Charles, right inset, and Matthew Edmonson, left inset, are accused of forcing their children to strip naked as a punishment at their home in Clermont County, Ohio. (Mug shots: Clermont County Sheriff’s Office; Screengrab: Crime Fix)
An Ohio couple accused of horrific abuse against their five adopted special needs children pleaded guilty in court and will both spend more than a decade in prison.
Matthew Edmonson, 50, and Charles Edmonson, 64, were each charged in July with five felony counts of endangering children and pleaded guilty on Dec. 27 to all counts. Charles Edmonson, the children’s father, also pleaded guilty to one count of felonious assault and one count of kidnapping. Clermont County police accused them of inflicting cruel and painful abuse, some of which was caught on camera.
Clermont County Prosecutor Mark J. Tekulve said at the time of the Edmonsons’ arrest that the couple took in the five special needs children, all brothers, as foster children before legally adopting them. Three of the boys were 9-year-old triplets, the other two were 12 and 14. According to the prosecutor’s office, the five children all had medical issues and were in and out of hospitals. Their mother Matthew Edmonson consistently played down their injuries as a normal effect of their conditions.
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When Charles Edmonson was caught sexually abusing another adopted child, who was an adult at the time, detectives discovered a cache of videos that showed the other children being abused in ways that were “too graphic to describe.” Tekulve said at the time that the children, who were kept in conditions he described as like a “dungeon,” were being treated “worse than prisoners of war in their own home.” He said in a statement, “The videos of these undernourished and naked children huddled up in a locked room in the basement, on the stone-cold basement floor like a pile of puppies trying to stay together to keep warm, are nothing short of gut-wrenching.”
The children were all removed from the Edmonsons’ home and were reportedly now “thriving,” according to Tekulve.
Matthew Edmonson was sentenced to 13 years in prison. Charles Edmonson was sentenced to 15 years.
