A neighbor in San Antonio, Texas, finally called the police after hearing children crying at a house for several weeks to report the disturbance.
When the police arrived, they were shocked by what they found, and it got worse when they went outside and saw what two toddlers were up to.
A concerned neighbor reported hearing at least two children incessantly crying for three weeks, before police officers were sent to the scene on Thursday night at about 11:45 p.m. Several knocks to the family’s front door went unanswered as the crying continued, so they went to the backyard where the source of the noise was coming from. That’s when they saw what two toddlers were doing and were absolutely sick by it, before finding six more kids inside the home.
Two toddlers were found in the backyard, one of them was chained to the ground and another was tied to a door with a dog leash, the Sheriff’s Office said.
According to KSAT, a little 2 to 3-year-old boy was chained to the ground in the backyard and a girl close in age to him had been tethered to a door with a dog leash. Officers said there were very obvious signs of abuse showing on their bodies, but the gruesome scene wasn’t just in the yard. When they gained entry into the home, six more kids were found in similar condition inside with their 34-year-old mother, Porucha Phillips, who was not the mother of the two toddlers chained up outside.
All eight of the children, raging in age from 10-months to 10-years-old, were immediately taken from the home and transported to the hospital for care. All of the kids suffered from various degrees of malnourishment, and several suffered broken bones from physical abuse perpetrated on them by Phillips. Police have yet to determine who the parents are for the two toddlers in the yard, who had received the brunt of the abuse.
“The Department of Family and Protective Services said CPS took custody of five girls — a 1-year-old, two 3-year-olds and a 9- and 10-year-old — as well as three boys, ages 10 months, 4 years and 8 years,” the news report stated. “To call this horrific is an understatement. It’s disgusting. It’s sad. It’s unbelievable,” Bexar County Sheriff’s Office spokesman James Keith said. “And we want the public to know that we will use every ounce of our energy to make sure the people who did this are held accountable and that these children are never hurt like this again.”
Phillips was taken into custody and charged with injury to a child by omission with serious bodily harm and injury to a child by omission with bodily injury. It’s believed that she also ran a daycare out of the home and that the two toddlers had been placed in her care for some time. Officers have still not located the toddler’s parents, but they could tell that the kids had been tied up in the yard for a significant amount of time, likely for days.
“For three weeks I was listening to it,” neighbor Michelle Williams said, who was the only one to call the cops, KENS 5 reported. “I felt bad, I felt real bad. I only wish I made the call sooner.” There is no reason why it should have taken so long to pick up the phone and call for help, after hearing this for hours, let alone almost an entire month.
If you see or hear something like this, do something about it, rather than assuming it’s none of your business. Eight children, specifically two treated like rabid dogs in the yard, endured unthinkable abuse and mental anguish that they may never recover from. Meanwhile, other people heard it and didn’t want to insert themselves in someone else’s business.
