Sixteen children have been removed from a home in Vinton County, Ohio, and four adults have been charged in a case that authorities described in unusually stark terms, with one official calling it pure evil. The children were taken from the home and placed into care as the investigation moved into its legal stage.
According to officials, the four suspects each face 17 counts of child endangering, a second-degree felony. The defendants were due to appear at the Vinton County Court of Common Pleas, where the formal court process against them begins.
The arrests followed the execution of a search warrant at a home in the county and were announced at a press conference by the Ohio Attorney General, the Vinton County sheriff and the county prosecutor. They said the case was the culmination of an investigation into conditions at the property.
Officials described the conditions inside the home as horrendous and deplorable. The children range in age from one to eighteen years old, and several of them are being treated for serious injuries, with two of the children airlifted to trauma centers for care.
The state attorney general stressed that the case is not a human trafficking situation. Authorities said the suspects were not from Vinton County and had been traveling, and the local prosecutor described it as an intra-family matter, seeking to reassure the community that other children in the county were not at risk.
On the welfare side, dependency complaints were filed through the county's juvenile and probate court, and officials asked for temporary custody of the children to be granted to Job and Family Services. Authorities said the children are now safe, have been placed, and are being protected while the case proceeds.
The four adults have been charged but not convicted, and the allegations will be tested as the case moves through the courts. Officials indicated that further issues related to the children's safety were still being addressed even as the criminal proceedings got under way.