Couple kept boy locked in lightless bathroom with ‘ratchet strap’ for days without food or clothing: Police

A 41-year-old mother in Arkansas and her 40-year-old husband are each facing more than 100 felony criminal charges for allegedly keeping the woman’s 15-year-old son locked naked in a bathroom without food for days on end, only letting him leave to go to school and keeping the door locked shut with a ratchet strap.

Jaclyn Machelle Barnett and Daniel Alan Wright, the victim’s stepfather, were taken into custody on Wednesday and charged with 112 counts each of first-degree false imprisonment with risk of injury as well as one count each of first-degree endangering the welfare of a minor and permitting child abuse, records reviewed by Law&Crime show.

Officers with the Mountain Home Police Department on Nov. 2, 2024, responded to the family’s upstairs apartment after a downstairs neighbor heard what they believed to be a child’s cries for help, Mountain Home news radio station KTLO reported.

Upon arriving at the address, an officer went to the reporting party’s bedroom and was able to communicate with a boy who said he was locked in the upstairs bathroom. The officer reportedly knocked on the door to the apartment upstairs where he was greeted by two juveniles, ages 10 and 11. The kids allegedly said their parents were working and claimed to have no knowledge of anyone being locked in the bathroom.

But authorities told Springfield, Missouri, CBS affiliate KOLR that the children’s response was likely the result of being coached by Barnett and Wright.

“It’s in my opinion, it’s in the opinion of some others as well, that these kids are no doubt coached, no doubt. Whether it be fear for themselves or what have you,” lead investigator Mike Day told the station.

Day said the children brought him to the back room from where the noise appeared to have originated.

“In the master bedroom, they found a ratchet strap that was attached to a bedpost, that was attached to the bathroom door where [the child] could not get out. The sergeant talked to the child behind the door, eventually let him out, and he discovered the child was in there with no clothes, and in fact, the child didn’t want to come out because he was embarrassed, because he was had no clothes. He hadn’t eaten. He was hungry.”

Investigators said the boy told them he was regularly locked inside the bathroom and was only allowed to leave to attend school. While the two other children slept in bunk beds, the victim reportedly slept on a wooden pallet left in the bathroom.

During interviews with police, Barnett and Wright both claimed to have no idea what the child was doing naked in the bathroom, instead blaming it on the other children playing, KTLO reported. However, police said that when they tasked the 10 and 11-year-old with using the ratchet strap, neither child was able to do so. The parents reportedly then modified their story, asserting that they had actually been using the strap to make sure the bathroom door stayed shut due to a leaky faucet.

Day explained that authorities decided to charge Barnett and Wright with 112 counts of endangerment based on the number of days the boy went to school in 2024.

“We know with the child stating in his forensic interview that he was held in this bathroom with no lights, no food every night, but he’s let out to go to school,” he reportedly told the station. “So that being he was let out and he’s put back, then he’s let out and he’s put back. Where [the prosecutor] came up with the number, just to start is ‘let’s go back to January. Let’s find out how many days of school he was actually in school.’ So that’s how we did it based on those numbers, to come up with a number as he was in school from January up until the time he was located, 112 times this year.”

Day also said that as the investigation proceeds, he expects to see additional charges filed against the couple.

“Never, never [seen] anything like this. It’s very, very, very traumatizing for the kids, but not only the kids, but for officers that have to deal with seeing this and hearing this and it sucks,” Day said.

Police further learned that there were 29 separate reports concerning mistreatment of the child dating back to 2013, the affidavit reportedly states. Day told KOLR that the public uproar over the allegations is justified.

“When the public starts to get upset about this, it’s justified, no doubt, but I think just as a whole, we all failed this kid,” Day said. “As a whole, we all failed him.”

Barnett and Wright were both being kept in the Baxter County Jail on $50,000 bond. As of Friday morning, Wright had posted bond and Barnett had not.

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