ashmann of the North Valley District of Superior Court said during a call to The Times.