2017: Three foster children, ages 13, 15 and 20 were found so severely malnourished that police initially thought them to be prepubescent. The children were home schooled, sleeping in a garage with buckets for toilets. Victims described abuse in many forms, such as being starved for days on end or being left in freezing basements or outside during the winter.

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The victims, now grown adults, say their foster mother kept them isolated by pulling them out of school and used haircuts and stripping them naked as punishments.  In an effort to avoid suspicion, the children's foster mother, Anya James, convinced the police and others that her foster children were emotionally disturbed.

 

Initial charges against James were dismissed in exchange for a guilty plea on just two counts of child endangerment, and she served just two years in jail. [7]