http://blogs.seattleweekly.com/dailyweekly/2009/11/judgement_day_rebecca_long_is.php

I’m glad to hear that the girl is doing much better. She evolved out of that gene pool that birthed her. Good for her!

SEATTLE – A Carnation man was sentenced to 41 months in prison for his role in an extreme case of child abuse that included starving and withholding water from his young daughter for years.

The sentence against Jon E. Pomeroy was handed down Friday in King County Superior Court after he pleaded guilty Aug. 31 to one count of first-degree criminal mistreatment in the case.

Pomeroy’s daughter, now 15, and his son were in the courtroom as the sentence was pronounced, and watched their father being led away in handcuffs.

Prosecutors had asked for the maximum sentence of 41 months, and the judge granted it. Before his sentencing, Pomeroy read a tearful statement expressing remorse for his part in the abuse against his daughter.

“I wish there was … I would give anything to change what happened. I’m sorry,” he said, crying.

The detective handling the case said it was the worst case of child abuse he had ever seen in a 16-year career of investigating abuse and neglect.

Sheriff’s spokesman John Urquhart says the girl weighed only 48 pounds when rescued in August 2008, and had been given only little food and water for several years.

At Friday’s sentencing, Judge William Downing said, “She looked like a prisoner of war because she in fact was treated as a prisoner of war.”

Pomeroy and his wife, Rebecca Long, were arrested Oct. 10, 2008 – several weeks after deputies removed the then 14-year-old girl from their Carnation home.

The investigation began when Child Protective Services was called to the house on Aug. 13, 2008, after neighbors reported hearing screaming the night before.

Deputies interviewed the girl privately when her father told detectives she was the one screaming.

The girl told deputies her mother disciplined her by restricting her water intake, and was primarily given toast to eat. She said she hadn’t seen a doctor in several years.

Pomeroy is the girl’s biological father and Long was her stepmother.

She and her then 12-year-old brother were taken from the home and the girl was admitted to Children’s Hospital for treatment of severe malnutrition. She was in the hospital for two weeks.

During the investigation, investigators said they found the girl’s mother restricted her water intake to about half of a small Dixie cup per day. The mother only let the girl shower every two or three weeks, and watched her during each shower and bathroom break to keep the girl from surreptitiously drinking water.

“She looked more like she was 8 or 9 years old. Clearly very, very malnourished,” Urquhart said after the arrests. “All of her teeth had to be either pulled or capped.”

The girl and her brother were forced to sleep on the floor in the same room as their parents, and a heavy dresser was pushed in front of the door to keep her from sneaking out and getting water, Urquhart said.

The girl said the dresser was placed there after she was caught one night sneaking out of her own room to drink water from the toilet, so the stepmother wouldn’t hear water running from the bathroom faucet.

The girl told deputies that on one occasion, her mother duct-taped her hands behind her back and dunked her head in the toilet as a form of discipline.

According to case documents released last year, the girl was so depressed that she told social workers she would rather have a “lethal injection” than go back home to her father and stepmother.

Dwight Thompson, who is now the daughter’s foster parent, said the girl planned to read a letter she wrote in court Friday – but she couldn’t go through with it.

“It was pretty tough. It was pretty tough,” he said. “But she was strong. You know a lot of kids couldn’t have even done what she did.”

The girl reported the abuse at her school in 2005, but nobody followed up on her cry for help.

Pomeroy offered no explanation in court as to why he allowed the abuse to go on for years.

Thompson told KOMO News that both children are now doing remarkably well, and they’ve totally recovered physically.

He also said the daughter is so bright and articulate she can do anything she wants, and that she’s talking about being a lawyer or scientist.

There is video if you follow this link. You’ll see the Wuss crying over his crime.

http://www.komonews.com/news/local/59790117.html