Douglas Marks was a scion of an important Republican family in Montana. His brother, Bob Marks, was the Speaker of the House. He was a teacher and molested children likely over thirty years before he was arrested. The prosecutor said he knew of at least 45 students, but over the course of his career, he molested children of men he had molested when they were young.
Here’s where it gets really bad. He was first reported in 1959. He was fired for molesting three children in Boulder but hired in 1960 at another school and was back in Boulder in 1965. In 1985, Paul Myrhow went to law enforcement, telling a deputy who had also been molested by Marks. The deputy went to the sheriff who did nothing, claiming he could not reach the witnesses. Marks continued to molest children for another 5 years. Myrhow went directly to the Sheriff. Again nothing even though Myrhow brought the names of victims to him. The timeline from the Helena Independent Record demonstrates a history of the school ignoring complaints and law enforcement doing nothing.
He has pleaded guilty to molesting four teens, all victims from after Myrhow came forward. He also went to the doctor who first reported Marks in 1959. The doctor took the case to the County Attorney who hired an investigator who quickly found enough proof to charge Marks more than 30 years after he was first fired for molesting young boys.
He pleaded guilty to molesting four boys, two of whose fathers saild they were also molested by Marks when they were young. He was sentenced to forty years, had twenty suspended, and iwas made eligible for parole in four years. The survivors were not allowed to testify in court because the judge said, ″I wasn’t going to embarrass this poor man any more.″
- LA Times: Small Schools, Big Secret: Predatory Teacher Worked 30 Years : Molestations: Many townspeople are not surprised. Some believe that two generations of boys were victimized.
- AP: 20 Years for Allegedly Molesting Male Students Over 30 Years
- Seattle Times: Montana Town’s Dark Secret: Molestations discovered in 1959, Teacher was not arrested until 1990
5 August 1990
