Child Abuse arrests

Escambia County deputies arrest 3 in abuse case.

On April 21, deputies responded to the 2800 block of Christine St after receiving calls of a child crying for help in a back yard. Once on scene the deputy heard a child crying and entered the back yard, where he observed a young female handcuffed behind her back, bleeding from the mouth, and wearing a “sandwich” style billboard sign. The victim then cried to the deputy “Please help me”. The sign was made of 2 pieces of wet plywood, approximately 3 foot squared, being held around her neck with 2 metal chains. Deputies asked the girl to kneel down and were able to remove the signs, which he estimated to weigh 40 lbs. Due to the weight of the signs the chain had slightly embedded into the victim’s neck. One of the signs read “I am a thief and a liar” and the other read “I well not”. Upon speaking to the victim deputies observed ligature marks on her neck, which she told them came from a rope that had been tied around her neck. Also on scene deputies saw a path worn in the ground around an above ground pool which the victim been walking.

After deputies secured two of the suspects at the scene, the contacted the third, DeeAnn Hale, to return home from church. While speaking with the victim a 4” gash was located on the back of the victims head in the hair line. When asked about that injury the victim told deputies the suspects had struck her in the head with a bucket 2 days ago. Deputies found that the suspects had used superglue to attempt to close the wound. The next day the wound was still open so the suspect sewed it closed with a needle and thread. The victim was transported to a local hospital and will be in the custody of the Department of Child and Families.

The investigation revealed that suspect Rondal F. Hale, 59 and DeeAnn Hale, 58 are married and live together with the victim in the 2800 blk of Christine St. The third suspect, Clinton Michael Carr, 53, is friend of the other two suspects and was visiting them from Lillian, AL. The victim is a 21 year old female, who is mentally handicapped. All three suspects were arrested and charged with Aggravated Abuse of Disabled Adult, a first degree felony and maybe facing more charges at a later time. At this time no further information is expected to be released other the weekend, all reports involving this incident will be released on Monday April 23, 2012.

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