Jenice Spurgeon of Cape Coral pleads not guilty to abuse

MICHAEL BRAUN   | MBRAUN@NEWS-PRESS.COM

Jenise Spurgeon, 52, of Cape Coral, has plead not guilty to 10 charges of aggravated child abuse stemming from an investigation at the S.E. 11th Place home she and her husband shared with a number of foster, adopted and natural children.

Jenise Spurgeon was released on $300,000 bond for her 10 counts of aggravated child abuse and has retained Fort Myers attorney Peter Ringsmith.

Her husband, Daniel Spurgeon, 47, faces 15 counts, including sexual assault and lewd and lascivious behavior on a child between ages 12 and 18 as well as several counts of aggravated child abuse.

On Friday, Daniel Spurgeon,who remains in Lee County jail, pleaded not guilty to his charges and waived a formal reading of his charges. He has retained Fort Myers attorney Aaron O'Brien.

Both will be arraigned on Aug. 22.

One of the Spurgeons' foster daughters, now 19, who had moved out to live on her own, told Cape Coral detectives that she had been sexually abused from age 12 to 16, which would place those activities while the family lived in Alabama.  Police in Florence, Alabama, where the family lived at one time and still owns a home there, say they have opened an investigation into a family that is the focus of a sexual and physical child abuse case in Cape Coral.

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