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Extending the Fight Against Child Abuse in Worcester County | Latest News | wboc.com
BALTIMORE - Child neglect is officially a crime in Maryland. 
NORFOLK, Va. (AP) - A Norfolk woman has been sentenced to 25 years in prison in the death of her 4-year-old daughter. Jathiya Wooden received the sentence Friday on the first-degree murder conviction in the death of her daughter Tamera, who suffered years of abuse. Prosecutors had sought a life term.
Wooden, 28-year-old mother of six, falsely reported that Tamera had disappered from a playground in August 2008. She later admitted that the child was hidden in a closet, and police found her body there. Prosecutors said Wooden admitted stabbing Tamera with an umbrella after the child tried to break free from being pinned behind a dresser as punishment.
Doctors said the child was starved, deprived of water and forced to stay in confined spaces. An autopsy found injuries on every part of the child's body.
WASHINGTON -- More than five dozen child prostitutes have been found in the last three days as part of a nationwide crackdown on the sexual exploitation of children, the FBI said today.FBI spokesman Jason Pack said 69 children were removed from prostitution and 99 suspected pimps were arrested in 40 cities across 30 states and the District of Columbia. Authorities arrested 785 other adults on a variety state and local charges, Pack said.
All the children found in the last three days have been placed into protective custody or returned to their families.
The children were found during Operation Cross Country V, a three-day roundup targeting child traffickers and pimps. The largest group of child prostitutes, 24, was found in and around Seattle, according to the FBI.
FBI executive assistant director Shawn Henry said the children found ranged in age from 12 to 17. Authorities are working with the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children to confirm their identities.Henry said child prostitutes are often recruited by loose-knit groups that seek out kids who may be involved in drugs or runaways looking for a "responsible adult" to help them.
"There are groups of people out there preying on naive kids who don't have a good sense of the way of the world," Henry said. "Sometimes there's a threat of force, threats of violence. A lot these kids operate out of a sense of fear."
Since 2003, when the FBI and the Justice Department launched the Innocence Lost National Initiative, about 1,250 child prostitutes have been located and removed from prostitution.
( Sept. 22) -- An Indianapolis woman who's been charged in the deaths of her two young children allegedly locked her five kids in a closet for 10 hours before the two perished.
The police report also alleges that Farah failed to call 911 after she arrived home and discovered her children's lifeless bodies, and tried to prevent neighbors and relatives from doing so.
Meanwhile, neighbors of the Farah family at their two-story apartment complex said they were shocked by the deaths.
Crisfield Police have arrested 20 year old Virgil Dashields on child sex abuse charges. Police say he sexually assaulted a 14 month old child at the Somers Cove Apartments last Friday. Dashields faces numerous charges and is being held at the Somerset County Detention Center in default of $50,000 bond.VIRGIL ERIC DASHIELDS
157 SOMERS COVE APARTMENTS
B/M/3-8-1990
(See Attached Photo)
On 9/20/2010 at 9:52 pm Virgil Eric Dashields was arrested by the Crisfield Police Department for a Sexual Child Abuse charging him with sexually abusing a 14 month old child. The sexual child abuse occurred in the Somers Cove Apartments located in Crisfield on 9/17/2010. Dashields was located at 59 Somers Cove Apartments and placed under arrest. The following charges were placed on Dashields:
Sex Abuse of a Minor
Sex Offense 4th Degree
Sex Offense 4th Degree
Assault 2nd Degree
Child Abuse
Sex Offense 3rd Degree
Assault 2nd Degree
Attempt Sodomy
Dashields was placed on $50,000 bond by Somerset County Court Commissioners. He is currently residing in the Somerset County Detention Center.
SEAFORD, Del.- Seaford police say an 18-year-old woman is facing charges after her 3-year-old son fired two shots from a .410 shotgun, which struck the roll-up door of a firehouse.Christy A. Smullen is charged with tampering with physical evidence, reckless endangering, possession of a firearm by a person prohibited, endangering the welfare of a child, criminal mischief over $1,000 and discharging a weapon in city limits. She was released on $8,000 unsecured bail, pending a preliminary hearing in the Court of Common Pleas.
It happened about 2:10 p.m. Wednesday when officers received a report that the Seaford Volunteer Fire Department was being shot at. When officers arrived on the scene, they found two bullet holes in a roll-up door on the west side of the firehouse.
Police say an investigation showed that a 3-year-old boy on a porch across the street had gotten the unsecured loaded shotgun from the home and fired at the firehouse.
Smullen, who is the boy's mother, was taken into custody and arrested on the aforementioned charges. Police say the shotgun was also recovered from the home and found to have been loaded with .38-caliber ammunition.
Seaford police detectives executed a search warrant at the home on the 200 block of Cannon Street where they located additional ammunition and a BB gun.
The Delaware Division of Family Services also responded and placed the child with his father.
Formeka Sanders, 29, was arrested after her 4-year-old was found wandering in the Oak Glenn Apartments parking lot about 1:45 a.m. Monday. She is facing child neglect charges.
DCF initially turned the children over to Sanders' mother, a police report said. But at a hearing
Monday, a judge and DCF officials said Sanders' mother has a history of crack-cocaine use.
Sanders has six children, but apparently only five of them were home at the time.DCF also had prior involvement with the family with allegations involving failure to protect, sexual abuse and inadequate food.
Judge Anthony Johnson indicated Sanders' mother wouldn't be a possible option for the kids to live with because of the previous DCF involvement and drug use.
Sanders' children — ages 12, 10, 9, 4 and 2 — were left home alone at their apartment on Mercy Drive while she went to Club Firestone in downtown Orlando, police said.
Sanders appeared at the hearing in a navy blue jail jumpsuit and said little. She remains in the custody of the Orange County Jail on a $1,000 bond.
David Rushing, the father of the 4-year-old, also attended the hearing and requested custody of the boy. The judge ordered a review be conducted to determine if it will be a suitable home for the child.
A similar study is being conducted at Sanders' great-aunt's home to see where they will be placed.
Police were alerted around 1:40 a.m. by a security guard who was patrolling the parking lot near Sanders unit and found the 4-year-old boy wandering around outside.
The child told the guard he was by himself and then led the guard back to his apartment, police said.
When officers arrived, they found four children sleeping in a bedroom. The officer woke all the children, who all seemed to be fine, according to the report.
The officer tried calling Sanders cell phone several times, but when she answered all he could hear was loud music in the background.
Sanders returned home around 3:20 a.m. Monday with her boyfriend and was detained.
During an interview with police, Sanders said she left her home around 12:30 a.m. and placed her oldest son in charge. She told police she feels the child is "old and responsible enough" to take care of the four children.
Jail records show Sanders has been arrested several times in the past on charges of aggravated battery with a weapon and grand theft of a motor vehicle.
After the hearing, Rushing said he wants custody of his son and he thinks Sanders is a "fit" mother.
"I would never expect for anything like this to happen," he said.
Sunday's incident isn't the first time DCF and law-enforcement have been involved with Sanders' children.
Orlando police and DCF responded to the apartment complex July 6 when one of her children nearly drowned in a pool.
Sanders was not home at the time. A father of one of the children was supposed to be supervising the kids.
"Clearly we have a documented pattern of inadequate supervision and, given the potential for such serious harm, especially in the July incident, we felt we had no choice but to remove the children and place them into protective custody," DCF spokeswoman Carrie Hoeppner said Monday.
NEWPORT NEWS, Va. (WAVY) - A Hampton couple is facing felony child endangerment charges for allegedly leaving their toddler in a car alone while they went shopping. An employee at the Walmart in the 12000 block of Jefferson Avenue told police he was in the parking lot at around 11 a.m. on August 18 when he noticed a child alone in a car. He said he waited for about ten minutes for someone to return to the car, but that never happened, so the employee alerted his manager.
Newport News Police arrived at the store and made an announcement over the Walmart sound system. When the parents returned to the car, they reportedly told officers they were only inside the store for about three minutes. According to the store manager, the 2 year old child was in the car for as long as 40 minutes.
Police charged Andriy Kot and Khrystyna Porseua, both 29 years old, with felony child endangerment.
KEYSTONE HEIGHTS, Fla. (AP) - A central Florida mom who thought it would be funny to post a picture of her baby with a bong on her Facebook page has been arrested.Nineteen-year-old Rachel Stieringer was charged with possession of drug paraphernalia. A Texas resident called Florida's abuse hot line after seeing the picture online of the baby posing with his face in the bong.
Two weeks ago the mom had defended her actions , claiming there were no drugs or tobacco in the bowl, and her child was not breathing in smoke.
But child protection officers from the Florida Department of Children and Families launched an inquiry into her actions.
"We are alarmed that any parent would take pictures of their child next to what is obviously drug paraphernalia," said spokesman John Harrell.
The mother had spoken via the social networking site Facebook, and insisting the pictures were a joke.She said: "If u look at the picture u can see that there is no bowl in the TABACCO pipe.
"And i took a pic to show one (expletive) person and it was a mistake. I would never ever ever let him get high."
The mom said that as part of the investigation she was ordered to take a drugs test, and her son was being checked by doctors.
She added: "Do you realize how serious this is? i can go to jail and he can be taken away from me. WHY would you do something so (expletive) stupid?
"i know what i did was stupid but i would NEVER put by baby in harm. im so nice to everyone idk (I don't know) why you would do this to me."
Clay County Sheriff's deputies say Stieringer turned herself in July 29 and was released on $502 bond.
A spokesman for the Department of Children and Families said Monday the baby had no injuries and drug tests came back negative.
A message could not be left at Stieringer's home Tuesday morning. The phone number was busy on several attempts.
(The grandparents are now caring for the child.)
ORANGEBURG, S.C. - A South Carolina mother who claimed her children drowned when their car careened into a river was charged with murder Tuesday after authorities said she confessed to suffocating the two toddlers and then faking the accident.
I bet this case is far from being over!Justin Jones and Julia Tomlin were charged with felony child neglect after police say they failed to seek medical attention for their daughter. The stove top--four heating elements and four drip trays--were taken for analysis.
The child suffered burns on her back, shoulders, and arms.
Police went back to the Misty Harbor Apartments and a building off Woodall Court, where the girl was allegedly burned on April 30. Detectives were called days later to meet Child Protective Services at the home and said she had burn marks on her back "consistent with the heating elements on a stove."Police contend the parents, Justin Jones and Julia Tomlin, placed the girl on the stove while they tended to another one of their five children. They say the toddler fell on one of the burners and was burned.
After the discovery was made, the girl was taken to a local hospital, treated and released.
In charging documents a detective wrote about Tomlin saying "she could not say for sure if the burners were turned off or not."
Neither Tomlin nor Jones could be reached for comment.
The little girl, along with her four siblings, who showed no signs of abuse, were placed in the care of Child Protective Services.
The body of Ethan Stacy, wrapped in plastic, was unearthed by police Tuesday.
Interview summaries filed by Layton police detectives documented increasingly harsh treatment of the boy during his short time in Utah. A Virginia judge had sent the boy to Layton for a summer visit with his mother just 10 days before his death, police said.
Investigators said they obtained photographs and video images of Ethan's worsening condition from his mother's cell phone, starting more than a week ago.
The injuries resulted from the stepfather, Nathanael Sloop, "engaging in a systematic and progressively more violent pattern of abuse toward Ethan," detectives wrote in interview summaries. The documents say Sloop was angry with the child and "tried everything" to discipline him; however, they don't say why the boy was being disciplined.
Sloop, 31, acknowledged hitting the boy, which caused his face to swell, and leaving him in a locked bedroom May 6 while the couple went to get married in Farmington, about 10 miles away, according to the probable cause statements used to support arrest warrants and detention in jail.
Sloop and the boy's mother, Stephanie Sloop, 27, feared his injuries would alert authorities if they took him along to the courthouse wedding, the documents state.
"This pattern of behavior and abuse was done in a manner that was recklessly indifferent to the child's welfare," police wrote.
Stephanie Sloop told police she did not seek medical help for Ethan because she was afraid Nathanael Sloop "would harm her," Detective Brooke Plotnick wrote.
The couple told police they found Ethan dead in his bed Sunday morning, and that Nathanael Sloop buried him later that day.
Stephanie Sloop told investigators she bought two cans of lighter fluid for Nathanael Sloop to burn the body before it was buried. The reports didn't say whether that was actually done.
The stepfather disfigured the boy's face and teeth "in an effort to defeat or delay identification," detectives concluded in their reports.
Prosecutors said they expect to file charges against the couple Friday. Nathanael Sloop was arrested on suspicion of aggravated murder. He and the mother face additional charges of desecration of a corpse, along with felony child abuse and obstruction of justice, police said.
Chief Deputy Davis County Attorney David Cole said prosecutors are awaiting the results of an autopsy conducted Wednesday.
The Sloops are being held at the Davis County jail.
Attorney Richard Gallegos, who has represented Nathanael Sloop in previous criminal cases, did not return a message Wednesday. It was unknown if Stephanie Sloop had an attorney.
Nobody answered a phone at the Sloops' apartment Wednesday, and a message wasn't returned.
Stephanie Sloop initially told officers that Ethan wandered away from their apartment complex late Monday, but that was just a ruse aimed at covering the couple's tracks, Lt. Garret Atkin said.
Police searched overnight and said that by midday Tuesday, the Sloops had revealed the location of Ethan's body. The search then moved 20 miles away to a spot off a wooded trail in Wolf Canyon, which borders the Powder Mountain ski resort, about 40 miles northeast of Salt Lake City.
Ethan's biological father told The Associated Press police gave him details on the slaying Wednesday.
"I can't talk right now. I just got the horrible news, talking to prosecutors," said Joe G. Stacy of Tazewell, Va.
A relative says Ethan didn't want to spend the summer with his mother.
"Ethan did not want to even talk to (his mother) on the phone. She'd call and he'd say, 'I don't want to talk to her,"' Freida Stacy, Joe G. Stacy's stepmother, told the Deseret News of Salt Lake City.
Stephanie Sloop told police Ethan was vomiting, lethargic and refusing to eat for three days before his death. She also said that on Friday, she found Ethan badly burned from his feet to his buttocks from hot bath water, and that she suspected Nathanael Sloop was responsible.
At another point, the couple forced the child to drink two 16-ounce bottles of water, a 16-ounce bottle of Kool-Aid and a glass of orange juice over two hours, police said. They also gave him Motrin and Benadryl to ease his facial swelling and pain.
Utah State Courts records show that between 2000 and 2003, Nathanael Sloop had several convictions, including for criminal mischief, disorderly conduct and drug possession. In 2003, he served 30 days in jail for one drug possession charge and received a six-month suspended sentence for another.
No criminal history was found for Stephanie Sloop.
