A White West Virginia couple found guilty of forcing their five adopted Black children to work as slaves on their farm, were sentenced to hundreds of years in prison.
63-year-old Jeanne Whitefeather was sentenced to 215 years in prison while her husband, Donald Lantz, aged 64, received 160 years.
The couple were sentenced two years after Kanawha County Sheriff’s deputies, raided their home in Sissonville to conduct a welfare check following intelligence by a neighbor, who reported seeing Lantz lock a girl and her teenage brother in a shed.
During their trial, the prosecuting counsels explained that the two children in the shed had no running water or bathroom and had been “deprived of adequate hygienic care and food.”
“The children said they slept on the concrete floor and had been locked inside for about 12 hours before they were found. Another girl was found inside the home”
“When Lantz arrived home, he had another child with him and led the deputies to a friend’s home where the fifth child was staying ”
The court heard how the victims were brutally maltreated, forced into labor without pay, and denied food, leaving them weakened and vulnerable.
The youngest child said they were “taught to laugh at” their siblings and had to watch a lot of the abuse.
“Now, at my new home, I see that everything was not right with Jeanne and Donald,” the child’s impact statement said.
“I will be something amazing,” another child said. “I will be strong and beautiful. You will always be exactly what you are horrible.”
After hearing the testimonies against the couple who were charged with human trafficking, child neglect, forced labor, and other crimes, the delivering judge, MaryClaire Akers, ordered Whitefeather and Lantz, to pay $280,000 each to compensate the victims of their wrongdoing.
“You brought these kids to West Virginia, a place as I know as almost heaven, and put them in hell,” Circuit Court Judge MaryClaire Akers said, The court will now put you in yours. May God have mercy on your souls, because this court will not,” she added.
