Custodial dad, step charged with felony child abuse against grade-school aged daughter (North Platte, Nebraska)

How do we know this was a custodial dad? Careful reading. Dad lives in North Platte, Mom lives in Lincoln. The child attends a North Platte school.


How did this violent dad get custody and who gave it to him? That we don't know. It is very seldom explained in the typical news article.


Dad is identified as JUSTIN FOUST.


http://www.nptelegraph.com/news/local_news/two-arrested-in-child-abuse-case/article_a18cced2-22f3-11e6-bcd2-c3751fc946b2.html


Two arrested in child abuse case


Posted: Thursday, May 26, 2016 3:00 am


By Tammy Bain


Two people were arrested Tuesday after a weeks-long investigation into felony child abuse.


On May 6, a North Platte police officer was called to Adams Middle School. A girl had arrived at school with a black eye, said Investigator John Deal. Her mother, who lives in Lincoln, had reported that her daughter texted her on the way to school and said her father had punched her in the eye.


The victim was interviewed at Bridge of Hope and said she and her father had argued the day before, Deal said. The father slapped the girl’s face several times and punched her eye, he said. The girl’s injuries matched her report.


The victim said her father told her to lie and say that a picture frame fell from the wall and hit her, Deal said. She said that her stepmother had witnessed the incident, and that other children in the home had been abused.


The other children living in the home were removed by North Platte Police Department and Department of Health and Human Services while the investigation is continuing, Deal said.


Two of the children, a boy and girl who are elementary school age, were sent to their mother’s home in Lincoln and interviewed at a Child Advocacy Center, Deal said. Both reported that at night, the father and stepmother would screw shut the door to the boy’s room so he could not use the bathroom, Deal said. They also reported that the father threw the boy on the ground. Deal said both children reported having witnessed the original punching incident.


The second girl also reported that the boy wasn’t allowed to eat lunch or breakfast at home.


The father and stepmother, Justin and Cortney Foust, were jailed on suspicion of felony child abuse. Each was released after posting 10 percent of $20,000 bail.


Deal declined to release ages of the three children. Other children who did not report abuse also lived in the home, and police hope to preserve their anonymity, he said.