Sex, lies, videotape … and a foot fetish

The sordid divorce case of Rowan County couple Curtis and Alice Buck makes “The War of the Roses” look like G-rated child’s play. Their story features criminal allegations, a hidden video camera, pornography, foot fetishism and was recently capped off with a six-figure damages award.

Curtis Buck and his attorney, James A. Davis of Salisbury, convinced a Superior Court jury last month that Alice Buck would do just about anything to win full custody of her two young children, even if it meant manipulating the legal system and ruining their father’s life. “I believe the jury found that this was a classic abuse of the system,” Davis said.

But Mrs. Buck’s attorney, Edwin H. Ferguson Jr. of Ferguson, Scarborough, Hayes, Hawkins and DeMay in Concord, said jurors might have reached a different conclusion if he’d been allowed to tell them about Mr. Buck’s foot fetish and penchant for online porn.

“This [case] is not as clear as it sounds,” he said.

The cascade of tawdry events was sparked by Mr. Buck’s refusal to sign divorce papers, which prompted Mrs. Buck to fill out a private warrant accusing him of breaking into their home after she kicked him out and changed the locks. While he was in jail on a trespassing charge, Mrs. Buck, who works as a paralegal, filed an emergency custody action, according to Davis.

But a judge found Mr. Buck not guilty of trespassing and, after a subsequent custody trial, the court ordered shared custody of the children. Unhappy with that arrangement, Mrs. Buck set to wooing Mr. Buck, who still wanted to save the marriage, Davis said.

They had a series of sexual encounters over the next month and a half and, at the same time, Mr. Buck decided to sign over his interest in both the marital home and in Mrs. Buck’s 401(k). Then their reconciliation came to an abrupt end.

After driving away from the final hookup, Mrs. Buck called 911 and reported that her estranged husband had pulled a knife on her. She later alleged that he forced her to have sex with him. Mr. Buck was charged with first-degree rape and kidnapping, and thrown back into a crowded jail, where he slept on the floor.

Mr. Buck, who has congestive heart disease and diabetes, vomited frequently while behind bars and shed about 20 pounds before he was released, Davis said. Once again, Mrs. Buck filed for emergency custody of the children.

The criminal case against Mr. Buck fell apart when his wife admitted to lying under oath about not having sex with him in the weeks before the alleged attack. Davis caught her off-guard on the witness stand by showing her a pair of panties she’d left with after a tryst with her husband.

“It was just too much in her face, I guess,” Davis said of the underwear.

And in the subsequent civil action against Mrs. Buck, Rowan County Superior Court Judge Bradley B. Letts ruled that evidence of Mr. Buck’s foot fetish and his posting photos of his wife’s feet online was prejudicial. But the judge did allow Ferguson to tell jurors about a hidden video camera.

Mrs. Buck found the camera hidden in a waste basket in her bedroom after her split with Mr. Buck. Its lens was aimed at the foot of the bed, Ferguson said.

According to Davis, Mr. Buck set up the camera in an attempt to catch Mrs. Buck cheating on him. He said the camera, like the inadmissible foot fetish talk, was nothing more than a red herring.

“I don’t think the jury focused on that hardly at all,” he said.

Jurors deliberated for less than three hours on Feb. 5 before awarding Mr. Buck $131,056, which includes $100,000 in punitive damages for malicious prosecution on the rape and kidnapping charges. If Mr. Buck had been convicted of those crimes, he would have faced more than 57 years in prison in addition to being branded as a sex offender.

Ferguson has asked the court to overrule the jury verdict or, in the alternative, grant a new trial. He says jurors wrongly based their decision on the fact that the charges against Mr. Buck had been tossed, instead of considering whether they were supported by probable cause.

The Bucks still share custody of their children.

Follow Phillip Bantz on Twitter @NCLWBantz