This is the ‘hell-on-earth’ house where twin toddlers were locked up and starved by their cruel ‘throuple’ parents – leaving one little boy on the brink of death.
Images obtained exclusively by DailyMail.com lay bare the squalid, feces-strewn bedroom where the two-year-olds were caged for days at a time and fed just ground beef and Cheerios slid to them underneath the door.
Their heartbreaking plight emerged Monday when one of the brothers was taken to a hospital in Jackson County, West Virginia, with kidney failure.
The youngster had not had anything to drink for days and had passed out because he was so severely dehydrated and malnourished, according to cops.
Parents Lylee and Michael Gillenwater are in custody after police found one of their twin boys at ‘death’s door’ following months of abuse, authorities said
This is the ‘hell-on-earth’ house where twin toddlers were locked up and starved by their cruel ‘throuple’ parents in Ripley, West Virginia
The boys’ 6ft by 8ft room was dark and dingy because of black-out curtains blocking the window, DailyMail.com images reveal
The bedroom door has a white plastic lock on the outside so it can’t be opened from inside
‘The room appeared to only have two small crib style mattresses laying on the floor that were completely soiled with urine and feces,’ the complaint states
DailyMail.com’s exclusive pictures show a child-size mattress, several plastic trays and a dozen or more soiled diapers littering the floor
Cheerios, a diaper and a stuffed animal were seen on the floor inside the Rolling Meadow Village apartment
The basement of the home was cluttered with toys, debris, clothes and a mattress
The basement was inhabited by Lylee and her lover Brian Casto, who moved into the home, which is on a low-income housing project, about a month ago. A litter box and toys are seen in the basement
CHILLING COINCIDENCE: ‘HELL-ON-EARTH’ HOME WAS SETTING OF LITTLE GIRL’S 2016 MURDER
The Gillenwaters and warped ‘live-in boyfriend’ Brian Casto could face tougher prison sentences because of an unrelated murder that happened seven years earlier – in the exact same house.
Emmaleigh Elizabeth Barringer
The trio are accused of keeping twin boys locked up and neglected at their shared home address on Meadowlark Lane in Ripley, West Virginia.
One boy is still fighting for life after suffering renal failure.
Benjamin Taylor
In a gruesome coincidence, DailyMail.com has learned the three-bed duplex on a public housing project was also the setting for the unrelated murder of a little girl in 2016.
Benjamin Taylor, 38, is serving life without parole for beating and sexually assaulting ten-month-old Emmaleigh Elizabeth Barringer there in October 2016.
Her mother, Amanda Adkins, walked into the basement to find Taylor kneeling over the unconscious girl with his shirt off and pants unbuttoned.
Amanda Adkins
He claimed he ‘blacked out’ and couldn’t remember what happened but jurors took just two hours to find Taylor guilty.
The horrifying murder prompted the West Virginia Legislature to pass ‘Emmaleigh’s law’ in 2017 which increases the sentence for a person convicted of child abuse causing death from 10 to 40 years to 15 to life.
If the twin boy fighting for life in the Gillenwater case loses his battle, the law would apply directly to his alleged tormentors.
Michael Gillenwater, 24, and his wife Lylee Gillenwater, 21, were arrested and charged with child neglect, along with 22-year-old Brian Casto – described in court documents as Lylee’s ‘live-in boyfriend.’
Investigators from the Jackson County Sheriff’s Department say the accused trio drugged the kids to make them sleep – because being parents was too much of a burden.
‘The average barnyard animal would probably provide better parental care and nurturing than what these kids were afforded,’ Sheriff Ross Mellinger said, announcing the charges.
He added: ‘These boys need lots of prayers right now. The one boy is stable. There are still a lot of hurdles to clear medically to see if he’s even going to survive or not.’
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In a gruesome coincidence, DailyMail.com can reveal the three-bed duplex in Ripley, 30 minutes north of Charleston, was also the setting for the unrelated murder of a little girl in 2016.
Benjamin Taylor, 38, is serving life without parole for beating and sexually assaulting ten-month-old Emmaleigh Elizabeth Barringer in October 2016.
Her mother, Amanda Adkins, walked into the basement to find Taylor kneeling over the unconscious girl with his shirt off and pants unbuttoned.
He claimed he ‘blacked out’ and couldn’t remember what happened but jurors took just two hours to find Taylor guilty at his 2019 trial.
The same basement has recently been inhabited by current tenant Lylee Gillenwater and her lover Brian Casto, who moved into the home, which is on a low-income housing project, about a month ago.
Prior to that, the Gillenwaters appeared a committed, loving couple, according to pictures and posts on social media.
They married in October 2021 and Michael, a US Postal Service worker and former Marine, uploaded multiple photos of their two adorable twin boys to Facebook.
But when Casto came on the scene he and Lylee moved downstairs into the cluttered, laundry-strewn basement while Michael stayed on the top floor of the house, cops say.
The twins – referred to as DG and ZG in court filings – occupied one of two bedrooms on the middle floor, their unnamed older sister living in the other.
The boys’ 6ft by 8ft box room was dark and dingy because of black-out curtains blocking the window, DailyMail.com images reveal.
Our exclusive pictures show two child-size mattresses, several plastic trays, a stuffed toy and a dozen or more soiled diapers littering the floor.
Cheerios can be seen scattered close to the bedroom door which has a white plastic lock so it can’t be opened from inside.
‘From the street you couldn’t tell that anything was going on. But my son is autistic, he’s real smart, and he would stare up at the twins’ bedroom window. I think he was trying to tell us something,’ a neighbor told DailyMail.com.
‘Michael was really weird, really controlling. Lylee always stayed in the house and never came out. Brian started coming round about a month or so. I hope they get beaten raped, or worse in prison – they deserve it.’
A young mom living nearby, who gave her first name, Tasha, added: ‘The parents are animals. I did not see those kids once in two years.
‘First that little girl and then this – something is clearly wrong with that apartment. That place scares me.’
Lylee Gillenwater, 21, has three children with her husband Michael. She’s pictured in her mugshot. Cops said she drugged and fed her kids ground beef and cereal pushed under the door
Michael Gillenwater, 24, married Lylee in 2021. He is accused of two counts of child neglect with serious risk of injury or death and child neglect resulting in injury
Brian Casto, referred to as Lylee’s ‘boyfriend,’ is also charged with child abuse in the case
A criminal complaint obtained by DailyMail.com states that the Sheriff’s Department got a call from Child Protective Services Monday reporting that DG had been taken to Jackson General Hospital and ‘that the child had been severely malnourished with signs of kidney failure.’
When deputies raided the boy’s home they found a room described in charging documents as ‘deplorable.’
‘The room appeared to only have two small crib style mattresses laying on the floor that were completely soiled with urine and feces,’ the complaint states.
‘The room was covered in human feces to the point investigators were unable to move about the room without stepping in both wet and dry feces.
‘This room had an external lock on the outside of the door which would not allow anyone inside of the room to exit.’
The complaint reveals two types of food were discovered in the doorway of the locked room: ‘Cheerios along with ground beef were laying in the doorway as if the boys had pushed the food out of the room.’
Lylee Gillenwater and Casto – ‘her live-in boyfriend and custodian of the children’ – were arrested at the house.
‘Casto would advise … that he had been living in the home for roughly four weeks and that in that time, he had not seen the boys (DG and ZG) out of the bedroom for more than 3-5 hours during the weekends,’ the complaint reads.
The Gillenwaters appeared a committed, loving couple, according to pictures and posts on social media
The sheriff referred to the trio as ‘animals’ and stressed that one of their children has a long road to recovery
Casto is charged with one count of child abuse resulting in injury and one count of child abuse with risk of injury. The trio are all in custody on bonds of $150,000 ahead of court appearances next week
Michael Gillenwater is accused of two counts of child neglect with serious risk of injury or death and child neglect resulting in injury. His wife is accused of child neglect resulting in injury and child neglect creating a risk of injury.
Casto is charged with one count of child abuse resulting in injury and one count of child abuse with risk of injury. The trio are all in custody on bonds of $150,000 ahead of court appearances next week.
Sheriff Mellinger said DG was flown to another facility in Morgantown where he is stable. His twin brother and the older sister were both removed from the home.
‘Once our officers began their investigations it was discovered that the two-year-old boys had been locked in a hell on earth situation within their apartment room where they’d been locked and neglected by the parents for as many as six weeks at a time,’ Sheriff Mellinger added.
‘It’s been found the parents self-medicated these children for long periods of time in an effort to get them to sleep so they won’t have to provide parental care.’
He added: ‘It’s just amazing to me that animals like this still exist where becoming a parent is a burden.’
