A Republican running for state Senate in South Dakota has been accused of heinous crimes: molesting, raping, and maniacally monitoring the actions of an underage female family member “since she was a young child.”
On May 6, a woman, now 19, told police that Joel Koskan, a Republican running for the state Senate seat for District 26, began molesting her when she was just 12. The abuse continued off and on for years until she turned 17, when he began raping her, she alleged.
“She explained that ever since she was young, Joel [Koskan] would give her very long hugs, kiss her and have her sit on his lap,” a retired agent with the South Dakota Division of Criminal Investigation wrote in a probable cause statement filed with the courts. “[The woman] thought that it was ‘normal things’ that families were supposed to do.”
Koskan also owned the property where she lived, so he installed cameras to watch her in her home, she said, and tracked her movements through GPS monitors on her phone and in her vehicle.