Akemi Cox (L) and Valerio Garcia

An 8-year-old boy, W. (b. 2013), was starved, physically abused, and medically neglected by his mother, Akemi Cox, and her fiance Valerio Garcia. W. was homeschooled.

Cox had a social services history dating back to 2002; five of her children had previously been removed from her care. Garcia had a social services history dating back to 2006. The couple last took W. to the doctor in 2014 or 2015 when he was around 2 years old. Between that time and his rescue in February 2021, W. gained a total of seven pounds. Cox and Garcia beat W. with a belt and kept him on a strict meal plan. When he was rescued, he was still the size of a 2-year-old, his belly was distended, and his skin was sagging. W. attended virtual school which, according to journalists, prevented the abuse from being caught earlier.

The abuse came to light when a neighbor spotted W. “climbing in and out of his window at night, searching for food in a dumpster.” Cox and Garcia were charged with child neglect and W. gained 15 lbs. in two months while in foster care.

Date: February 2021
Location: Edmond, Oklahoma

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Jacqueline Barbour and Jason Carroll

Nora* (b. 2010) was starved and tortured by her father, Jason Carroll, and her stepmother Jacqueline Barbour. The household also included Nora’s stepbrother and her half-brother. Nora was homeschooled.

Barbour and Carroll isolated Nora from family members; Carroll’s mother R. last saw Nora in person in August 2016. Carroll and Barbour claimed that Nora had “behavioral issues” beginning in February 2017, admitting her to a psychiatric hospital at least four times and obtaining a Valium prescription for her; however, authorities believe that Nora was a victim of medical child abuse and was forced to receive unnecessary care. In 2018, Barbour and Carroll asked Nora’s school to prevent her from purchasing lunch so that they could control her behavior. It is unclear exactly when Nora was withdrawn from school to be homeschooled. Nora reported that Barbour threw her into the snow in her underwear, forced her to do jumping jacks, and threw her into a fan when she was unable to continue. Nora also reported that her brother punched her and that Barbour “preferred” Nora’s brother. Nora was given very little to drink and only received bread and peanut butter for dinner “if she was behaving.” Nora was repeatedly punished by being confined to a clear plastic bucket or tote during the day, and she was forced to sleep there at night, curled in a fetal position. Carroll told R. that Nora was being confined to a bucket, but R. did not see the bin or understand its small size; R. told police “Looking back at all of this, I wish I would have seen the signs a little more clear, but at the time I could not have imagined anything like this would ever happen.” When Nora was rescued, she had injuries to the skin on her lower legs and an enlarged liver consistent with chronic severe malnutrition; she gained 14 lbs. in eight days.

The abuse came to light in January 2020 when Carroll brought Nora to the hospital, claiming that she had mental health issues. Staff noticed her condition and reported the abuse to the authorities. After being placed in a foster home, Nora ate voraciously, did well after being re-enrolled in public school, and did not display the reported behavioral issues. Barbour and Carroll were charged with child cruelty and endangering a minor.

*Nora is a pseudonym.

Date: January 2020
Location: Pomfret, Connecticut

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Brandon Gray, age 14, was starved to death by his mother, Terra Wells, and several other family members. Brandon’s 12-year-old sister K. was also starved and physically abused. The other eight children in the home were not reported to be abused. All ten children were homeschooled.

Brandon lived with three generations of his family: his grandmother Yvette Charleston, his mother Terra Wells, his uncle and aunts (Melvin Wells, Tamera Dishmon, Tessa Dishmon, Amanda Dishmon, Tabitha Sharp, and Breanna Wells), K. and three other siblings, and 5 cousins. In 2015 when Brandon was 9, he was accused of abusing one of the other children in the home; police investigated but the outcome of the investigation is unknown. Following this incident, Brandon was forced to live locked in a closet in the unheated garage with a mattress, portable toilet, and bleach jug for a urinal. He was fed a bran/corn mixture and V8 and at the time of his death weighed only 60 lbs. At some point K. was also forced to sleep in the garage while the rest of the children slept in beds in bedrooms inside the house. When she was rescued K. was malnourished and had patterned bruising on her body.

The abuse came to light in January 2020 when one of Brandon’s family members called 911 to report he was unresponsive and refused to administer CPR. Wells and her siblings were charged with murder, child abuse, and child neglect; Charleston died before she could be indicted.

Date: January 7, 2020
Location: Bartlett, Tennessee

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Serah Bellar

Serah Bellar (b. 2003) was physically and sexually abused by her family members. Several of her siblings were also abused. Serah was homeschooled.

Serah’s parents, Robert and Deborah Bellar, had 18 biological children and 1 adopted child. The family may have espoused Quiverfull ideology; Deborah Bellar told law enforcement that “God would give her all the children she was meant to have.” The family belonged to the Dove Outreach church, a new religious movement of around 8 adults led by Robert Bellar’s brother James “Jim” Bellar. Serah and her siblings were forced to attend Dove Outreach, which Serah characterized as a cult; Jim Bellar preached in favor of sibling incest in anticipation of the apocalypse and ran a church-affiliated online gaming association.

Serah attended an online homeschool. In the Bellars’ home, Serah was physically abused by her father, and her brothers systematically sexually abused their younger siblings with the knowledge and protection of their parents. Serah’s brother Josiah (b. 1997) raped two of his sisters between 2011 and 2016, and Serah’s brother Jonathan (b. 1994) sexually assaulted one of the same two girls between 2008 and 2016. In January 2016, Serah’s oldest brother Benjamin Bellar (b. 1991) was arrested and sent to prison for cooking meth in the Bellars’ home. Later that year, in October 2016, Serah’s brother Jacob Bellar (b. 1998) was arrested and sent to prison for severely physically abusing his 10-month-old son. The following month, in November 2016, Josiah was arrested and sent to prison for theft. Beginning in February 2017, multiple sexual abuse reports were filed with child services. On May 7, 2018, Serah attempted to run away from home but was stopped by a police officer. She reported that she was afraid of one of her incarcerated brothers who would be soon released from prison, explaining that he had sexually abused her and that she was at risk of self-harm. Serah’s mother denied the abuse claim, and when a social worker called to follow up, Serah’s father claimed Serah was lying and refused to allow the caseworker to speak with other children in the home.

Following these events, Serah reported the abuse to a school counselor at her online homeschool. Child services visited the home to investigate; as soon as they left, Serah’s parents disowned her and had her forcibly admitted to an inpatient mental health facility in Cleveland. Eventually the facility staff transferred Serah to foster care and she began to attend school, where she encountered Athens County Sheriff Sgt. Jimmy Childs, a school resource officer and friend of her parents’. Childs repeatedly asked Serah where she was living, implying that he would report this information to the Bellars, and refused to help Serah after she told him her family members were harassing her. Fearing that neither the police nor child services would protect her from her family, Serah ran away from home in April 2020 with the help of Jerry and Shayna Chadwick. Serah had met Jerry Chadwick through Dove Outreach’s online gaming association in 2018; Chadwick sexually groomed Serah and exchanged nude photos with her. After the Chadwicks helped Serah run away, they took her to Georgia where they sexually abused her, claiming to be in a relationship with her. Meanwhile, Serah was declared an “endangered runaway”.

This “absolute systematic failure” on the part of everyone to help Serah finally came to light on April 26, 2021, Serah’s 18th birthday, when she made a public Facebook post about the abuse she had experienced in the Bellars’ home. Robert and Deborah Bellar were charged with corrupt activity and child endangerment. Josiah Bellar was charged with rape and both he and Jonathan Bellar were charged with gross sexual imposition. The Chadwicks were charged with interfering in custody. Childs was charged with obstruction of justice and tampering with evidence.

Date: April 3, 2020
Location: Amesville, Ohio

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Seven children—six girls A. (b. 2007), Ru. (b. 2009), L. (b. 2011), Ro., S., and D. (b. 2018), and a boy W. (b. 2016)—were physically, medically, and educationally neglected by their parents, Matthew and Rebecca “Becky” Hibicki. The children were homeschooled.

The Hibickis operated a small dairy farm; Matthew Hibicki was also a rural mail carrier while Becky Hibicki worked full-time for the Wisconsin Farm Bureau. The family was active in the Green Lake County 4-H program, which was apparently the “only real outside contact” the children had. The children lived in a home filled with feces and trash, slept in shared soiled beds, were forced to use a bucket for a toilet at night and to wear torn and dirty clothes, and were rarely allowed to bathe because Matthew Hibicki “did not like the kids to have showers every other night”. The children “did not know they needed to wash their hands after using the bathroom”. Some of the children had diabetes and “were largely responsible for monitoring each other’s calorie count and insulin dosing as it related to their diabetes”. Several of the children had other medical problems: at least one had significant dental problems, one had a nail stuck in her foot, W. sustained a head injury in a three-wheeler accident, one suffered from frequent headaches and dizziness, and one had significant eye problems requiring the assistance of an ophthalmic surgeon. The Hibickis refused to seek medical treatment for all of these medical issues. The children may also have been forced to labor on the farm to the detriment of their educations; following Matthew Hibicki’s injury the family stated that “The farm is being managed by an amazing crew of neighbors along with their oldest child,” who was 13 at the time.

Becky Hibicki filed the required forms each year to notify the district she was homeschooling. However, prior to June 2020, the children had not received much education for a year; according to Matthew Hibicki, “the kids only need to know how to milk cows and be good wives.” All were significantly behind on their education with difficulties in reading and basic math: according to court documents, 11-year-old Ru. was “unable to read, wants to attend school and ‘is enthusiastic about learning more,’…only after being removed from her parents’ custody is the girl working on a kindergarten book and has learned to write her name. She can count to 13 but didn’t know the month of the year. ‘Based on [her] age and no known developmental delays, had she attended school or been taught regularly she would likely know how to read, count and be working at a much higher grade level.”

On June 22, 2020, Matthew Hibicki was hospitalized due to a farm accident which left him permanently disabled, necessitating the sale of the family’s dairy herd. This event coincided with social services receiving a tip about the children’s living conditions, and on June 26, two sheriff’s detectives and two social services employees toured the Hibickis’ house and determined it was unsafe for the children. The Hibickis were charged with 22 counts of felony child neglect.

Date: June 26, 2020
Location: Ripon, Wisconsin

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Chaskah Davis Smith, age 11, was murdered by his grandmother, Stephanie Marie Davis. Chaskah (b. 2011) and his half brother L. (b. 2013) were starved and physically abused by Davis for several years prior to Chaskah’s death. Davis’s husband, Thomas Desharnais, knew about the abuse but did nothing to stop it. Chaskah and L. were homeschooled.

Chaskah and L. lived with their mother, Amandria Davis-Smith, until around 2015. The family was Lakota. Following the March 2016 death of Davis-Smith’s brother (in which Desharnais claimed Davis-Smith was a suspect),  the boys went to live with Davis, their maternal grandmother.. Between March 22, 2017 and August 31, 2017, Arizona police received three reports that the boys were being abused. At least one report came from staff at Anasazi Elementary School who had noticed Chaskah’s injuries. Investigators dismissed all three reports for a lack of evidence. The family moved out of Arizona until the final investigation closed on September 18, 2017, and then Davis pulled the boys out of school, claiming that she was going to homeschool them. The boys were not enrolled in school after 2017.

In 2019, the family moved into an Extended Stay America building in Scottsdale, where the abuse escalated. According to Desharnais, Davis called the boys “worthless crap” and “lower than dirt,” bent their fingers back with pliers, and hit them with a broom. Courtney Lange, who worked at the hotel front desk, called police twice after witnessing strange behavior from both boys, including wearing hats and long sleeves in hot weather. However, no investigation was opened as a result of Lange’s calls. Desharnais told investigators that Davis became more abusive in the last three months of 2021. She hit Chaskah on the head with a wrench, refused him food and water, cut skin off his genitals to punish him for wetting the bed, and forced him to sleep in the bathtub so that he would not get blood in the room.

The abuse came to light on the afternoon of January 30, 2022 when Davis called 911 to report finding Chaskah unresponsive in the hotel bathtub. Half a liter of water was removed from Chaskah’s body during EMTs’ attempts to resuscitate him, and he was pronounced dead at the hospital. Although Davis claimed his injuries were self-inflicted, investigators found bedding with bloodstains at the hotel, along with pliers, a wrench hidden under a mattress, a trash bag filled with human hair, and an animal shock collar (although the family had no pets). Davis and Desharnais were charged with first degree murder and child abuse, and L. was placed in foster care.

Date: January 30, 2022
Location: Scottsdale, Arizona

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A 10-year-old boy, R.,  was physically abused by his mother, L., and sexually abused by Nelson Head, his homeschool teacher and mother’s boyfriend. 

R. was diagnosed with Asperger syndrome in 2017 at the age of 10 and was removed from school around the same time. Head, who lived with R. and L. at their shared Wichita Falls home, began to homeschool R. When the two were home alone, Head repeatedly sexually abused R., despite R. continually refusing and asking for the abuse to stop . During this period, R. was physically abused by his mother, who either did not know about or did not try to stop Head’s sexual abuse. 

The abuse came to light in September 2017 when Wichita Falls police received a call from R., who said that he was going to wait until his mother fell asleep and kill her with a knife. A police officer took R. to the local campus of North Texas State Hospital for evaluation, where he complained of physical abuse. R. revealed Head’s sexual abuse in the CPS investigation that followed. His mother gave up custody, and Head received two consecutive life sentences. R. testified at Head’s 2021 trial that he has found happiness with a prospective adoptive family. 

Date: September 15, 2017
Location: Wichita Falls, Texas

Kendrick Lee (b. 2012) was murdered by Brian Coulter, his mother’s boyfriend, on or around November 20, 2020. Before his death, Kendrick and his three brothers (b. 2006, 2011, and 2014) were physically abused by their mother, Gloria Yvette Williams, and Coulter for at least six years. All four boys were homeschooled.

Kendrick grew up with Williams and her other children in Houston, Texas. The family was intermittently homeless during Kendrick’s childhood, spending time in homeless shelters. Kendrick and one of Williams’s other sons were autistic, and Williams received government aid for them totaling $2,000 per month. In 2015, the Texas Department of Family and Protective Services was first notified of abuse in the family when residents of a homeless shelter overheard Williams cursing and slapping her children, who were screaming. The DFPS recorded eight further reports of physical abuse, neglect, and sexual abuse towards Williams’s children by one of Williams’s romantic partners over the following six years.

In late 2017, Williams met and married a man named Daryl Wayne Towner, who loved Williams’s four sons “as if they were his own,” according to statements by family members and lawyers who knew the family. Towner took Kendrick and the other boys to McDonalds, on fishing trips, and to family barbecues in the park. During his marriage to Williams, Towner took on a primary parenting role. However, the family was evicted twice during this period, and Towner passed away from existing health conditions in 2019. That year, the local school district filed truancy papers against Williams for the first time.

Around this time, Williams began dating Brian Coulter, who moved in with the family some time in 2020. Coulter, who had previously attempted to have a son from another mother removed from school to isolate him from his mother, physically abused Williams’s sons, including Kendrick. Kendrick’s older brother recalled that Coulter would lock himself in a bedroom with the younger boys and punch them while wearing a square diamond ring with sharp points. In May of 2020, Kendrick and his brothers left school and did not return. Although the school department visited the home in September 2020 to file truancy papers, they got no response. Harris County Deputy John Craig, later the lead investigator on the case, commented: “How easy is it to say, ‘My kids are going to get homeschooled,’ and that’s where it stays because you don’t have the manpower to follow up on everything.” In the case of Kendrick and his brothers, there is no evidence that any education took place at home after they left school.

On or around November 20, 2020, two of Kendrick’s brothers witnessed Coulter beating Kendrick until his eyes turned black and he stopped moving. Coulter then left the body in the back bedroom, covered it with a blanket, and warned Williams not to contact authorities. Williams knew that Kendrick was dead, but chose not to report his death.

Williams and Coulter stayed in the apartment with the three surviving boys and Kendrick’s corpse until March 2021, when they moved to an apartment about fifteen minutes away and left the boys alone. The apartment had no furniture or bedding and was infested with roaches, flies, and other bugs. Kendrick’s corpse remained in the bedroom, decomposing and prompting neighbors including Titania Shorter to report the smell of a dead animal to the building management, who did not respond. During this period, Williams occasionally brought snacks to the children, who also received food from neighbors. Building residents Erica Chapman and Trevor Thompson both gave food to the 15-year-old boy, but recalled that he seemed afraid of poisoning and would only accept packaged food and pizza. Coulter visited occasionally, continuing to abuse the children when present. In late September, he severely injured the jaw of Williams’s 9-year-old son; she did not give him any treatment or pain relief, and the injury eventually became infected and required reconstructive surgery.

The abuse came to light on October 24, 2021, when Kendrick’s 15-year-old brother called 911 to report that he and his brothers had been living in the apartment with Kendrick’s corpse for almost a year. The boys were removed from the apartment and placed in foster care. Coulter was charged with the murder of Kendrick Lee and Williams was charged with two counts of injury to a child and tampering with evidence—in this case, the corpse of her son.

Date: October 24, 2021

Location: Houston, Texas 

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Date: February 8, 2022
Location: Bragg, Raleigh County, West Virginia

>An 8-year-old girl, A. (b. 2014), was tortured, imprisoned, and starved by her father, Bobby Richmond, and his wife Rebecca Richmond. Bobby Richmond’s mother Carol Richmond, who also lived in the home, was aware of the abuse but did nothing to stop it. A. was homeschooled. 

Bobby Richmond had a prior felony conviction that barred him from owning a firearm, though he illegally possessed one. A. “expressed terror at seeing her father” and reported that Bobby Richmond also abused his wife, Rebecca Richmond. The Richmonds may have had more than one child, as Bobby Richmond reported that he had previously placed his children in social services’ custody for their own protection. The Richmonds’ home was unsanitary and they kept A. locked up in a laundry room with exposed wires, cleaning supplies, and “a little desk sitting up there for her to do homeschool type work.” Despite the available food in the house, the Richmonds starved A., feeding her only beans on the day she was rescued. They tortured her with a cattle prod and shaved her head. When she was rescued, A. was covered in her own urine, wearing only underwear, with marks all over her body. Bobby Richmond claimed that he was unaware of his daughter’s living conditions because he was always working.

The abuse came to light in February 2022 when a relative who owned the home visited, noticed the abuse, and called the authorities. Bobby, Rebecca, and Carol Richmond were charged with felony child neglect, and Bobby Richmond was also charged with unlawful possession of a deadly weapon.

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Roman Anthony Lopez, age 11 (b. 2009), was starved, tortured, and murdered by his father, Jordan Piper, and his stepmother Lindsay Piper. Roman’s 7 siblings who lived in the home (ages 1 to 17) were also abused, including Carson (b. 2008) and Brock Garvin (sons of Lindsay Piper and her former husband Marcus Garvin). All the children were homeschooled.

Roman’s mother, Rochelle Lopez, did a tour of service in Iraq in 2009, around the time Roman was born. Rochelle Lopez experienced physical and mental health challenges as a result of her service, so Roman spent his first seven years with his paternal grandmother, Jackie Farah, in Wisconsin. Farah described Roman as “funny, goofy and loved to dance,” and Rochelle noted that “he loved trains and he loved cars and he loved being in the water. He was a little water bug.” Rochelle Lopez last saw Roman in 2018 “after a custody agreement with his father fell apart.” Around that time Roman went to live with the Pipers in Michigan and later Pennsylvania, where Roman “became distant” from Farah and the abuse began March 1, 2018. Around the same time, when Roman was in third grade, Lindsay Piper pulled all the children out of school to homeschool them, explicitly in order to hide the abuse. In his victim statement, Carson noted that “She told people we were homeschooled but we weren’t… It was to protect herself from school counselors and staff. I believe that if we had gone to school that someone would have had a feeling that something was off and that she would have been reported.” Carson and Brock also reported that Lindsay Piper coached the children to lie to authorities about the abuse and threatened to abuse them if they did not participate in abusing their siblings. The family moved often to avoid detection. In December 2019, Jordan Piper also began grooming and creating pornographic images of a girl who lived in the home.

Lindsay Peters whipped Roman with a cord, zip-tied him to a bed by his fingers, zip-tied him in a stress position in the closet, and forced him to sleep in a box or closet without access to a bathroom. She also starved him, so at the time of Roman’s death he weighed only 42 lbs., the weight of a 5-year-old. She mixed poison into Roman’s drinking water; he was dehydrated when he died. She deprived Roman of medical care—he had not visited a medical professional in several years at the time of his death. About two months before Roman’s death, the Pipers moved the family to California where they rented a house.

The abuse came to light when Roman was reported missing in January 2020. After a community search, later that same day, his body was found in a storage bin in the Pipers’ basement. After a lengthy investigation, the Pipers were finally arrested Feb. 4, 2021 and charged with child abuse, poisoning, and torture. In April 2021, Rochelle Lopez died before the Pipers could be charged with Roman’s murder; they were finally charged in October 2021 as the investigation continued. In June 2022, Jordan Piper was additionally charged with sexual exploitation of a child; his case is ongoing. As part of a plea deal, in July 2022, Lindsay Piper pled “no contest” to murder and the other charges against her were dropped; she was sentenced to 15 years to life.

Date: January 11, 2020
Location: Placerville, California

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A 14-year-old boy (b. 2005) was choked, beaten, neglected, and imprisoned by his father, Anthony Jerome Lewis. The boy’s mother was also present and witnessed the abuse but did not stop or report it. The boy was homeschooled.

When he was growing up, Anthony Lewis’s son was often sent to live with his aunt due to incidents of abuse. At the beginning of 2019, he returned home to live with his mother and father. In January of that year, Lewis removed the boy from school to homeschool him. Instead of teaching him, though, Lewis forced him to do chores, such as cleaning the house. When he wasn’t working, the boy was forced to stay in his room with no television, phone, or access to the internet. He had only two pairs of clothes at a time. If he needed to use the bathroom, he was forced to ask Lewis for permission.

During this time, Lewis physically assaulted his son at least three times. In one incident, the boy said that Lewis choked him until he saw “weird colors” and “it started turning black.” On another occasion, he was beaten with electrical cords and belts twenty times each. At one point, the boy disclosed to his father and mother that he was having suicidal thoughts. With the boy’s mother watching, Lewis brought a shotgun, put it between the boy’s legs, and forced his fingers onto the trigger. “Do it,” he said. “Just do it. End it now.”

On November 20, 2019, police were called to the high school that Lewis’s son had begun attending to respond to a report of child abuse. The boy spoke to police, describing the abuse he experienced at Lewis’s hands between January 19th and June 30th of that year. Lewis was charged with first- and second-degree assault, reckless endangerment, second-degree child abuse, providing means of assisting suicide, use of a firearm in a violent crime, and failure to send his child to school, and has been ordered to have no contact with his son.

Date: November 20, 2019
Location: Odenton, Maryland

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A teenage boy, L. (b. 2007), was imprisoned and tortured by his parents, Joseph and Peggy Flores. L. was homeschooled.

Joseph Flores had a conviction of sexual assault in 2002 and had a warrant for his arrest in Colorado for failure to register as a sex offender. According to L., the Floreses began to abuse him in March 2020 after the public school district was shut down due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Several news articles identify L. as being homeschooled during this time, although no education occurred. 

The Floreses locked L. in a room with the window nailed shut and imprisoned him in a dog kennel, naked, with two dogs. They poured urine on L, yelled profanity at him (including racial slurs), and hit him with an extension cord. When L. was later examined, the medical examiner found bruising and scarring on his body.

The abuse came to light when L. talked to an investigator at the Child Advocacy Center in July 2020. Due to the pandemic, it took a long time to investigate the abuse and remove L. from the Floreses’ custody. The Floreses were charged with child abuse in June 2022.

Date: June 2, 2022
Location: Springfield, Missouri

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A boy, G. (b. 2013), was physically abused by his mother, Shannon Hickman. G. was homeschooled.

Shannon and Dale Hickman served 6 years in prison following the death of their third child and infant son David Hickman in 2009. They were members of the Followers of Christ Church in Oregon City, which teaches the use of prayer instead of modern medicine. David was born prematurely at home and a lack of medical care resulted in his death. The couple were allowed to homeschool G. after being released from prison in 2017. 

The abuse came to light when Shannon Hickman slapped G. on the side of his head, causing his nose to bleed. G. was participating in a live virtual assessment of his homeschooling at the time, and his teacher reported the abuse after witnessing it. Hickman was convicted of criminal treatment in the first degree and was sentenced to home confinement, probation, and counseling for parenting skills. 

Date: October 2020
Location: Oregon City, Clackamas County, Oregon

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Ana Loera, age 11 (b. 2007, also identified as Anna Loera), was physically abused, medically neglected, and murdered by her adoptive parents, Rafael and Maribel Loera. At the time of her death, she lived with her sisters, K. (b. 2009) and L. (b. 2016),  and her brother R. (b. 2011), who were also reported to have been abused. The eldest three were homeschooled. 

Ana was born Charisma Marquez. Her biological mother, Priscilla Marquez, described her as a “very happy little girl” who was “very spontaneous” and “was going to be a little cheerleader.” Marquez, however, gave her up for adoption as she was struggling with a methamphetamine addiction, and Rafael and Maribel Loera adopted Ana between 2010 and 2014. Initially, the three eldest children attended school but the Loeras soon withdrew them. Their neighbor Claudia reported in 2020 that she used to carpool them until the children “told [her] that they were going to be home-school,” and she hadn’t seen any of them since. In 2014, police received a report which alleged that Rafael and Maribel Loera were physically abusing one of their children, but this case was closed and the claims were declared unsubstantiated. Later, Ana’s siblings reported Maribel Loera had physically abused all of them. Rafael Loera was aware of the abuse but did nothing to stop it. 

In July 2017, Ana became violently ill. Rafael Loera waited several days before taking her to the hospital, but by the time he took her, she was so ill that she passed on the way. Rafael Loera took her body back and hid it in the attic, claiming that he feared he would lose custody of the other children if her death was discovered. The Loeras hid the death from Ana’s siblings and told them she had been adopted and sent to Mexico or Columbia. They successfully hid her death for three years, and police report that no one had seen Ana since 2016. 

On January 20th, 2020, 11-year-old K. called the police after being left at home for two days alone, saying that she was hungry and without food. Arizona Department of Child Safety removed her from the home. Maribel Loera had taken the other two children out of town, but eight days later she returned and child services removed the other two children. An hour later, Rafael Loera set the house on fire with the intent to hide Ana’s remains and die by suicide, though both attempts were unsuccessful. Ana’s autopsy revealed injuries across her body in various stages of healing, confirming the history of abuse prior to her death. Rafael and Maribel Loera were charged with 1st-degree murder, concealment of a dead body, and two counts of child abuse. Rafael Loera has also been charged with arson of an occupied structure. There have been calls for the death penalty, but a decision has not been reported.

Date: July 2017
Location: Phoenix, Arizona 

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Nicole (b. 2010) and Jasmine (b. 2013) Snyder were emotionally and physically abused and killed by their mother, Marie Snyder, and her partner, Echo Butler. Butler’s parents Michelle and Ronald Bulter lived with them for a time, and both knew about the abuse and actively helped conceal it. Nicole and Jasmine’s younger brother, J., also lived with them but was not reported to be abused. All of the children were homeschooled.

Nicole and Jasmine lived with their mother in a trailer in Hepburn Township after she won full custody over them in 2015. Snyder initially shared custody with their father, Joshua Snyder, until she claimed he sexually abused one of the girls and filed for primary custody. She later admitted the abuse claim was a lie, but Joshua Snyder lost custody and visitation of Nicole and Jasmine after he failed to appear in court. He last saw his children in 2015, which was also the last time any educational or official personnel had any contact with them. Neither girl was in public school as Marie Snyder homeschooled both of them.

Nicole and Jasmine were subject to harsh abuse. Echo Butler choked them and forced them to stand in dark hallways for long periods, often with their hands tied behind their back. Marie Snyder confessed that Echo Bulter would hit them, bash their heads against the wall, and rub feces and urine in their faces as punishment for having accidents. On at least one occasion, Echo Butler choked Nicole until she stopped breathing. Marie Snyder said that her partner hated her daughters, and police later found letters in the household in which Snyder wrote Butler that she was “sorry about these f***ing b*tches,” and that “if you want them gone, they’re gone.” Lisa Shoemaker, Echo Butler’s aunt, reported to police that the couple had even tried to sell Nicole but had backed out in fear that Joshua Snyder would find out. Marie Snyder and Echo Butler conspired to kill the children by intentionally starving them to death. A neighbor, Dale Fisher, testified that he had witnessed the entire family eating pizza, except for Nicole and Jasmine who ate only two spoonfuls of peas and some water.

On May 10, 2016, Nicole starved to death. Snyder admitted that at the time of Nicole’s death, she weighed 10 pounds and did not speak. She had been starved and dehydrated for two weeks, and her hair was falling out. Snyder claimed to have attempted to call 911, however, Echo and Michelle Butler stopped her, and they buried Nicole’s body in a shallow grave in their backyard. Marie Snyder and Echo Butler then moved to an apartment in Williamsport. Because she did not want to lose another child, Marie Snyder treated Jasmine better for a short time, but this period ended quickly. Around August 11, 2017, weighing 5 pounds, Jasmine died of the same cause as her sister. She was buried next to Nicole in Hepburn Township.

Marie Snyder kept her daughters’ deaths secret for several years and continued to collect child support and food stamps as though they were both still alive. Police only revealed the murders in November 2021. Lycoming County Children and Youth Services discovered the bodies after they came to the house to investigate reports that J. was not being properly educated, and they obtained a search warrant once they realized Nicole and Jasmine were unaccounted for. Marie Snyder and Echo Butler were arrested along with Michelle and Ronald Butler. Marie Snyder testified against her partner to avoid the death penalty. Michelle Butler pled guilty and was given credit for time served so she did not have to spend her 12–24 months long sentence. Ronald Butler was similarly given credit and avoided his six–12 month sentence. Marie Snyder and Echo Butler received two life sentences each. Giselle Bank, Nicole and Jasmine’s great-grand-aunt, said that this sentence was mild compared to what “you made my nieces suffer.”

Date: May 10, 2016 & August 11, 2017
Location: Hepburn Township, Pennsylvania

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