https://www.washingtonpost.com/news...-police-say/?tid=hybrid_experimentrandom_3_na
When Officer Steve Dunham met the 7-year-old, the boy was offering to sell his teddy bear.
The little guy must have seemed industrious, standing in front of the CVS at the busy intersection of Second and Main in Franklin, Ohio, trying to hawk his toy on July 7. Most children don’t want to part with their stuffed animals. In this boy’s case, it was a lone source of comfort, but he was desperate.
He hadn’t eaten in days.
Perhaps if he sold the small bear for enough money, he could walk across the street and get a kid’s meal at Subway. At the very least, a Snickers bar from CVS. Those cost mere quarters.
And it must have seemed like a charitable area. One walking the short two blocks from the Great Miami River to the CVS would see the towering spires of at least four churches.
But he wasn’t having any luck.
Still, being downtown and completely alone was likely better than being home. His parents allegedly weren’t even aware he’d left the house.
“It broke my heart,” Dunham told WLWT. “He told me he was trying to sell his stuffed animal to get money for food because he hadn’t eaten in several days.”
Dunham approached the boy, who was initially shy and uncomfortable.
“I think he thought he would get in trouble,” he told CNN. “He told me he was hungry and was trying to get money for food.”
Dunham was not going to buy the bear. But he would buy the boy a sandwich at Subway.
The pair “said a little prayer and ate dinner together,” Dunham told the TV station.
Meanwhile, Dunham asked the boy where he lived, who his parents were.
Their names are Tammy and Michael Bethel, and they live on Main Street, according to the Journal-News.
Dunham and the boy headed to the Franklin Police Department, where the boy watched cartoons with a dispatcher for a few hours.
Meanwhile, fellow officers Amanda Myers and Kyle O’Neal went to the house.
There they found utter disarray, along with four other boys — ages 11, 12, 15 and 17.
The floor of the house was covered in trash and discarded, empty liquor bottles. Cockroaches scurried in and out of the odorous crevices in the trash piles, and the house had the pungent, choking smell of stale and drying urine — both cat and human, Police Chief Russell Whitman told WTWL.
A photograph of the refrigerator released by the police department showed that what little food it contained was rotting, such as a package of raw chicken that had turned a deep, dark brown. One of the containers attached to the door — which are generally used to hold jars of salad dressing and other condiments — was filled halfway with black liquid. Small, unidentifiable chunks floated in it.
The entire refrigerator was smeared with what appeared to be a sludge of some sort, varying in color from red to yellow to black.
When Officer Steve Dunham met the 7-year-old, the boy was offering to sell his teddy bear.
The little guy must have seemed industrious, standing in front of the CVS at the busy intersection of Second and Main in Franklin, Ohio, trying to hawk his toy on July 7. Most children don’t want to part with their stuffed animals. In this boy’s case, it was a lone source of comfort, but he was desperate.
He hadn’t eaten in days.
Perhaps if he sold the small bear for enough money, he could walk across the street and get a kid’s meal at Subway. At the very least, a Snickers bar from CVS. Those cost mere quarters.
And it must have seemed like a charitable area. One walking the short two blocks from the Great Miami River to the CVS would see the towering spires of at least four churches.
But he wasn’t having any luck.
Still, being downtown and completely alone was likely better than being home. His parents allegedly weren’t even aware he’d left the house.
“It broke my heart,” Dunham told WLWT. “He told me he was trying to sell his stuffed animal to get money for food because he hadn’t eaten in several days.”
Dunham approached the boy, who was initially shy and uncomfortable.
“I think he thought he would get in trouble,” he told CNN. “He told me he was hungry and was trying to get money for food.”
Dunham was not going to buy the bear. But he would buy the boy a sandwich at Subway.
The pair “said a little prayer and ate dinner together,” Dunham told the TV station.
Meanwhile, Dunham asked the boy where he lived, who his parents were.
Their names are Tammy and Michael Bethel, and they live on Main Street, according to the Journal-News.
Dunham and the boy headed to the Franklin Police Department, where the boy watched cartoons with a dispatcher for a few hours.
Meanwhile, fellow officers Amanda Myers and Kyle O’Neal went to the house.
There they found utter disarray, along with four other boys — ages 11, 12, 15 and 17.
The floor of the house was covered in trash and discarded, empty liquor bottles. Cockroaches scurried in and out of the odorous crevices in the trash piles, and the house had the pungent, choking smell of stale and drying urine — both cat and human, Police Chief Russell Whitman told WTWL.
A photograph of the refrigerator released by the police department showed that what little food it contained was rotting, such as a package of raw chicken that had turned a deep, dark brown. One of the containers attached to the door — which are generally used to hold jars of salad dressing and other condiments — was filled halfway with black liquid. Small, unidentifiable chunks floated in it.
The entire refrigerator was smeared with what appeared to be a sludge of some sort, varying in color from red to yellow to black.
