Foster Parents From Hell

"As bad as you think that house was on the outside, that's probably the cleanest part of that place. It was filthy, feces on the floor, holes in the wall.  The bathroom, you could see from outside of the hall into the bathroom. Sink was trashed. No running water."
Eddie Cathey, Union County Sheriff, North Carolina

Shocking conditions: Wanda Sue Larson and Dorian Lee Harper were arrested Friday after a sheriff's deputy found the shivering 11-year-old boy

Little wonder so many young people become traumatized by their experience in foster homes. This provided quite the revelation, when it was revealed that Wanda Sue Larson, and Dorian Lee Harper, adoptive parents to four children who were wards of the county, and serving as foster parents to a fifth child, were horrendously maltreating the children in the most miserably unforgivable way.

The children slept in one room of the house, on the floor, a floor that was covered with feces. What makes this even more mind-bogglingly unbelievable is that the two people who took these vulnerable children into their care would have been recognized as responsible members of their community.

Dorian Lee Harper was an emergency room nurse at CMC-Union in Monroe, North Carolina, while his wife Wanda Sue Larson was a supervisor with the Union County Department of Social Services.

Together, they assumed responsibility for the care and nourishment of five young children who were entrusted to them by their community. They are both now under arrest for failing that trust. The fifth child, an eleven-year-old boy whom they fostered was discovered, shivering with cold, a dead chicken around his neck, handcuffed to the front porch of the house.

It just happened to be a sheriff's deputy who discovered the presence of the boy in his helpless condition. He was, presumably, being punished by his foster parents -- who evidently held a strict code of ethics -- for some unspeakable childhood infraction he had been guilty of, and which brought their wrath down on the child.

The two upstanding members of their community have been charged with intentional child abuse, inflicting serious injury, false imprisonment and cruelty to animals. The cruelty to animals portion of the charges stemmed from the fact that these two kept on their property and without proper care for them as well, dozens of chickens, turkeys, geese, two llamas and a horse. Dogs lived in the house with the children.

The Sheriff's deputy happened to be on site, investigating a complaint at a neighbouring property about animal services. And that is when his attention was brought to the shivering child shackled to the porch with a dead chicken draped about his neck. All of the children were hungry and discovered to be suffering from malnutrition.

Which leaves a curious observer to wonder at the rather casual manner in which children are handed over to those incapable of furnishing a decent life for them. Would not the Union Country Department of Social Services routinely check to ensure that living conditions are decently hygienic, that children are well fed and clothed and cared for?

One look around the dilapidated property with the rank stench of uncleanliness and the unkempt conditions in which the children were kept should have sufficed to have them removed and their adopted and foster parents charged with neglect and maltreatment. How long did these children live in such disgusting circumstances without due care and attention?

In the meanwhile, the couple sit in jail, where they belong, awaiting their court appearance. The children have been removed from their care, and one can only hope that these suffering children will be placed in the care of a loving family dedicated to fulfilling the emotional and practical needs of the young, to help them find their place in life.