Oklahoma City boy’s abuse claims prompt two arrests
teen says he’s been locked in closet
Published: September 29, 2009
The 14-year-old boy was filthy and smelled bad.
His shorts, held in place by a tightly cinched belt, sagged on his scrawny frame, and his black hair was unwashed. Scars laced across his neck and arms. He wore no shoes or socks and said he hadn’t eaten in about a week.Multimedia
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2 arrested in wake of teen's claim
Sep 28View the exterior of the apartment complex in which a 14-year-old...
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• Shortly before 5 p.m. Friday, the boy approached a security guard at the National Guard Armory near NE 23 and Interstate 35. The guard called police at the boy’s request. An officer brought the boy to the Springlake police division. The boy, who did not know his address, said his mother abused him. He displayed a variety of scars. "He told me most of the scar [sic] were from being hit with an extension cord,” the officer wrote. "He showed me scars on his wrists from where he had been tied up. VI (victim) showed me numerous scars on the right side of his neck from where he had been choked. I could see fresh fingernail marks on the right side of his neck. VI showed me scars on his stomach and torso where he told me (he) had alcohol poured on him and set on fire.” The boy said he had been living with a relative in New Jersey but came to live with his mother in Oklahoma when she was released from jail about 4½ years ago. "VI said this is when the abuse started and that he spends most of the time locked in a bedroom closet and has never been to school since he moved to Oklahoma,” the officer wrote. (The Oklahoman was unable to find a record of McCall’s incarceration in New Jersey, New York or Oklahoma. Monday afternoon, police Master Sgt. Gary Knight said detectives were seeking the same information.) The closet door is usually blocked with a bed or stepladder, the boy said, but he managed to push the door open enough on Friday to break free. Police located McCall the next morning at her apartment at the Grand Boulevard Townhomes in the 2300 block of NE Grand Boulevard, Knight said. Detectives interviewed McCall and Hamilton, whom McCall identified as her best friend, at police headquarters before arresting them on the abuse and neglect charges, Knight said. "He was there off and on,” Knight said of Hamilton. "He’s a transient with no permanent address, and there’s no romantic involvement between him and McCall. He was there on a regular basis and actually a participant in some of the abuse.” McCall has seven other children, six of whom are minors, Knight said. The victim and other minor children are in state Department of Human Services custody. The other children do not show signs of abuse, Knight said.
‘I never even knew’
McCall’s eldest daughter, who is 18, answered the door at the apartment Monday morning. She said she did not want to talk about what happened.
According to the complex’s leasing records, McCall and her children moved in on Aug. 12, a day after court records show they were evicted from the Hillcrest Apartments on S Youngs Boulevard.
Karen Gilleland, Hillcrest manager, said she was shocked Saturday when police came asking about McCall, who had lived there six to seven months.
"I never even knew she had a 14-year-old,” Gilleland said. "I saw all the other ones, but I never saw that one.”
She said she’d been in the apartment often because McCall’s unit had frequent plumbing issues, and she’d noticed that McCall always kept the upstairs bedroom doors shut. She recalled a time, shortly before the eviction, when she went to the apartment about 7 p.m.
"I saw her take a plate of food up to the bedroom, but she only opened the door about this much,” Gilleland said, holding her palms about a foot apart. "But I have no idea who was in there.”
McCall was evicted Aug. 11 because of the repeated maintenance problems, Gilleland said.
"They kept stopping up the toilet,” she said, "so the last time, I sent them the bill. She couldn’t afford both the rent and the plumbing.”
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