Siblings Sentenced In Horrific Child Abuse Case (Photos)

Two half-siblings in Virginia were sentenced to more than 100 years combined for sexually abusing two children. The case has been described by prosecutors as one of the most disturbing cases they have seen.

Robert Eugene Clark, 39, was found guilty of nine counts of rape, aggravated sexual battery and taking indecent liberties, according to the Daily Mail. He was sentenced to 65 years in prison. Clark’s half-sister, 30-year-old Samantha Kay Simmons, was found guilty of 11 counts of aggravated sexual battery, sodomy and endangering the welfare of a child. She was sentenced to 43 years in prison.

The victims, two sisters aged 3 and 8, were found in 2015, living in a trailer home that was covered in human feces and filth and was crawling with cockroaches. An investigation was launched that year after police received a call about the trailer from a neighbor concerned for the wellbeing of the two girls.

In a police report, the deputy wrote that as he approached the trailer, he was overwhelmed by the smell of urine and noted that insects were swarming the home. Upon entering the home, the deputy found the 3-year-old girl crying at the kitchen counter while insects crawled all over her body.

Both that trailer and another trailer nearby, in which the victims’ grandmother lived, smelled of human feces and were infested with insects.

The Roanoke Times reports that social services workers found the 3-year-old girl wearing just a diaper, covered in dirt, with her hair matted and messy. She was only able to speak two words — her sister’s name and “no.”

“She was a feral child; that’s the only way I could describe her,” said Peggy Sigler, a caseworker for the Rockbridge Area Department of Social Services, during her testimony.  “You walked in the home and the cockroaches would literally jump on you and crawl all over your body.”

Eight months after the girls were removed from the home, the 8-year-old girl told her foster mother that Clark had repeatedly raped and sexually abused her and her sister over the course of four months in 2015.

She said that he forced them to perform sexual acts on each other and whipped them with a belt when they were naked. The girl added that Clark forced them to watch pornography and that they often bled from the abuse.

Prosecutor Jared Moon described the case as the most disturbing sex crime he has ever encountered. He called for Clark and Simmons to be sentenced to prison for the rest of their lives.

Nearly two years after the abuse took place, the girls are doing better and their foster parents are preparing to adopt them. The younger sister, now 5 years old, still suffers from developmental problems. She continues to have trouble learning words and is only able to identify the color purple. 

Defense attorneys for Clark and Simmons said in court the half-siblings had been the victims of abuse as children themselves. Simmons’ attorney compared her to a “quivering rabbit” unable of comprehending what was wrong with her actions. Clark’s attorney said his client has a mild form of mental retardation.

Sources: Daily Mail, The Roanoke Times / Photo credit: Thomas R Machnitzki/Wikimedia Commons, Rockbridge Regional Jail via Daily Mail