Latest / Crime Stories with Nancy Grace / Social workers ignore years of red flags before Adrian Jones death?
Transcript
- 0:04Speaker 1: Forty one Action News digs deeper and get to answers
- 0:07Speaker 1: about what happens to Adrian Jones. Investigator Jessica McMaster now
- 0:10Speaker 1: uncovered exclusive evidence he was just a typical little boy,
- 0:14Speaker 1: just full of life. Adrian's dad and step mom abused
- 0:17Speaker 1: him for months. He just had the most amazing smile
- 0:20Speaker 1: never before seeing. Video takes us inside Adrian's last moment.
- 0:24Speaker 1: You can see the look of nothing in his eyes.
- 0:27Speaker 1: This is Crime Stories with Nancy Grace. So you eat
- 0:31Speaker 1: out of the trash? Could you keep on getting cold?
- 0:32Speaker 1: Could you're outside? In this video, you can hear Heather's
- 0:35Speaker 1: harsh words towards Adrian and a lack of compassion for
- 0:38Speaker 1: a desperate little boy. The last days and hours of
- 0:40Speaker 1: Adrian's life spent stripped and confined to a shower stall,
- 0:44Speaker 1: left outside overnight to stand in a filthy pool. New
- 0:47Speaker 1: records show with the State of Kansas knew before the
- 0:50Speaker 1: death of little seven year old Adrian Jones. We learned
- 0:53Speaker 1: as early as twenty eleven, d c F had allegations
- 0:55Speaker 1: of Adrian's abuse, hundreds of red flags. They should have known.
- 1:01Speaker 1: That's just not good enough. They should have known. Oh no,
- 1:05Speaker 1: they knew. Kansas Department of Children Family Services records show
- 1:12Speaker 1: that police, doctors, social workers, they were all aware of
- 1:17Speaker 1: the horrific abuse a little boy, Adrian Jones, suffered before
- 1:24Speaker 1: his brutal death, his horrible death. Why did they let
- 1:31Speaker 1: him die? And why is everybody afraid to call for
- 1:36Speaker 1: criminal charges against defects workers that knew this child was
- 1:44Speaker 1: in danger. I've had it. I've had it with a
- 1:47Speaker 1: whole kid and kimboodle. This seven year old boy, beautiful
- 1:52Speaker 1: baby boy, is dead after suffering years of horrific abuse.
- 1:59Speaker 1: With me now on Crime Stories is the reporter that
- 2:03Speaker 1: cracked the whole thing wide open? I Nancy Grace, this
- 2:07Speaker 1: is Crime Stories. Thank you for being with us. And
- 2:11Speaker 1: if you are a parent, if you ever hope to
- 2:14Speaker 1: be a parent, or if you even care about children,
- 2:18Speaker 1: this is going to make your blood boil with me, Jessica,
- 2:24Speaker 1: make masters with action forty one out of Kansas City
- 2:29Speaker 1: k S h B. Jessica, thank you for being with us.
- 2:34Speaker 1: Two thousand pages were just released detailing how case workers, doctors,
- 2:42Speaker 1: social workers, police, they all knew where this boy was
- 2:45Speaker 1: going through. This is a crime, Jessica, Start at the beginning.
- 2:53Speaker 1: What do you know? I think the most interesting thing
- 2:58Speaker 1: about reading through this several ty Jes is that Kansas
- 3:02Speaker 1: did identify the stepmother, Heather Jones, is a threat to
- 3:06Speaker 1: the children. Almost immediately after Michael received custody of his
- 3:11Speaker 1: three kids and it started. He got custody in September
- 3:16Speaker 1: of two thousand eleven. Within a couple of months, Heather
- 3:20Speaker 1: took his youngest child, who was under the age of three,
- 3:24Speaker 1: because Asian was three and was older than this child,
- 3:26Speaker 1: to the emergency room and said that that child had
- 3:29Speaker 1: fallen down the stairs. Well, this child had internal bleeding,
- 3:34Speaker 1: bruises on their face, and she took the child there
- 3:36Speaker 1: because she had been having seizures, and she told Heather
- 3:41Speaker 1: told doctors that Adrian, a three years old, pushed the
- 3:44Speaker 1: child down the stairs. But the doctors didn't buy it.
- 3:47Speaker 1: They said that the injuries did not mapped up with
- 3:51Speaker 1: falling down carpeted stairs. Heather, how do you get all
- 3:59Speaker 1: of those was those bruises to the face and head
- 4:03Speaker 1: from a fall down what maybe seven or eight stairs
- 4:06Speaker 1: plus internal bleeding? Uh, that's not right. I've heard that
- 4:10Speaker 1: stare excuse about a thousand times too many. Go ahead.
- 4:16Speaker 1: She then came back and said that Adrian also hit
- 4:19Speaker 1: that child with a wooden rod, so at that time
- 4:24Speaker 1: they did start investigating her for abuse. In Kansas, social
- 4:27Speaker 1: workers told Michael Adrian's father that she was not allowed
- 4:31Speaker 1: to have contact with the children, to which she told
- 4:33Speaker 1: them that he was not with her anymore, that he
- 4:35Speaker 1: thought she was on drugs and had been acting erratically.
- 4:39Speaker 1: He also said that things seemed to happen to the
- 4:42Speaker 1: kids whenever they were in had there was care, So
- 4:44Speaker 1: it appears that he was suspicious of her as well
- 4:48Speaker 1: in the very beginning and maybe not participating um. But
- 4:54Speaker 1: then when they moved to Missouri, then they crossed that
- 4:58Speaker 1: state line. There's no documentation in the Missouri record that
- 5:04Speaker 1: those social workers were informed about the safety plan involving Heather,
- 5:09Speaker 1: So when they went to the home, it's not clear
- 5:11Speaker 1: ifhose social workers knew that she wasn't supposed to be
- 5:14Speaker 1: there and she was at their first visits. Your story
- 5:20Speaker 1: details all of this, including the surveillage footed surveillance footage
- 5:26Speaker 1: that captures the last day of this little boy's life.
- 5:30Speaker 1: What is caught on surveillance footage, So this is at
- 5:35Speaker 1: the point when they they bounced back and forth between States,
- 5:38Speaker 1: and he ended up dying in Kansas and it's it's
- 5:43Speaker 1: it's just unimaginable stuff. They kept him confined to a
- 5:48Speaker 1: shower stall for the very last month of his life,
- 5:51Speaker 1: Stripped of his clothes, he would stand for hours with
- 5:53Speaker 1: his hands above his head. They starved him and eventually
- 5:57Speaker 1: that shower stall became his coffee. Um, that's where he died.
- 6:02Speaker 1: And they left him there for a couple of weeks
- 6:04Speaker 1: before the disposing of his body. Two pigs. But they
- 6:09Speaker 1: had you know, some of the surveillance footage shows him
- 6:11Speaker 1: sneaking out of the shower and getting water. Uh, he's
- 6:14Speaker 1: handcuffed out in the backyard at night, left in a dirty,
- 6:18Speaker 1: filthy pool overnight. At one point, you can hear one
- 6:22Speaker 1: of that filter saying you can see the video of
- 6:25Speaker 1: him out in the pool up to his neck overnight. Yes,
- 6:30Speaker 1: that that's one of the most actually kept a video
- 6:34Speaker 1: log of all their torture of this little boy. Yeah,
- 6:38Speaker 1: like they were proud of it. What what what did
- 6:40Speaker 1: you say? You can hear one of the other children
- 6:43Speaker 1: saying something. So they had the surveillance inside the home
- 6:47Speaker 1: and would be watching Adrian outside. But while they're watching
- 6:50Speaker 1: it on one of the monitors. It appears Heather would
- 6:53Speaker 1: also be recording it with her phone, and you can
- 6:55Speaker 1: hear Heather talking to one of the younger sisters talking
- 7:00Speaker 1: about how Adrian is eating out of a dirty bowl
- 7:02Speaker 1: of apple sauces and things like that, and you could
- 7:04Speaker 1: hear one of the kids saying, Adrian's about to start
- 7:08Speaker 1: crying again, which just tells me he was out there
- 7:11Speaker 1: crying every night. You know what, I can hardly I
- 7:16Speaker 1: can hardly stand to even hear what was being said.
- 7:22Speaker 1: The grandmother of the boy now wants all the records
- 7:26Speaker 1: unsealed and wants the truth about his death. But what
- 7:30Speaker 1: is incredible is that they actually kept a log on
- 7:35Speaker 1: surveillance video of how they brutalized the little boy. And amazingly,
- 7:41Speaker 1: in all of these documents that we have just obtained,
- 7:45Speaker 1: the little boy, Adrian tells social workers and deputy deputies
- 7:51Speaker 1: that he was being beaten and tortured. I mean, what
- 7:56Speaker 1: happened with that? He told them what was happening, according
- 7:59Speaker 1: to your story, But what why didn't they act on
- 8:03Speaker 1: the Missouri side the first time they visited the home,
- 8:06Speaker 1: according to child welfare experts that we've spoken to, because
- 8:10Speaker 1: obviously we need them to analyze these documents. I'm no
- 8:13Speaker 1: expert in that field, um, But she says that first
- 8:16Speaker 1: visit to the home, after a hotline call came in
- 8:19Speaker 1: with concerns over the children, a safety plan was not
- 8:22Speaker 1: put in place. That was on the Missouri side. So
- 8:25Speaker 1: when that social worker got called out to the home
- 8:28Speaker 1: again a couple of months later, she started noticing, Okay,
- 8:31Speaker 1: maybe this kid is in real trouble. And at that time,
- 8:33Speaker 1: Adrian has showed her markings on his wrist and said
- 8:36Speaker 1: that it was from his dad taking him up. So
- 8:40Speaker 1: she put over a request to the juvenile office to
- 8:43Speaker 1: have him removed from the home. However, according to the
- 8:46Speaker 1: expert we talked to, the juvenile office could not remove
- 8:50Speaker 1: him from the home because they had not shown reasonable
- 8:53Speaker 1: efforts as in putting a safety to land in place
- 8:57Speaker 1: in offering the family services first. So she had to
- 9:00Speaker 1: do that first. But Michael and Heather Jones, the little
- 9:05Speaker 1: boys killers, told the state they did not want him.
- 9:08Speaker 1: They did, they did not want their son, but the
- 9:11Speaker 1: state left Adrian in their care. They did right, yes, yes,
- 9:16Speaker 1: and and and the little boy had many visits with
- 9:19Speaker 1: Defects Department. Family Children's Services, many visits double several and
- 9:25Speaker 1: so it's just was a huge domino effect. It was
- 9:29Speaker 1: the initial The expert says, had Missouri been notified that
- 9:34Speaker 1: Heather was not supposed to be in the fahlle in
- 9:37Speaker 1: the home, then the juvenile office would have been able
- 9:41Speaker 1: to remove him when that request was placed, because that
- 9:44Speaker 1: would have shown reasonable effort. But that as it wasn't there.
- 9:47Speaker 1: You know what I'm hearing. I'm hearing blah blah blah
- 9:51Speaker 1: blah blah, dead seven year old boy, blah blah blah
- 9:54Speaker 1: blah blah, boy beaten to death, blah blah, boys starved.
- 9:59Speaker 1: That's all it matters. Because during one meeting, the social
- 10:04Speaker 1: workers spoke with Michael and Heather about allegations that they
- 10:08Speaker 1: were torturing their children. And the employee reports that she
- 10:12Speaker 1: never saw Adrian Hello, and they lied and said that
- 10:17Speaker 1: Adrian was with his uncle. So she makes the whole
- 10:20Speaker 1: report with not even seeing the little boy. She leaves
- 10:24Speaker 1: the home, and she was directed by the Sheriff's office
- 10:28Speaker 1: to never go there again without law enforcement. I mean,
- 10:31Speaker 1: even the cops say, according to her, that this guy
- 10:36Speaker 1: Michael is bad news and not to go out there
- 10:38Speaker 1: with two officers that he had an arsenal of guns
- 10:42Speaker 1: and that there is something not quite right. But they
- 10:44Speaker 1: leave the little boy there to get killed. I mean,
- 10:47Speaker 1: Alan Duke helped me understand why this boy went through
- 10:52Speaker 1: this and was killed. They knew about it. It's a
- 10:55Speaker 1: seventy mile drive between Kansas City, Missouri and Topeka, Kansas. So, Jessica,
- 11:00Speaker 1: it seems that these people were able to avoid the
- 11:04Speaker 1: supervision simply by moving about across the state line and
- 11:08Speaker 1: then seventy miles down the highway. That's the bottom line, right,
- 11:12Speaker 1: it is. It is moving back and forth. And but
- 11:14Speaker 1: like you said, there was so much documentation. Uh. The
- 11:18Speaker 1: police officer on the Kansus side before they moved to
- 11:21Speaker 1: Missouri said that he could confirm that Adrian was punched
- 11:27Speaker 1: with a closed fist because when Heather took that baby
- 11:30Speaker 1: to the hospital, doctors also know ift that Adrian had
- 11:33Speaker 1: a black eye. Quote. Sometimes he kicks me on the
- 11:36Speaker 1: back of my head and little bone come out. My
- 11:40Speaker 1: daddy keeps hitting me in the head and punches me
- 11:42Speaker 1: in the stomach, and my mom keeps pulling on my
- 11:45Speaker 1: ears and it really hurts. She keeps being mean to me.
- 11:49Speaker 1: The little boy is saying to the social workers, Mommy
- 11:53Speaker 1: and Daddy can't feed me. I have to sleep without
- 11:56Speaker 1: a pillow in blanket. I just I just don't understand
- 12:03Speaker 1: how these people are walking scott free, how they can
- 12:08Speaker 1: live with themselves, how they can look in the mirror
- 12:11Speaker 1: in the morning and see their face. I don't understand it.
- 12:16Speaker 1: I mean, is there any repercussion at all, Jessica, other
- 12:21Speaker 1: than for Michael and Heather, You know no. I mean,
- 12:25Speaker 1: the neither agencies are willing to sit down and talk
- 12:29Speaker 1: about the case. There has to be an open conversation
- 12:34Speaker 1: and open it on his conversation. You mean, nobody's getting fired.
- 12:38Speaker 1: Nobody's at least getting fired. I mean, I think they
- 12:40Speaker 1: should go to jail. They stood by and let this
- 12:44Speaker 1: boy get tortured when he was begging for help, telling
- 12:47Speaker 1: them how he was being abused. The doctors knew about it,
- 12:50Speaker 1: the police knew about it, social workers knew about it,
- 12:53Speaker 1: and they let the boy die. They let him die.
- 12:57Speaker 1: They might as well pull the trigger themselves. Why aren't
- 13:01Speaker 1: their criminal charges, Why aren't they at least being fired?
- 13:04Speaker 1: Just hoping to get answers, We're still pushing. I was
- 13:07Speaker 1: just asking for interviews again the other day. You know,
- 13:11Speaker 1: it has to be a discussion. We don't know anything.
- 13:13Speaker 1: I mean, we don't even know what the basic policies
- 13:16Speaker 1: and procedures are because nobody in those agencies is willing
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- 14:42Speaker 1: get back to our podcast. Okay, Alan, who the A
- 14:46Speaker 1: and that jurisdiction? Who's the who's the prosecutor? You're talking
- 14:51Speaker 1: actually about two jurisdictions, and this is the problem here.
- 14:54Speaker 1: Let's start with the world afare he died. Adrian died
- 14:57Speaker 1: in Yon Dot County. The district attorney over the area,
- 15:00Speaker 1: Mark Duprix. And what if anything is Mark Duprix doing
- 15:05Speaker 1: about this. I only spoke with him briefly because again
- 15:08Speaker 1: they his office doesn't often meet with us either, and
- 15:11Speaker 1: he he also has not really sat down to talk
- 15:13Speaker 1: about the case. But when I spoke with him, he
- 15:15Speaker 1: did attend a hearing for Adrian's act and when I
- 15:19Speaker 1: spoke with him there, he said the bottom line is
- 15:22Speaker 1: that the agency's underfunded. Oh my stars, that's like saying
- 15:28Speaker 1: a killer is unemployed. The phone number for the Wayan
- 15:34Speaker 1: Dot County District Attorney is nine one three five seven
- 15:39Speaker 1: three five thousand, repeat nine one three five seven three
- 15:48Speaker 1: five thousand, Alan, could you please include that in our
- 15:53Speaker 1: Crime online dot Com summary of our interview with Jessica
- 15:59Speaker 1: Play as well as their email address? And who may
- 16:03Speaker 1: I ask? Would be the Kansas why and dot county?
- 16:09Speaker 1: Is that? Is that in Kansas? That's the Kansas side
- 16:14Speaker 1: that Kansas. Yeah, Adrian died, so who would the Kansas
- 16:19Speaker 1: attorney general b I'm looking at up right now, Schmitch,
- 16:24Speaker 1: I'll pull it up. But Derek Schmidt, Derek Schmidt, Okay,
- 16:30Speaker 1: this would be a fun thing for him to look
- 16:32Speaker 1: into Kansas attorney generals. It's two thousand eleven. Okay, Let's
- 16:40Speaker 1: not trash him until we see what he can do
- 16:42Speaker 1: about this, all right, Let's give him a chance before
- 16:46Speaker 1: we say anything. Like he's been in office is two
- 16:48Speaker 1: thousand eleven, and what if anything has been done? Phone
- 16:54Speaker 1: number is toll free eight eight four to eight eight
- 16:58Speaker 1: four three six and you can click online to send
- 17:03Speaker 1: an email. I think I'll do it right now. What
- 17:06Speaker 1: are you doing about the Adrian Jones debacle? What are
- 17:15Speaker 1: you doing about Adrian Jones murder? Child Services are responsible
- 17:33Speaker 1: to Let's see what happens. Probably nothing right, but we
- 17:37Speaker 1: can try, right We can try. We don't try, we
- 17:40Speaker 1: can keep trying, then we're just as bad. We're just
- 17:44Speaker 1: as bad if we stand by and do nothing. They
- 17:47Speaker 1: need to review their inner state communications, their procedures for
- 17:52Speaker 1: notifying outside the state an agency. They need better communication.
- 17:57Speaker 1: And in this day and aids, can't they at least
- 17:59Speaker 1: tweet it? Can't they put it on whatever. One agency
- 18:03Speaker 1: needs to talk to another and follow somebody across state lines.
- 18:07Speaker 1: We've got fifty different state agencies. If they're not communicating
- 18:11Speaker 1: with each other, you've got forty nine opportunities to get
- 18:14Speaker 1: away from the people who are about to catch you, right,
- 18:16Speaker 1: And it does appear that Missouri was having phone conversations
- 18:21Speaker 1: with Kansas, letting them know that they're bouncing between states
- 18:24Speaker 1: and things like that. But there's no record again that
- 18:27Speaker 1: there needs to be some kind of a database, some
- 18:29Speaker 1: kind of a data link. We've got it for all
- 18:32Speaker 1: other crimes, it seems, I mean, if you are arrested
- 18:35Speaker 1: for a sexual offense, the national national registries wait wait, wait,
- 18:40Speaker 1: wait wait wait, the Kansas Child services were responsible to
- 18:45Speaker 1: It's not just Missouri. Didn't the child services in Kansas
- 18:49Speaker 1: know what was happening, Jessica, everybody had documented. I think
- 18:52Speaker 1: the file is in total ten years long. They have
- 18:55Speaker 1: a ten year history with these children's disgusting discussed ing. Okay,
- 19:01Speaker 1: we have the knowledge, we have the power to at
- 19:06Speaker 1: least try and affect change. If we don't try, then
- 19:11Speaker 1: it's on us, because I mean, yes, they're wrong. The
- 19:15Speaker 1: boy is dead and it is horrific. Jessica McMaster is
- 19:20Speaker 1: bringing it to light. She is bringing it to our attention.
- 19:24Speaker 1: Now what are we going to do with the knowledge
- 19:27Speaker 1: that we have nothing? You're just gonna listen to this
- 19:31Speaker 1: podcast and sit back and go, Wow, that's awful. No act, act,
- 19:37Speaker 1: make the call, make send the email, demand justice or else.
- 19:43Speaker 1: Adrian Jones's murder well have been in vain if no
- 19:48Speaker 1: one acts, if we sit by and let this continue
- 19:52Speaker 1: to happen, they are just as responsible. They knew what
- 19:57Speaker 1: was happening to this child, and they let and be
- 20:00Speaker 1: murdered and did nothing. Nothing. I can tell you this much.
- 20:05Speaker 1: It may not work, it may not amount to a
- 20:07Speaker 1: hill of beans. But I'm doing something. God help me,
- 20:11Speaker 1: we are doing something. Jessica is trying, Alan is trying.
- 20:16Speaker 1: I am trying crime online crime stories. We're trying. I
- 20:21Speaker 1: want justice. I don't want this boy to be just
- 20:26Speaker 1: another statistic, because somewhere out there as another little boy
- 20:31Speaker 1: or another little girl, just like Adrian Jones, and they're
- 20:35Speaker 1: going to be ignored by family, children's services, and police
- 20:41Speaker 1: and doctors and social workers until they die. Mark, my
- 20:44Speaker 1: words count on it. So we don't act now, it
- 20:48Speaker 1: will just happen over and over and over. That is
- 20:52Speaker 1: what I learned from all my years as a prosecutor. Jessica,
- 20:58Speaker 1: I am so grateful to you. As much as I hate,
- 21:02Speaker 1: I absolutely hate hearing these details, hate it, but I'm
- 21:08Speaker 1: grateful to you. And I'm grateful for what you're doing.
- 21:12Speaker 1: And again, if you're not there when a fire starts,
- 21:16Speaker 1: who will be there to save your home? Would simply
- 21:19Speaker 1: save home security, your smoke detectors, immediately alert emergency services
- 21:24Speaker 1: at the first sign of a fire. Get timber sent
- 21:27Speaker 1: off your system today, it's simply safe. Dot com slash Nancy.
- 21:32Speaker 1: That's simply safe dot com slash Nancy, Nancy Grace crime Stories. Goodbye, friend,