A Lilburn couple faces child cruelty charges after authorities found their children allegedly living in squalid conditions, with piles of trash, no water running and sewage backing up into the house, Channel 2 Action News reported.
The state of Georgia now has custody of the two children, ages 7 months and 2 years, of Stephen Robert Hunt and Sky Alexandra Mitsch, authorities said.
Charles Reagin, who lives next door and who rents the house on Wynn Russell Drive to the couple, said he called police Saturday after seeing the conditions inside the dwelling.
“I can’t believe they’ve done this,” Reagin told Channel 2. “They’ve just demolished it.”
Inside, police found "broken glass on the floors, spoiled and rotten food on the floors, water that was not running [and] a septic tank that was full and backing into the rest of the house,” Lillburn police Capt. Ben Haynes said.
There was insufficient food to feed the children, and the 2-year-old had "what appeared to be flea bites on the child's face; his ear appeared to be impacted with wax," Haynes said.
“You wouldn’t want an animal or a child to have to live in conditions like that,” he said.
Hunt and Mitsch were arrested and taken to the Gwinnett County Detention Center. They have been released on bonds of $11,200 each, according to Gwinnett Sheriff’s Department records.
Channel 2 spoke with the mother by phone Tuesday, and she said it was a big mistake, and the family was doing all it could to get the children back.
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