INSIDE HELL HOUSE (STARVED TEENS)

New York Post ^ | 11/04/03 | DON MURRAY and KATE SHEEHY

[kattracks]

Shockingly disturbing photos of a ripped-up wall in the dingy attic where four emaciated New Jersey boys lived may provide the best evidence yet that they were victims of horrible abuse.

Plaster has been torn away from one wall, revealing the wooden boards and insulation behind it in the grungy room on the second floor of the Jackson family's home in suburban Collingswood. Authorities say the starved boys told them they ate such building materials - even chewing on a windowsill in the house - to get more "nutrients" because they were being fed only pancake batter, peanut butter and cereal by their adoptive parents.

[kattracks]

PHOTO EXCLUSIVE: Adopted brothers Bruce, Keith and Tyrone Jackson may have torn pieces off their wall and munched on the plaster board and insulation to curb their hunger after being fed only pancake batter, peanut butter and cereal, New Jersey authorities say.

[kcvl]

I think I'm going to vomit. How can ANYONE do that to a child???!!!

[Terridan]

And to think these social workers are free and not charged with contributing to this offense, a felony, AND that the parents were release yesterday, to their CHURCH. What kind of church is that??? All should be put away for life. I guess the state doesn't prosecute their own... Anyone hear from hitlery on this???

[kcvl]

"the parents were release yesterday, to their CHURCH"

To a STANDING OVATION!!!

[Iowa Granny]

It is just very difficult to believe children can be treated this way and a church would protect the parents.

[WaterDragon]

These social workers have so much power over families that it's scary, yet they are often incompetent, not terribly bright, but arrogant and loving their cushy jobs. They come out of the universities barely literate with their heads full of mush.

It really is time to get very specific with these agencies, AND with the juvenile courts. The judges know this stuff goes on, believe you me. The agencies, the juvenile courts, and the states' legislatures that have the only oversight over them that exists.

[kcvl]

These children would be MUCH better off in an orphanage. At least, they would have a place to call home, sleep in the same bed every night and have food to eat.

[chainsaw]

If that's a bed, it doesn't look very comfortable

[aardvark1]

If this story is true, I have not mercy for the parents or this church....however, I am not about to believe child protective services in ANY state in the union until I had more evidence than presented in the newspaper.

For all you freepers who don't trust gov't intrusion, why now swallow this story without at least a littel skepticism. The parents' story does sound far-fetched, but I'm not ready to jump on the state's bandwagon quite yet.

[mass55th]

"To a STANDING OVATION!!!"

The church leader even mortgaged his house to pay the bail for these two miscreants. The same people going to bat for them are the same morons who continually vote for the likes of Bill and Hillary Clinton. How can anyone with half a brain even believe the parents' claim that all four kids had eating disorders. I guess if all I was fed was pancake batter, cereal and peanut butter, I'd have an eating disorder too. I hope these people rot in jail. They should be fed nothing but bread and water for the rest of their life and see how they like it. Even the special vegetable loaf given to some disruptive inmates in New York State prisons would have more nutrients than what those kids were eating. They resemble the emaciated prisoners released from Andersonville in 1865, and probably suffer from scurvy and rickets as well as other related diseases. That something like this could happen to an American child is beyond belief.

[netmilsmom]

I have to agree with you.
My question is "why did the parents do this?"

If they actually starved these boys, they should be starved themselves.

[ccmay]

It is just very difficult to believe children can be treated this way and a church would protect the parents.

You're joking, right? Churches do this and worse all the time, if the parents mouth the right platitudes and kiss the parson's @$$.

-ccm

[Iowa Granny]

You're joking, right?

No I'm not joking. Where I come from, the church would stand with the children. I'm sorry you don't live in a similar community. I would not deny such church communitites exist, only that they are not present here where I live.

[r9etb]

The kids' adoptive parents, Raymond and Vanessa Jackson, insist it's all a misunderstanding because the children have severe eating disorders.

Well ... I suppose it's possible that their kid had severe eating disorders, and that they subsequently adopted three more kids who also had the same sorts of eating disorders.

I'm inclined to believe that there's real abuse here. But some of the other stuff is odd -- maybe there's more to it.

The church thing is really strange. Sounds like some of those folks are going out on a limb for these people, so maybe they know something we don't.

They could have been fooled by the Jacksons, who'd have honed their skills on the social services people.

[Bob]

For all you freepers who don't trust gov't intrusion, why now swallow this story without at least a littel skepticism. The parents' story does sound far-fetched, but I'm not ready to jump on the state's bandwagon quite yet.

Have you seen the pictures of these kids? The nineteen-year-old is only about four feet tall and he weighs under fifty pounds. Four adopted boys in the same family don't 'just happen' to have eating disorders.

[justshutupandtakeit]

This is not a real church merely a recruitment office for the RAT party and an enabler for professional leeches. Like far too many Black churches it has little to do with Christianity but exists to provide a platform for RAT racists to spew their venom.

Its "minister" is undoubtedly as much a follower of Christ as "Rev" Jerkson and "Rev" Fat Albert.

A relevent question is how much state money flows into this church from which dubious programs.

[justshutupandtakeit]

We have seen such stories repeatedly from all across the nation and your efforts to put the blame on the State when it is obviously the sadistic pyschopaths draining the state funds for their own use who deserve it is contemptible. But such misinformation and falsehoods are typical of the ideological blind who haunt these precincts.

Social workers are inundated by the destruction caused by Out of Wedlock births and CANNOT POSSIBILY CORRECT ALL THE DAMAGE therefrom. Yet, we have to listen to the crap which flows from those who do not recognize that the problem is one of individual behavior.

In general there is far more of a problem from social workers who are unable to intervene quickly and sufficiently than from those who are too zealous without appropriate cause. It isn't even close.

[Middle Man]

"...very difficult to believe children can be treated this way and a church would protect the parents."

Probably one of those "church" created solely to get the tax exemption bennies of a religious organization.

[aardvark1]

You MAY be right about this case in NJ. My point was not that the any of what was reported was a distortion. But I read often on this site about skepticism over newspaper stories but in this case, everyone seemed to jump right on this as infallible.

Admittedly, this appears from the report to be genuine and these "parents" ought to subject to the same treatment with as much compassion as they showed these children. BUT, there's also this thing about "innocent until proven guilty" as opposed to being tried and convicted in the same newspaper article.

If this church is complicit in this incident, they too should be starved...or better yet, at their next communion use wallboard or insulation in place of the bread.

[GovernmentShrinker]

Guess you haven't been following this story. These kids had been adopted through the child welfare system, and another child in the home (a girl, so she got fed) was pending adoption. Child welfare workers had been filling out regular reports on their alleged visits to the home for years, stating that everything was fine. Nine workers have already been fired over this. I'll believe the state on this one (though I'm quite skeptical as to whether the state will actually take the needed steps to prevent a recurrence -- especially as that would require firing all the workers who were protesting today that the fired workers shouldn't have been blamed because it's really "the system's" fault).