Boy In Cage Child Abuse Case Stuns U.S. Authorities
Posted May 4, 2007 12:00 pm.
This article is more than 5 years old.
Just one day after Toronto Police revealed a shocking investigation into the drugging and sexual assault of a 12-year-old girl with the alleged complicity of her own mother, comes another astounding case of a crime against children. This one allegedly took place in Toledo, Ohio, where a mother and father of two small boys are charged with keeping at least one of them in a locked 2X2 foot cage, so the dad could take drugs.
Police contend the 10-year-old child was also made to wear an electronic remote controlled dog collar which was used to shock him whenever his parents didn’t like his behaviour. It’s not clear how long the alleged abuse was going on, but it finally ended when the adults made a mistake, leaving the youngster and his 5-year-old brother alone in the house.
They used the absence to escape and were found sitting on a neighbour’s front porch when police arrived. The older boy told cops he was simply tired of having to be in the cage and ran away. “He had to tuck his knees into his chest, and he fell asleep in there on a couple occasions,” an astonished Captain Ray Carroll relates. “It wasn’t continuous. It was probably on and off for punishment.”
It’s not known if the younger child suffered a similar penalty, but some neighbours say they weren’t even aware the family had a second son.
Jessica Botzko (top left), the children’s 28-year-old mother and 37-year-old John Westover were arrested earlier this week and made a court appearance on Thursday.
Botzko had temporarily lost custody of the elder boy in 1998 when she was charged with child endangerment. The father has a long criminal record. An infant daughter died of Sudden Infant Death Syndrome several years ago, and police now say they’ll be reopening that case to have a second look.
