A boy is safe after what law enforcement are calling a horrific case of child abuse.
According to court records, it's at a house on 42nd and Paseo where Jackson County prosecutors say the parents of the now 12-year-old boy carried out the alleged abuse.
Police first learned about it last September when the boy stabbed himself in the hand and called 911 because he was upset about getting in trouble.
"I think it's also tragic for our community to know that there are adults right here as our neighbors that are suffering themselves that are responding to their own issues by hurting someone else,” Ann Thomas, president of The Children's Place, said.
The boy told investigators he moved to the house on Paseo last spring with his mother, Royce Jackson, stepfather, Timothy Arnold, and his younger sister.
Officers say they saw bruises on the boy's right leg.
In court documents the boy told police in one instance of the alleged abuse he got tied up by his stepfather to a garage door and he got hit with a PVC pipe 50 to 60 times.
The boy and his sister are now in foster care.
Their mother filed a complaint with the state citing there wasn't sufficient evidence to remove them from her home.
But now Jackson and Arnold face criminal charges.
The Children's Place is a center that works with young children to heal them after abuse has taken place.
“It's very hard for children to say this is what's happened to me it is incredibly hard, nobody wants their parents to be punished but they want the abuse to stop,” Thomas said.
She adds children are resilient.
“Is it easy? No. The trauma doesn't have to define us but this is definitely not a way we would've ask any person to grow out what that person needs a lot of help because suddenly the relationships they trusted have been violated,” Thomas said.
No court date has been set yet for Jackson or Arnold’s first appearance.
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Andres Gutierrez can be reached at andres.gutierrez@kshb.com
