Officer Adopts Boy From ‘Worst Case of Child Abuse’ — The Case I Can’t Forget | Full Episode

foreigner my name is Jody Thompson my life changed forever on April 27, 2015. I am a poto local here in Oklahoma, I was born and raised here my entire life, I reside in the house I grew up in in Genie and I have been married since 1999. and I've been in law enforcement since we're a happy small town family, two working parents and two kids, and you know, we thought it would be April 27, 2015, the call came over the radio through dispatch in reference to a boy who had gone to a neighbor's house and told her that he thought his parents were trying to kill him.

I was off duty, but the nature of the call, my previous experience and the investigation of these crimes is the reason I decided to go ahead and offer help. to the guard shift from the beginning I had many occasions to investigate

child

abuse

and

child

sexual crimes, some were simply forwarded and terrible, you know, this evil is happening in our backyard, even in a small town of Poteau, once I entered the house, I saw this. child, his hands were still tied, he was very underweight, you could see his collarbones, you could see every rib on his body, he had cuts on his body, bruises from head to toe and he had a knot on his head and easily sized. of a tennis ball that I never got out of my head.

I found out his name was John. The house the boy lived in was quite horrible. Was dirty. There wasn't much food. The boy's room was messy. There was a latch. on the outside that showed investigators that this child had been locked inside from the outside. I was in that room with him for only 10 15 seconds when I took him into protective custody and took him out of that house. I took him to the emergency room. I will never

forget

the journey he went on trying to tell me what had happened to him. He was just scared to death on the floor of my car.

None of this will escape my mind due to his health and his injuries. He was admitted to the hospital. Intensive Care Unit for a day and a half, two days, at that time I separated from the police part and stayed by his side the entire time in the hospital. I knew this was different, no one in Poteau Oklahoma would have ever thought that a

case

like this would happen and go unnoticed, so I personally and professionally vowed to try to stop that from happening again through investigation. I found out about the

abuse

of water. He started with shower nozzles on his face.

Once the boy grew up, he left. to a 55 gallon trash can

full

of water and that's where the boy would sometimes dive headfirst until he stopped fighting them, but most of the time he would dive up to his nose with the lid on many times bags of ice. He was put there to make the punishment more severe. It was one of the

worst

things I have ever seen in a child who was still alive. Both parents were charged with two counts each of child abuse by injury and neglect and were sentenced to 35 years. of peace once John was released, he went to a traditional foster home in Poteau was on my mind all the time.

I couldn't get him out of there. I could not sleep. I was not eating. I told my wife what had happened. and I thought we needed this child in our house, we had a brief conversation but no plans were made, so while Jeannie was at work and unbeknownst to her, I made some phone calls when she showed up that day and saw a child strange in In her front yard, I think she put two and two together pretty quickly, it was a big surprise and then she proceeds to tell me she's pregnant again so it was totally unexpected.

John's transition into the family seemed smooth to me, but from the beginning there was a bit of fear of showering, obviously, a bit of food hoarding, you know, I guess what I mean is that there will be no memories or problems that our life I'd be naive, so he's working on it and I think he's doing pretty well and now he's a straight student, he's in band, he's involved in community plays and drama clubs, he's doing really well and then I was working with a child welfare worker when she gets a phone call, she says John's mom just had a baby in jail and she says what are we going to do?

Well, we are going to go get her and that was obvious, we were going to adopt her too to keep her intact and about 24 hours later we went to the hospital and I picked her up and brought her home. My biggest fear was that two kids would end up in the foster care system, in foster care, in foster care, in foster care, and where they would end up, if they would stay together, if they would get the individual attention they needed. Someone has to be their voice and if it's not their own family and friends then we have to be that voice and we have to do whatever it takes to get these kids out of these situations.

I believe God put it in the heart, the heart of my family. and we brought these kids home today we wouldn't trade it for anything in the foreign world