5-year-old boy found wandering on road was kept in filthy room, blocked by wooden boards and zip ties for days on end: Authorities

A 5-year-old child found wandering in the middle of a Pennsylvania road led authorities to a home filled with trash, flies, and wood boards on the kid’s bedroom door, they say.

Jade Shuey, 21, Stephanie Schaffner, 42, and Tucker Heagy, 20, have been charged with endangering the welfare of a child, according to court records reviewed by Law&Crime. They all had a preliminary arraignment in court on Saturday.

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The day before, on July 10 at about 7:30 a.m., the Pennsylvania State Police was called to the intersection of Quarry Road and South Lancaster Street in Swatara Township, Pennsylvania. The area is some 95 miles northwest of Philadelphia.

Good Samaritans had reportedly told troopers that they found a 5-year-old boy “naked walking in the middle of the road.” When authorities arrived, they brought the child to a hospital to be looked over.

Investigators said they determined the boy “escaped” from a nearby home on North Poplar Street in the township. When authorities went there, they observed “[h]oarder conditions” inside, such as “trash throughout, hundreds of flies,” and “limited room for maneuvering the house” due to the “clutter.”

Then, troopers came to one bedroom in particular. It apparently had a baby gate “affixed to the outside of the door frame” being held together by “numerous zip ties and duct tape.”

It was the boy’s bedroom, authorities said, and there were more troubling signs inside.

“Above the baby gate, there was miscellaneous wood boards drilled into the outside of the door frame to prevent the male child from escaping the bedroom,” Pennsylvania State Police said. “Feces was observed to be smeared on the walls, feces smeared on the bedroom window, a bed was observed to be torn apart with food all over it, trash was observed on the floor, hundreds of flies flying around the bedroom and the residence, along with various children’s toys scattered throughout.”

When authorities spoke with Shuey, she said the boy spent 90% or so of his day in the room and sometimes would stay there for up to three days without leaving, regional NBC affiliate WGAL reported. He was allegedly fed through the gate and was bathed once a week, if that.

Heagy reportedly told police that when they let the boy out of his room, they needed to cut five to 10 zip ties to open the gate. The suspects allegedly bought zip ties in bulk from a local hardware store because they used so many.

Shuey, Schaffner and Heagy were all arrested and booked in the Lebanon County Prison. None of them were able to post bail.

Their respective relationships with the child victim are unclear.

The defendants are scheduled to appear for a preliminary hearing in court on July 23.

The post 5-year-old boy found wandering on road was kept in filthy room, blocked by wooden boards and zip ties for days on end: Authorities first appeared on Law & Crime.