TACKLING THE PROBLEM OF CHILD ABUSE

When two-year-old Latasha Johnson of Cape Girardeau died in 1983, the autopsy showed multiple signs of abuse. Her body bore the marks -- cigarette burn scars, bruises from beatings with electrical cords, chipped teeth from being struck in the face and bruises on the buttocks so deep that tissue was excised from the bone.

At least two blows to the girl's head, one on each side above the ears, caused the bleeding and pressure to the brain which eventually led to Latasha's death. Her mother, Angela Johnson, was convicted of manslaughter.

Ten years later, Samuel Denny of Delta admitted to the suffocation death of two-year-old Lorena Barnett. Denny, who lived in a mobile home with the girl's mother, was watching the girl while her mother went into Jackson late one night. An autopsy revealed that the girl had been raped and sodomized no more than a hour before she died.

Denny told investigators, "Why should she live if no one cared?"

In 1994 three-year-old Bobby Miller was rushed to Southeast Missouri Hospital where he was pronounced dead on arrival. Kenneth Johnson, the boyfriend of Bobby Miller's mother, was charged with kicking the boy with such force that it lifted the boy in the air and caused him to land on the arm of a couch.

After pleading guilty to involuntary manslaughter, Johnson told the court that he had kicked the boy in the excitement of watching WWF wrestling on television.

As gruesome as the cases seem to most people, awareness of the reality of child abuse is one of the first steps in preventing the abuse, said Frances Gould, the Cape Girardeau County director of the Division of Family Services.

"It does exist in Cape Girardeau County. It is real," Gould said.

DFS, along with Prevent Child Abuse Missouri and the National Committee to Prevent Abuse, are trying to make the community, county, state and nation even more aware of child abuse during April, which has been designated Child Abuse Prevention Month.

"We want to get out the information now and not wait for a crisis, like when a child dies," Gould said.

But child abuse fatalities continue to occur.

In 1996, the last year for which statistics are available, 36 child abuse and neglect related fatalities throughout the state were confirmed by child protective services. Seventy percent of the children who died were five years old or younger.

Nationwide that year the number was 1,046 confirmed abuse-related deaths, an increase of 20 percent over 1985 figures. Seventy-seven percent were under five. Forty-five percent were under a year old.

"Fatalities are just the tip of the iceberg," said Morley Swingle, prosecuting attorney for Cape Girardeau County.

The majority of cases referred to the prosecutor's office by law enforcement or the Division of Family Services, the office responsible for investigating reports of child abuse or neglect, are not fatalities but cases of excessive force assaults committed by the custodian of the child, Swingle said.

In addition to reports of physical abuse, the Division of Family Services investigates alleged cases of neglect, medical neglect, educational neglect and emotional abuse.

Swingle said there are also a significant number of sexual abuse cases which his office sees. His office does not see as many neglect cases, he said, because most neglect cases do not reach criminal status. But occasionally, criminal neglect cases are tried by the prosecutor.

Neglect, as defined by DFS, is the failure to provide the proper support, supervision, nutrition or care necessary for a child's well-being. To be a criminal offense, the person must act in a way that creates substantial risk to the life, body or health of a child.

Last week, Daniel and Nancy Kreiter of Jackson pleaded guilty to endangering the welfare of a child by criminal negligence.

Prosecutors said that the Kreiters lived with their children, ages two and four, and two other adults in a mobile home that had no heat and no running water. The Kreiters slept with their children and the other adults on a mattress on the floor of living room.

Because the refrigerator was inoperable, the Kreiters kept perishable food, including milk and raw meat, lying on the floor of a rear bedroom with cat feces scattered nearby. Several mice were seen running throughout the home.

Daniel Kreiter, who was also charged with failure to register as a sex offender, was put on probation. A condition of his probation is that he must complete a screening process for a program about taking care of children.

Prosecutors recommended a similar sentence for Nancy Kreiter, who will be sentenced April 30, with the same recommendation that she attend parenting classes.

The Kreiter's children, a four-year-old boy and a two-year-old girl, are presently in state custody.

Reported incidents of child abuse and neglect have declined throughout the state over the past two years. Still, nearly 52,000 incidents involving over 81,000 children were reported statewide last year.

In Southeast Missouri 4,406 incidents of child abuse or neglect involving 6,823 were reported in fiscal year 1997. St. Francois County had the most reports with 692 incidents involving 1,035 children. Cape Girardeau County reported 452 cases involving 637 children.

Only Pemiscott County in Southeast Missouri showed an increase in both the number of reported incidents of child abuse or neglect (516, up 12.42 percent over 1996 figures) and the number of children involved (921, up 11.1 percent).

In the Pemiscott County, 44 out of every 1,000 children were victims of some sort of child abuse or neglect, compared to Cape Girardeau County where seven of every thousand were victims.

Swingle said that the prosecution of people accused of child abuse or neglect is not easy.

"It's depressing for prosecutors handling the case to delve into the facts and then go home and try to forget about it," he said, adding that often he is dealing with several cases at a time.

If there is a bright side, Swingle said, it is that when the case is over prosecutors may feel as if they have helped parents alter their behavior toward their children.

"Our hope is that we may have contributed to saving and improving the life of a child down the road," he said.