Bigamy

How seriously do we take bigamy these days? I’ve just read an article about a prison warden who has re-married before the Decree Absolute of his first marriage was pronounced. He claims not to have realised that he was not already divorced which means he is either very stupid or has a very bad solicitor.

It’s interesting that he simply couldn’t wait those few extra weeks before tying the note with the next love of his life. And what of her? Did she know that her whirlwind marriage wasn’t worth the paper her certificate was written on?

The case was reported in the papers in December and I have yet to find exactly what happened to him. I thought it was interesting that the police went to the trouble of arresting him at the airport and that the CPS chose to prosecute. That fact that he was in the process of being divorced from his first wife must count for something in terms of the seriousness of the offence.

It seems to me that committing bigamy says a lot about him. Clearly this is a man who takes the institution of marriage very seriously, so seriously in fact that he is prepared to commit a criminal offence, lose his job, reputation and livelihood all for the sake of waiting a few weeks before re-marrying. Did he think that cohabitation was a mortal sin?

The real victim in this is the second wife (sic). She is not legally married and therefore has none of the protection that the law affords to married couples. To remedy her situation she must marry him all over again (of course this time she had better wait until he is actually divorced) and think of the cost in cake and wedding gowns. It is difficult to believe that she knew he was still married and if she didn’t his actions must shake the very foundations of her trust in him.

I have had a case very recently where the facts are very much the same. Marry in haste in Las Vegas and repent at leisure is the moral of this story and please do your first spouse the courtesy of at least waiting until the ink on the Decree Absolute is dry.