Police in Bristol have arrested the wife of Roger Barriault, the man charged with first-degree sexual assault for allegedly sexually assaulting a girl in their care for more than a decade and impregnating her.
Darlene Barriault, 48, was arrested Wednesday night, according to Bristol police. She appeared in New Britain Superior Court on Thursday on a charge of risk of injury to a minor.
Barriault was issued a no-contact order and will be back in court later this month. She refused to comment to NBC Connecticut outside of court and did not have an attorney at her arraignment.
Roger Barriault, 63, was arrested last month after a woman told police she was sexually assaulted by him over 3,000 times over the course of more than a decade. The now 28-year-old said she was raped almost daily by Barriault and was impregnated by him as a child.
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According to an arrest warrant, the abuse started when she was 9 years old, and ended at age 20. Police said a DNA test proved Roger to be the father of the child.
NBC Connecticut reached out to Roger Barriault's attorney for comment but have not heard back.
The woman's attorney, Nate Baber, said he and his client were glad to see Darlene Barriault arrested.
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“On behalf of my client, I was relieved. I think more than anything though, it's a good warning for those people who stand by while children are getting abused,” Baber said Thursday. “Let this be a warning that if you have a responsibility to a child and you do nothing, then you might get arrested, and that's exactly what happened in this case.”
Baber said the case is also a “massive failure” by the Department of Children and Families (DCF). He said his client’s foster mother left her with the Barriaults, and the department “lost track of her.”
“She was the guardian of my client and she simply did nothing while she knew that persistent and continuous abuse was happening right underneath her nose,” Baber added. “It's close to impossible for my perspective, for her to say that she didn't know it was happening. I mean, she was pregnant at the age of 12 years old.”
DCF previously said that they did not place the accuser in the home with Barriaults, and that they were granted guardianship through the Probate Court. The department also emphasized that the Barriaults were not licensed foster parents.
DCF Commissioner- Designate Jodi Hill-Lilly provided a statement to NBC Connecticut Thursday evening disputing Baber's claim:
“First and foremost, our hearts go out to the victim - who is now 29 years of age - and we applaud her bravery for coming forward. As always, we are grateful for the collaboration of law enforcement and for their work to help hold this individual accountable and bring forth justice.
Understandably, the Department has received many inquiries about the events in question that occurred over 15 years ago. However, we are limited in what we can share due to our confidentiality statutes and the pending criminal and civil litigation.
Statutes do allow us to correct misinformation made public about the Department's role in how the victim arrived in the home of the person who harmed her.
It has been reported that DCF "lost track" of the victim and a prior legal guardian (who had been her prior foster parent) in 2005. To clarify, the Department had no involvement with the child or any of the involved families between 2003-2006.”
