GOP Senator Changed Utah’s Consent Law After Family Member Raped 13-Year-Old

The Republican is taking the party’s obsession with “family values” to a whole new level of hypocrisy.

By Danielle Han  |  August 6, 2025 | 6:37pm
Screenshot: Utah Senate YouTube Politics
GOP Senator Changed Utah’s Consent Law After Family Member Raped 13-Year-Old

Yep, you read that headline right. A Utah Republican has taken the party’s obsession with “family values” to a whole new level of hypocrisy.

In 2024, the Salt Lake Tribune reports that Senator Stuart Adams changed the state’s consent laws after his 18-year-old relative was charged with four first-degree felonies for having sex with a 13-year-old girl. The age of consent in Utah is 18, but 14- and 15-year-olds can consent to sex with someone less than four years their age. Of course, the girl was neither 14 nor 15, and was more than four years younger than the 18-year-old. 

The teen was arrested in 2023 and charged with two counts of child sodomy and two counts of child rape. Adams said he was “surprised by the severity of the charges” (uhhh) against his family member. Under his revisions to S.B. 213, the law now states that if “the defendant is 18 years old and enrolled in high school at the time the sexual activity occurred,” they’ll no longer be tried as an adult—but charged as a minor.

The senator claims that because the new legislation was not enforced retroactively, he did not intend for it to help his family member. But people who helped him draft the law sing a different tune. According to the judge, prosecutor, and defense attorney in the case, the relative’s situation was a “pivotal” part of the decision to amend the policy.

And retroactive or not, the change inspired court negotiations to end in a plea deal last week. The 18-year-old could have received a 25-year sentence and been required to register as a sex offender, had Adams not tipped the scale in their favor. Instead, in exchange for pleading guilty, they doesn’t have to serve any additional jail time (they only served once, for one week right after their arrest) and doesn’t have to register as a sex offender. Incredible.

The 13-year-old’s mother found out about the incident through “random conversation,” according to the newspaper, and reported it to the police with permission from the child. Court records later showed that a friend of the 18-year-old also contacted the police. The mother told the outlet that she felt “punched in the gut” when the law changed. “It was out of nowhere.”

“I feel like a law is the law, regardless of who you are,” she said. “But that wasn’t what was going on here.” 

 

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