Trial postponed for Ankeny couple accused of locking kids in basement

Trial postponed for Ankeny couple accused of locking kids in basement

11:40 AM, May 7, 2013 | by Jeff Eckhoff |

A continuance was requested and approved for JoAnn Drake and Paul Drake of Ankeny, a married couple who are charged with false imprisonment and neglect or abandonment of a dependent person. (Mary Chind/The Register)

Polk County authorities have postponed the trial for two Ankeny parents accused of locking adopted children in their basement.

The postponement came after plea negotiations failed to move as quickly as planned. Paul Alan Drake, 45, and JoAnn Drake, 44, had been scheduled to plead guilty to unspecified charges this morning to stave off a scheduled June 10 trial on felony counts of false imprisonment and neglect or abandonment of a dependent person.

Authorities arrested the couple in November amid accusations that they locked their 13-year-old daughter and 14-year-old son in the basement for up to three days at a time with no way to escape. Windows to the basement had been boarded up and the door barricaded, according to court documents. The children were fed under a door.

Assistant Polk County Attorney Jaki Livingston asked today that the trial be postponed to September, because “we haven’t reached agreement to a plea at this time.”

Livingston later said negotiations are ongoing.

“We’ll get there,” said Jesse Macro, attorney for Paul Drake.

Ankeny police reports say authorities removed three children — the two teens and a 6-year-old — from the Drakes’ home on Oct. 5. The Iowa Department of Human Services first learned of the alleged abuse in September after one of the teens told a school employee.

A neighbor of the Drakes said problems at the home had been growing in the months before their November arrests.

“It was a last resort that the parents were doing to try to create some kind of safety, some kind of order and semblance in the home,” friend and neighbor Maree Ulrich said in November. “They were worried about the safety of the other kids and themselves.”

Urlich said the accusations against the couple do not provide a full picture of what they have been dealing with.

Police records, however, provide a glimpse of the turmoil that existed in the home.

Authorities were called to the house in February 2012 when the male teenager reportedly threw a butter knife at his sister; in May 2012, when the teenage daughter reportedly threatened to kill herself; and again in June 2012 after both children reportedly assaulted JoAnn Drake.

As mandatory reporters, police officers are required to alert DHS when child abuse occurs. However, the agency has declined to provide specific details about the Drake case, and spokesman Roger Munns said incidents such as a child harming a sibling or a parent, though “potentially serious,” do not demand notification.

Ankeny Police Chief Gary Mikulec last fall said he was aware of one or two cases in which the mother was assaulted by one of the children and the department “worked feverishly to process the child into a diversion program. However, the mother would not agree to the terms and allow us to proceed, so we submitted the case to Juvenile Court.”

In other situations, officers restored order at the house “to the satisfaction of the parents” and did not leave until the children were settled and orderly, he said.

“The family already had counselors and life works assistants in place, and these professionals were conducting home visits and were regularly assisting the Drakes,” Mikulec said. “The Drakes made direct contact with these counselors following these events, and our agency offered several intervention possibilities. However, the Drakes felt comfortable with the success of those case workers and life coaches they had in place.”