Raymond Gabaldon & Ashley Tafoya Arrested for Child Abuse

Relatives of accused child abuser Raymond Gabaldon said they can't believe their loved one could possibly harm a two-week-old infant, but Gabaldon and his girlfriend Ashley Tafoya remain in custody on felony child abuse charges.

Police said the injuries Isaac Gabaldon received the July 4th weekend are consistent with torture and sexual molestation. That's why Gabaldon and Tafoya are behind bars in custody in lieu of one $250,000 cash bail.

According to the Children, Youth and Families Department, the child should never have been left alone with the couple following a protective agreement in June. The department said the family failed to hold up its end of the bargain.

Family members stated their disbelief of the charges.

"They have my blessings and I love them, but they didn't commit those crimes," said Brenda Gabaldon, Isaac's grandmother.

Brenda was staying with Raymond and Ashley at the time Isaac's arm was broken, but apparently wasn't watching him at the time.

Thursday she met with CYFD investigators and saw photographs of Isaac's latest injuries. She said they are not the injuries she saw on the 4th.

"I think the hospital did it," said Brenda. "The majority of them and the sexual abuse on this child. There was no sexual abuse on this child whatsoever."

University Hospital officials said that because Isaac is in state custody, privacy laws prohibit the hospital from commenting on gabaldon's allegations in any way.

CYFD officials said federal and state law requires the agency to consider in-family placement for Isaac. CYFD officials said that process is under way. The agency also said for an in-family placement, the family member would have to go thru a rigorous background check and take foster parenting classes.

Isaac is currently staying in a licensed foster home.

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http://www.kob.com/article/stories/S1083606.shtml?cat=517

Joseph Lee Arrested for Dunking 7-year-old in Sink Full of Water

Huntsville police arrested a man Friday accused of picking up a 7-year-old boy by the ankles and dunking him, upside down, in a sink full of water.

Joseph A. Lee, a 61-year-old professor at Alabama A&M University, was arrested and charged with one count of torture and willful abuse of a child under the age of 18, said police spokesman Sgt. Mark Roberts.

Roberts said officers were called to 223 Salem Drive in Huntsville at 1:40 p.m. Friday. A 14-year-old witness told officers that Lee picked the boy up by the ankles, dunked his head in the sink and dropped him on the ground, Roberts said.

The police incident report did not detail the events leading to the alleged abuse.

Lee, a graduate of Tuskegee University, teaches community planning and urban studies at Alabama A&M, according to university spokesman Jerome Saintjones. Lee also is president of A&M's Community Development Corp., an agency that works to revitalize neighborhoods near the campus. The address listed on the police report - Salem Drive - is in the Edmonton Heights neighborhood and a block away from the southern edge of the campus.

Saintjones and President Andrew Hugine declined to comment on Lee's arrest. It's unclear if the university has taken any administrative action against Lee.

Torture and willful abuse of a child is a felony that carries a maximum sentence of 10 years in prison and a $5,000 fine.

Brothers Gerald & Glen Hall Arrested for Using Blow Torch to Burn 6-year-old

Two Clare County men are headed to trial on charges of torture and first-degree child abuse.

A Monday pretrial hearing for Gerald T. Hall and his brother, Glen L. Hall, failed to produce plea agreements so the case will proceed, said Special Prosecutor Norman E. Gage. Glen Hall, 44, faces an additional charge of being an habitual offender.

A trial date is pending.

State police from the Mount Pleasant Post claim the men in October took turns using a blow torch to burn a 6-year-old boy's buttocks to punish him.

The youngster is the son of Gerald Hall, 36. The boy suffered second- and third-degree burns.

Glen Hall already is on probation for a charge of operating under the influence causing serious injury, state Department of Corrections records show. He pleaded guilty in 2003 in Isabella County.

Robert Pratt Arrested for Molesting & Abusing Stepson

For years, a man regularly confined his adolescent stepson to a bedroom rigged with an alarm, molested him several times a week and often denied him food, water and access to a bathroom, authorities said.

The 17-year-old boy, who lived with his stepfather for nearly six years, told police Robert J. Pratt would smash his head into a wall when he resisted his advances and sent him to school in long-sleeved shirts and pants so no one would see his bruises and scars.

Pratt was being held without bail on sex assault charges, accusations that surprised acquaintances who know him as a quiet, helpful neighbor.

The boy came forward after Pratt, 37, of Bennington, kicked him out of the apartment they shared and he moved in with his mother, who lived in the same apartment complex.

Once there, he told her and a counselor about his life with Pratt. He had moved in with him when he was 10 or 11, when Pratt and the mother split up. He said the abuse started about a year later and he never told anyone of it because Pratt threatened him, sometimes with a loaded gun.

Investigators, trying to verify the boy's claims, had the boy wear a wire to record a conversation with Pratt. In that conversation, the victim asked Pratt why he sexually abused him.

"I have tried to block that out," Pratt replied.

Questioned by police, Pratt didn't deny the sexual activity but attributed it to the victim's "desires," according to an affidavit filed by Vermont State Police Trooper Tyler Burgess.

"When this was brought to the attention of law enforcement, we all were taken aback at the pervasive and lengthy abuse that was going on, and had been going on for years," prosecutor Erica Marthage said Wednesday. "It was concerning to all of us that this was something we potentially missed for this long. It just makes you wonder."

Pratt, who has no prior criminal record, pleaded not guilty Tuesday to six charges including aggravated sexual assault, lewd and lascivious conduct with a child and unlawful restraint.

He was ordered held without bail. His lawyer, public defender Marie Wood, didn't respond to two messages left by The Associated Press on her voicemail. There was no answer to a knock at his apartment door at the Applegate Apartments, where the abuse allegedly occurred.

The boy's mother no longer lives in the complex; she could not be located for comment Wednesday.

Neighbors and acquaintances interviewed Wednesday were surprised by the charges against Pratt, who goes by R.J. They described him as a quiet, slightly built man who was into camping, hunting and fishing.

"He's not that type. ... I don't think he's got a mean bone in his body," said Mary Hunt, who said she's known Pratt since they were children.

Another neighbor, Stanley Brookins, said Pratt was always quick to help others, especially if it involved fixing a car.

"I've never seen him argue with anyone, never heard a cross word," Brookins said.

That's not the picture painted by police and prosecutors.

They say Pratt sometimes threatened the boy with a loaded rifle, threatened to kill him or grabbed his genitals, asking "Whose is this?" as he pulled.

"I'd have to reply 'yours' or he'd pull harder," the boy told investigators.

The boy was confined to an apartment bedroom with no toilet, sometimes for so long that he had to relieve himself into a wall-mounted telephone jack.

The homemade alarm system consisted of a magnet that stuck to a metal strip on the floor so that when the door opened, it signaled, according to the affidavit.

At Christmas, Pratt would let the boy open gifts, then put them in a box, duct tape it and store it in the basement.

"There are days I cried myself to sleep and wanted to die," he said.

Pratt's decision to part ways with the victim coincided with the boy's maturation, according to Marthage, the prosecutor. He's now 6 feet tall and has put on about 100 pounds since moving in with his mother.

"It all fits. He got too big. Once the kid gets to be bigger than the defendant, then both control and persuasion are affected," Marthage said.

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http://crime.about.com/b/2009/07/09/man-charged-in-molestation-of-stepson.htm

Teresa Moses Accused of Torturing & Killing 8-year-old

Three doctors who evaluated Teresa Moses, a 26-year-old Richmond woman accused of torturing and killing her 8-year-old son in 2006, found that she was legally insane at the time of his death, her attorney Emily Gunston said Thursday.

Moses has been charged with felony child abuse, torture and murder in connection with her son Raijon Daniels' death.

All three mental health professionals, one psychiatrist and two forensic psychologists, concluded that Moses suffered from paranoid delusions and was incapable of knowing or understanding the nature and consequences of her actions, Deputy District Attorney Gerald Chang said.

Prosecutors will be reviewing the reports and making a decision within the next couple of weeks about whether to accept a plea of not guilty by reason of insanity or take the case to trial, Chang said.

Raijon died Oct. 27, 2006. Police and paramedics were called to Moses' apartment at 725 S. 40th St. early that evening and found Raijon unconscious and lying near a puddle of his own vomit.

Moses allegedly told police that her son was "destructive" and might have poisoned himself by drinking the household cleaner Pine-Sol, a Richmond police detective said.

Along with several open containers of Pine-Sol found throughout the apartment, investigators allegedly uncovered evidence that Moses had kept Raijon locked in his bedroom and had restrained him with a nylon cord tied to his wrists, arms and legs.

They also found surveillance cameras in his bedroom that were hooked up to a monitor in Moses' bedroom and motion sensors designed to alert Moses if Raijon attempted to get off his bed, according to investigators.

A forensic pathologist testified during a preliminary hearing in the case that Raijon had bruises, scrapes, chemical burns and extensive scarring covering his entire body. The child was also starving, and the coroner's office concluded that he died from continuous, long-term abuse diagnosed as "battered child syndrome."

Before his death, Contra Costa Children and Family Services had received five separate reports from people who suspected that Raijon was being abused beginning in November 2005. The most recent report was in January 2006. Raijon's case was closed eight months before he died, according to CFS documents.

Investigators found no evidence that Moses had abused Raijon's half-sister, who is now 5 or 6 years old, but a CFS report alleged that the girl had suffered severe mental and emotional trauma from witnessing her mother's continuous torture and abuse of Raijon, according to a California Court of Appeal decision issued in 2008.

The court heard the case after Moses sought visitation rights with her daughter and unanimously denied her appeal.

If Moses is found not guilty by reason of insanity, she will be committed to a state mental hospital, but could be released within a few years. If she is convicted of the charges, she could face a life sentence with the possibility of parole, Chang said.

Moses is scheduled to return to Contra Costa County Superior Court in Martinez on June 25 at 8:30 a.m.

Chauncey Taylor Arrested for Torturing 5-Month-old Son

A Hesperia father is in jail for allegedly torturing his 5-month-old son, who is hospitalized with a broken leg and slashed scrotum.

San Bernardino County sheriff's investigators arrested 27-year-old Chauncey Taylor and booked him for investigation of torture and child abuse. Bail is set at $500,000.

The injured boy was brought to Loma Linda University Medical Center on Friday with a lacerated scrotum. During surgery, they noticed that the cut was smooth and had clean edges.

Sheriff's spokeswoman Arden Wiltshire says the infant also had a broken leg, multiple bruises and possible head trauma, indicating "this has been going on for a few months."