Trinity Teen Solutions abruptly paused its business following an NBC News investigation into allegations that teens were forced to perform heavy manual labor.

By Tyler Kingkade

A rural Wyoming ranch accused of subjecting troubled girls to forced labor and humiliating punishments has notified state regulators it halted operations.

The closure of Trinity Teen Solutions comes amid an ongoing criminal investigation and a lawsuit against the ranch, and follows an NBC News investigation last month that revealed a long history of allegations of hard labor and abusive treatment at the for-profit facility offering Christian-based therapy in northwest Wyoming. The facility has denied many of the former residents’ allegations in court filings, and no charges have been filed.

Trinity Teen Solutions informed the Wyoming Department of Family Services, which licenses the ranch, that it stopped providing services and enrolling new teens on Sept. 28, officials said. 

By Lyda Longa lyda.longa@myheraldreview.com

A Cochise County judge has ruled in a complex civil sexual and child abuse case that was scheduled for a lengthy trial, granting a summary judgement to the defense late Friday afternoon, court records show.

The order signed by Cochise County Superior Court Judge Jason Lindstrom erases any chance — for the moment — of a jury trial in the 3-year-old civil case of Ryan Frodsham v. the State of Arizona [Department of Child Safety] and Catholic Community Services.

TIM HAHN   Erie Times-News

It will be at least a few more months before a Crawford County woman charged with fatally poisoning her 11-year-old adopted son will face a jury as prosecutors and her lawyer continue to work through pre-trial procedures.

A trial for 63-year-old Mary E. Diehl, who was charged in November with criminal homicide in the death of Najir W. Diehl on Sept. 5, 2021, was scheduled for September in Crawford County Court. But county Judge Mark Stevens tentatively moved the trial to Crawford County's November trial term during a status conference in the case on Wednesday morning.

Stevens said Wednesday's hearing was the first time the case was before him, and there were pre-trial matters to work out between Crawford County District Attorney Paula DiGiacomo, who is prosecuting the case, and Diehl's lawyer, Eric Hackwelder.

Those matters include a pre-trial motion filed by Hackwelder in early August seeking to exclude certain evidence from trial, including a polygraph given to Diehl and a letter Diehl had reportedly sent to Crawford County Coroner Scott Schell after the boy's death.

LIMESTONE COUNTY, Ala. (WHNT) — Questions have been raised about the retired judge who presided over the high-profile criminal trial of then-Limestone County Sheriff Mike Blakely. Questions focus on the judge’s standing with the Alabama State Bar Association at the time of the trial.

Blakely’s attorneys say they may file a petition with the court to investigate the matter. News 19 has been working to get some insight into these claims.

Blakely’s lawyers say retired Alabama Court of Appeals Judge Pamela Baschab’s status with the state bar association was not up to date when Blakely went on trial in July 2021 and was convicted.

Blakely’s attorney Robert Tuten tells News 19 his team may eventually file a rule 32 petition, asking for an investigation into the timeline surrounding Baschab’s status with the bar when the trial took place.

The judge was retired when Alabama Supreme Court Chief Justice Tom Parker appointed her to hear the case, which came after another retired judge bowed out over COVID-19 fears.

By KY3 Staff

SALEM, Mo. (KY3) - A jury found a Dent County father guilty in the starving death of his adopted daughter.

On Wednesday, the jury returned a verdict of second-degree murder and neglect of a child against Randall Abney. A judge set sentencing for November 18. His wife, Susan Abney, pleaded guilty to lesser charges in the case.

In October 2020, Dent County sheriff’s deputies responded to the Abney house for a report of a girl unconscious. They say they noticed Josie Ann Abney was very thin. Susan Abney told them the child hadn’t been eating much. Josie Ann later died at the Salem Memorial District Hospital.

Investigators say the girl, ten years old, weighed about 39 pounds. A typical child at this age weighs around 70 pounds.

By John Tunison | jtunison@mlive.com

GRAND RAPIDS, MI -- A 50-year-old woman accused in the extreme malnourishment of her 13-year-old adopted daughter also allegedly used ratchet straps to tie the teen to a bed.

Wilma Edwards was arraigned Monday, Aug. 29 on two counts of first-degree child abuse.

Kent County sheriff’s deputies said they are looking for her 49-year-old boyfriend and say he was complicit in the abuse.

According to a probable cause affidavit used to obtain a warrant against Edwards, detectives said that Williams was “forced by CPS to bring (the teen) to the hospital on 8/26 where she was diagnosed with being extremely malnourished.”

by: Madalyn Buursma, Byron Tollefson

GAINES TOWNSHIP, Mich. (WOOD) — Deputies say one adult has fled and another has been arrested in a child abuse case in Cutlerville.

A 13-year-old was brought to the hospital on Friday with “severe malnourishment and physical injuries,” the Kent County Sheriff’s Office said in a Monday release. It said she is still at the hospital, where she is in serious but stable condition.

An investigation by the sheriff’s office and Child Protective Services found she was hurt at a home in the 100 block of Fontana Street SE in Gaines Township, deputies say.

The sheriff’s office said the girl’s guardian, 50-year-old Wilma Edwards, has been arrested, while Edwards’ boyfriend, 49-year-old William Williams, fled. Deputies are looking for him.

Brothers Home was supposed to help get people off the streets, but a government commission has confirmed its role in detentions and other abuses was a “grave human rights violation by the state.”

By Choe Sang-Hun

SEOUL — From 1976 to 1987, military dictators in South Korea ​swept roughly ​38,000 people off the streets, corralling them into a welfare center called Brothers Home. The facility was supposed to feed and teach what the government called vagrants — many of them minors — and train them for jobs.

Instead, Brothers Home turned out to be a house of nightmares.

Many were beaten, raped and used for slave labor. More than 650 people died while being held there illegally and unbeknown to their families, according to survivors and investigators.

South Korea's former military governments have been found responsible for atrocities at a state-funded welfare centre where thousands were enslaved and abused from the 1960s to 1980s.

A landmark report by the country's Truth and Reconciliation Commission released on Wednesday comes 35 years after a prosecutor first exposed the horrors at Brothers Home, in the southern port city of Busan.

It reveals an attempt to cover-up incriminating evidence which would have confirmed a state-sponsored crime.

The commission's chair, Jung Geun Sik, urged South Korea's current government to issue a formal apology to survivors and explore ways to ease their suffering as he announced the initial results of the investigation, which included extreme cases of forced labour, violence and deaths.

The commission also called for the government to review the conditions at current welfare facilities around the country and swiftly ratify the UN convention against enforced disappearances.

The Supreme Court on Thursday finalized a 22-year prison term for a 37-year-old man charged with beating his 2-year-old adopted daughter to death last year.

The adoptive father was charged with murder by child abuse for allegedly slapping the then 33-month-old daughter in the face repeatedly in their home in Hwaseong, 43 kilometers south of Seoul, in May last year, eventually causing her to die at a hospital about two months later.

Investigations showed the man had beaten her on several occasions during the previous month, sometimes with a shoehorn because she was being "naughty."

After repeated beatings, the toddler fell into a semicoma in early May, but her adoptive parents left her unattended for seven hours, causing her to suffer a cerebral hemorrhage and eventually die at a hospital in July.

The 22-year term handed down by the Supreme Court on Thursday is the same as the sentences given by two lower courts that ruled the adoptive father was aware the baby could die if beaten seriously.

The top court also upheld the lower appellate court's 2 1/2 prison sentence for the 36-year-old adoptive mother charged with child abuse resulting in death for turning a blind eye to her husband's abuse. (Yonhap)