Rotting garbage, feces on wall, and ‘flies everywhere’: Marathon County couple face child neglect charges after 4 children found living in filth
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MARATHON COUNTY, WISCONSIN: A couple has reportedly been facing multiple criminal charges after several children were found living in a filthy Marathon County apartment, strewn with dead flies, garbage, rotten food, and human excrement, court documents revealed.
The Abbotsford Police Department launched an investigation on December 20, 2022, when an anonymous caller tipped them about possible child neglect. The caller reported to police that the apartment, which is located in the Colby Cottages, smelled of rotten garbage and had feces-covered walls, with "flies everywhere”. Upon their arrival, the officers found the three-bedroom, two-bathroom residence almost entirely covered in piles of garbage, the Wausau Pilot & Review reported.
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The officers also found four children, ranging in age from 4 to 13, living at the residence. They then searched the place and interviewed a female resident, who acknowledged feces on a doorway and said she had “not gotten around to cleaning it,” a court document reported. The authorities immediately declared the residence unfit for children and evacuated them. The minors were taken to a safe place to stay until the apartment can be cleaned and inspected by Marathon County Social Services.
What are the charges against the couple?
The department continued the investigation and six weeks later, Matthew Weber, 39, and Megan S Johnson, 38, were charged with four counts of neglecting a child, two of which are felonies. The duo will be summoned into Marathon County Circuit Court on February 23 for an initial appearance in the case. However, the officials have still not specified the relationship between the children and the couple.
This horrifying incident came amid a concerning rise in the number of child neglect and abuse cases. At least 1 in 7 children have experienced child abuse or neglect in the past year in the United States, as per a report by the Centers for disease control and prevention. In 2020, 1,750 children died of abuse and neglect in the United States.
Similar incident
In a similar case, a 23-year-old mother was arrested and charged with starving her five-month-old baby to death in case of severe child neglect. Tania McGowan was arrested in December 2022 after police found the newborn in an unconscious state at a property in the 14000 block of Duval Road, as reported previously. The infant was rushed to the University of Florida Health, where he was declared dead shortly after his arrival. According to a Jacksonville Sheriff's Office arrest complaint, the severely underweight baby weighed only around seven pounds at five months of age.
The officials later found that McGowan harshly handled the baby and even shoved his face into the couch several times. As reported earlier, officers even recovered several surveillance footage from her residence which showed McGowan assaulting the baby. In one surveillance video, the mother “picks up the baby, and then forcefully slams him back onto the couch. She grabs the victim by the head and face and forcefully twists the victim's head to the side. She then covers the victim's head with the blanket and repeatedly strikes the victim on the back with an open hand," the arrest report stated.
