Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
Good point about the coworkers. It's hard to imagine this odd looking man showing up to a work setting everyday in clean, normal clothes and with decent hygiene given the squalor they lived in. Hard to imagine anyone hiring him in the first place with his odd, unkempt appearance.
I've worked with weirder looking people than him in an IT environment.
Keep waiting for some ex-coworker to chime here too in but nothing yet. I don't trust the family and the neighbors didn't know them, so co-workers would have direct knowledge of his behavior at least while he was at work. It must be a sick feeling to be someone who worked with him every day finding out this was going on at his home.
Was the father even working at the time of arrest? Makes me wonder if they used their adult children's identities to get credit cards and max them out to support themselves and other benefits like food stamps. Even if they did get food stamps, no way it would be enough to feed a family of 15.
I get food stamps and it only covers enough for a week's worth of food. Thanks to the cut that was made in the State I live in.
food stamps get you 2 weeks of food if that. my mom made it last but again she ate like a bird. yep now i know why people shoplift groceries.
on the news it said father used to buy pies cakes etc and leave them on the table. the kids couldn't eat them. what a sicko those 2 are.
It is sickening. But I can tell you this much, whoever helps these children will be people who can get past feeling sick. Some of the older children may never be able to recover from years of abuse and malnourishment, but the younger ones probably can. Their caregivers will have to focus on the children's well-being and their futures, not protecting their own delicate selves.
As for the dogs, I don't know if the children were bonded to them, but either someone needs to step up and take them, or they will go to a shelter and probably be euthanized. Adopting the dogs is a kind, helpful deed.
I agree. It will take some strong, special people to help these children and I hope they find the right kind of help. It will be life long. I'm sure there will be so many physical, mental challenges w/ being deprived of food stunting their brains, musculoskeletal systems, all systems--endocrine, renal, etc. All probably have PTSD, goes on and on. Sure the animals in the house have symptoms of trauma. I think other severe trauma victims will play a role in their recovery, too.
Was the father even working at the time of arrest? Makes me wonder if they used their adult children's identities to get credit cards and max them out to support themselves and other benefits like food stamps. Even if they did get food stamps, no way it would be enough to feed a family of 15.
I get food stamps and it only covers enough for a week's worth of food. Thanks to the cut that was made in the State I live in.
In addition to Lockheed, there has been mentioned Northrop Grumman, who has “declined to verify if he is currently employed”.
And I doubt they could get food stamps for 15 kids because only 6 of them were minors. Unless the adult children had been declared as incompetent & the Turpins been declared their legal representatives, they wouldn’t qualify.
It appears that the Turpin children were adequately nourished when they were babies, judging by baby pictures of the youngest and eldest siblings. So that's something positive, as so much brain development takes place in the first couple of years of life. Of course the later deprivation followed by near-starvation for the last couple of years - must have taken a terrible toll, but it does explain why the adult children's heights are short but not exceptionally so (their "mother" is also short).
It also appears that at least one of the earlier babies was left in a playpen for hours and hours, unattended, so significant neglect, if not outright abuse, was any early presence in the Turpin "home".
From experiences with terribly neglected kids with special needs adopted from deplorable orphanages and institutions in eastern Europe and elsewhere in the developing world, children who've suffered such starvation can regain weight but are likely to need intravenous calcium supplements to improve bone density. Younger children can also grow in height and their skills and intelligence can develop, though they will remain well below the norms. The Children's Hospital of Philadelphia - CHOP - is one of the go-to places for immediate treatment of such kids as well as for follow-up.
Much is still being learned about the prognosis of these rescued children's health and development, and of course each case is different. I know of a child with Down syndrome who was internationally adopted from eastern Europe at age nine, weighing about fourteen pounds. She was skeletal and the same height as her two-year-old adoptive sister, who also had DS.
She is presently healthy, and looks like she's about seven, and is a well-rounded child, but she is actually about 14, and her intellect was severely impacted by starvation as well as institutional autism. She is a very slow-blooming little flower, at this point, but is a happy child who walks independently, feeds herself, and is greatly loved.
The hellhole where she was imprisoned was reformed and those responsible for the severe neglect and abuse of the sixth floor kids - those with special needs - were brought to justice, and many of her orphanage companions, equally neglected and abused, were also adopted, but other places that are nearly as bad are still out there.
OT, but the first-birthday snapshot of the eldest Turpin child with her "mother" shows a chubby baby and her mother, both in Disney attire, plus a Minnie Mouse birthday cake. The snapshot of Louise Turpin pregnant with the youngest child shows her wearing a Mickey Mouse maternity T-shirt, with Mickey on the back and his long skinny arms reaching around to embrace the wearer. The Disney obsession seems to have permeated Louise's life for close to three decades, if not more.
Too bad there's not a Disney version of Dr. Spock, or some other basic baby and childcare book...
It's hard to keep up with all the info emerging, but the two dogs are going to be adopted to the winners of a lottery. All entrants must qualify for adoption before being eligible. I assume the Turpin children were asked if they wanted to be reunited with the dogs first - it's possible that the dogs would have been a distressing reminder of their ordeal, as they were cared for far better than were the children.
This story motivated me to go back and re-acquaint myself with the Fritzl case in Austria where the father kidnapped and held his daughter captive in an underground basement for 24 years. She had seven children, one died, three of the children were taken upstairs to live, the other three remained underground with her. The oldest daughter almost died due to lack of oxygen at 19 and that was the catalyst for their release. The father is in prison of course but the mother and six children now live under new names in a remote village with security. They have permanent physical and mental damage, especially the two oldest children and mother.
For the Turpins, I don't see how an adoptive family could possibly take care of 13 children. Maybe there is a house in a small town where they could live with managed care like the Fritzl case.
It's hard to keep up with all the info emerging, but the two dogs are going to be adopted to the winners of a lottery. All entrants must qualify for adoption before being eligible. I assume the Turpin children were asked if they wanted to be reunited with the dogs first - it's possible that the dogs would have been a distressing reminder of their ordeal, as they were cared for far better than were the children.
The dogs were well fed?
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
