HE DOESN’T EVEN KNOW WHAT’S HAPPENING – SH0CK CLAIM ABOUT OHIO ‘H0USE OF HORR0RS’ GRANDFATHER ADDS ANOTHER TWIST TO CASE OF 16 RESCUED CHILDREN
Meanwhile, a niece of Gary Sr. and his wife, Christina, 67, has gone online to defend her family, especially the elderly and ailing Gary Sr. -Credit:Southeastern Ohio Regional Jail
New reports from the Ohio family arrested over the alleged abuse of 16 children living in a “house of horrors” suggest the family patriarch suffers from health issues that could have contributed to the deteriorating living conditions.
The judge has ordered both a competency evaluation and an insanity evaluation for Gary Siders Sr. At first, he was only expected to be evaluated to determine whether he could enter a not-guilty-by-reason-of-insanity plea. But his attorney says the 73-year-old doesn’t seem to understand the charges or the case being made against him.
“When he was initially arrested, and he was arraigned, he had no idea what was going on,” says Los Angeles Magazine contributor Lauren Conlin. “He couldn’t really identify the judge’s role, not even his own lawyer’s role. And so as a defendant, you really need to be capable to help with your own defense, and they’re not sure that that’s going to happen.”
• Grandpa from Ohio house of horrors is seen in throwback photo years before abuse began
• Ohio approves $1M to care for 16 kids rescued from ‘house of horrors’
Gary Siders Jr.’s sixteen children were rescued from their squalid, crumbling family home, where they were “kept in worse conditions than livestock” last week. The children’s father, Gary Siders Jr, 36, was arrested along with his parents, Gary Siders, 73, and Christina Siders, 66, and his wife, Elizabeth Siders, 33.
The four defendants made their appearance at the Vinton County Court of Common Pleas on Wednesday morning and are currently being held on $300,000 bail. Grandfather Gary Siders was released earlier this week on medical grounds and transferred to a medical facility, where he remains under monitoring via a GPS tracker.
Gary Siders Sr. and his wife pictured here in 2023, years before the arrest and accusations -Credit:Facebook
According to recent reports, Gary Siders Sr. fell on Tuesday while officials were taking him to a scheduled court hearing. His attorney then asked the court to change his bond from a $300,000 cash-or-surety bond to a personal recognizance bond so he could undergo the mentioned physical and mental health evaluations.
Vinton County Judge Laina Rogers approved the request on the condition that he wear a GPS monitor if he is released from the hospital. Siders Sr. was transported to OhioHealth O’Blenness Hospital in Athens, where, apparently, doctors found he has a serious medical issue that requires specialized treatment at a hospital outside the local area.
Elizabeth Siders, now 33, married Gar Jr. at age 15 -Credit:Southeastern Ohio Regional Jail
Meanwhile, a niece of Gary Sr. and his wife, Christina, 67, has gone online to defend her family, especially the elderly and ailing Gary Sr. The niece argued that the descriptions of the home’s awful condition and the way the children were discovered don’t match what she remembers.
The niece believes both Gary Sr. and Christina may be dealing with mental health issues. She also suspects their son, Gary Siders Jr., 36, may have played a role in the situation deteriorating as she accuses him of being the “golden child” who could “do no wrong.”
Christina Siders, the grandmother, was also arrested at the scene -Credit:Southeastern Ohio Regional Jail
The sixteen children were removed from the dilapidated family residence last week, where authorities say they were “kept in worse conditions than livestock.” Elizabeth Siders, 33, the children’s mother, was arrested alongside the grandparents and her spouse, Gary Siders Jr., now 36.
According to Elizabeth’s relatives, contact was severed after she wed Gary Siders Jr. when she was just 15 years old and he was 18. Elizabeth was seven months into her pregnancy when the ceremony occurred in West Virginia, where state law at the time only mandated parental consent without requiring an investigation into the circumstances surrounding the expectant teenager.
Elizabeth, the mother, has resided with the Siders family since age 15, while Gary and Christina have relocated with the couple throughout Ohio for nearly two decades.
Gary Siders Jr. and his family moved around Ohio -Credit:Southeastern Ohio Regional Jail
Authorities report that Elizabeth and Gary’s children, currently ranging in age from 18 months to 18 years old, “looked like feral animals.”
The Vinton County Sheriff’s Office in Ohio discovered them on Tuesday morning while serving a search warrant connected to an active investigation.
Deputies encountered a disturbing scene, with all the children trapped inside a deteriorating three-and-a-half square meter structure smeared with human excrement. The appalling conditions, which the children allegedly endured for four years, were condemned as “pure evil” by Ohio Attorney General Andy Wilson.
Wilson described the children as living in “conditions you cannot even imagine people being in, let alone children being in.”
He revealed that multiple children were unable to speak, and investigators found that an 18-year-old resident couldn’t even write her own name. Wilson stated, “It was terrible. They looked like almost feral animals. It was terrible.”
From behind bars, Elizabeth, the mother, insisted that the older children had phones and access to social media, though no educational institution in any county has records indicating the children were registered for any form of schooling. Seven of the children were rushed to hospitals in Columbus immediately, with two requiring emergency airlift transportation.
Wilson disclosed that as of Tuesday, one child remained in critical condition, while the remaining children were continuing to receive medical treatment.
None of the four suspects had any prior ties to the area, and investigators believe the group had been constantly on the move to avoid creating medical and government records. “These folks were pretty good at hiding these kids,” Wilson said.