Man accused of inseminating stepdaughter with syringe

A jury today began deliberating the case of a man accused of inseminating his stepdaughter with a syringe of his semen, violating rape laws he had pushed Ohio legislators to enact.

Paternity tests show that John Goff, 41, fathered his stepdaughter’s baby. The boy, born in 1999, is in foster care.

Goff is charged with rape, sexual battery and endangering a child.

His wife, 43-year-old Narda Goff, was convicted in March of helping him impregnate her daughter and was jailed for three years.

In closing statements to the Akron court, defence lawyers argued that Goff did not commit a crime because the stepdaughter agreed to carry his child.

Tim Ivey told jurors that the daughter turned against Goff after the baby was born and her new boyfriend pressured her.

Prosecutors countered that Ohio’s rape law is clear and that John Goff raped his stepdaughter.

The daughter testified that Goff, an auxiliary police officer and former Marine, threatened to kill her mother if she did not agree to become pregnant.

Narda Goff’s lawyer argued during her trial that her daughter, then 16, willingly allowed the insemination because the mother wanted to give her husband a child. Narda Goff was unable to bear children after having a hysterectomy.

The Goffs had persuaded politicians to change the state’s rape laws after a man accused of molesting Narda Goff’s daughter was acquitted.

The law was toughened in 1996 to include penetration with any object as a component of rape.

Previously, only sexual intercourse was considered rape.

The daughter, now 19, has been diagnosed with post traumatic stress disorder and depression and has attempted suicide.