Thursday, January 9, 2014

Boy testifes that he was tied up, starved by custodial dad, dad's girlfriend (Brevard County, Florida)

We've posted on this case before. If you read through the material carefully, it is clear that dad MICHAEL MARSHALL is custodial--though he is not openly identified as such. Even after two years, I have yet to see any explanation as to how this creepy sadist and his equally creepy gal pal got custody of this child--only to torture him like a concentration camp inmate.

What happened to this child's mother? Why has she been erased from the story? Who removed this child from her care? How? Why?

And yet another f*** up by Florida DCF. What a surprise...

http://www.wftv.com/news/news/local/trial-begins-suspect-accused-starving-child-titusv/ncfYC/

Posted: 4:22 p.m. Wednesday, Jan. 8, 2014

Boy testifies he was tied up, starved for days at a time in Titusville

BREVARD COUNTY, Fla. — Testimony resumed Wednesday in the trial of a Brevard County woman accused of starving a child.

Two years ago, Channel 9 reported the horrifying details of how Sharon Glass and the boy's father, Michael Marshall, were accused of caging and starving a then-12-year-old boy for weeks at a time.

Investigators said the boy spent months locked up in a closet, bathroom or tied to his bed over the course of a year.

The young victim told jurors Wednesday the abuse began with an accusation he took an iPod. Before long, anytime anything was missing, he was the one to blame and was punished for it.

Glass barely looked at the boy as she sat in court Wednesday.

It wasn’t until March 2012 that a family friend tipped police off. When detectives showed up at the child's home, they found him starving, weighing only 40 pounds.

Prosecutor: "What did they feed you?"

Victim: "Um, noodles, like macaroni noodles."

Other days the boy said he didn't eat at all.

Prosecutor: "Did Sharon ever bring you food?"

Victim: "No, 'cause she said it was my dad's responsibility."

Prosecutor: "Do either Sharon or Mike talk to you while you're in the closet?"

Victim: "Not unless they were trying to tell me to be quiet, basically, because I was crying."

One witness said Tuesday that he was as shocked by the pictures of the victim as he was when he saw the boy in 2012.

Glass and Marshall are accused of neglect and abuse.

In court, jurors saw food that was taken from the couple's Titusville home, but a detective testified the child wasn't getting any of it, and was very pale and emaciated when he was found.

"The only way I can describe it is he looked almost like a skeleton," he said. "He was very, very thin."

The victim and two other children were removed from Glass' home.

"I heard it and I just said, 'Please God don't let it be him,' and then they said his name," said his former teacher, Rhonda Rochon. "He was thin and small then, now it is quite a bit ... it's shockingly different."

Rochon said she warned DCF and the police about the boy's condition in 2010 after the elementary school suspected Marshall and Glass were starving him.

DCF investigated the family, but did not find anything criminal. Now, officials are looking back at those findings to make sure nothing was overlooked.

Investigators also said that another child, a 10-year-old sibling of the abused boy, was sometimes locked in a closet for several days at a time and forced to stand guard while the older child was caged.

During the trial, jurors are expected to hear the victims' testimony.

Marshall, 40, also faces charges in the case. He has a hearing scheduled for later this month.