Charges of unimaginable, heinous acts of child abuse against two helpless infants were filed against a father this week, following an investigation into injuries to seven week old infant twin girls. Richard Osborne, 29, of Wallback was arrested by WV State Police this week, charged with four felony counts of child abuse resulting in serious injury.
State Police received a call from Tuesday from a social worker at Women’s and Children’s Hospital in Charleston about suspected child abuse. Trooper Young and Trooper Smith travelled to Charleston to meet with the social worker and the infants’ attending physician who advised one of the babies had suffered several brain hemorrhages and broken ribs and the other infant endured a hematoma on the side of her head, along with several broken bones including both arms and legs as well as her ribs. Doctors also discovered this abuse had not only happened once but multiple times to both of the 7-week old infants, as both babies had broken bones that had already healed. All injuries were consistent with child abuse.
Osborne, the father of the babies, was then interviewed about the injuries the twins had received. Osborne gave a statement admitting to injuring both children. According to the statement, Osborne said on the night of October 28, one of the babies was staying with a relative and he had put the other baby into her rocker for the night at around 9:00 pm. The baby started to cry at that time and continued to cry for several hours. At this time, Osborne admitted violently grabbing the infant out of the rocker by her right arm and squeezing her against his chest. He advised that the baby then stopped crying and he placed her back in her rocker for the remainder of the night. The next morning Osborne noticed a deformity to the child’s upper arm and made arrangements to take the child to the doctor’s office. During the interview Osborne also admitted to grabbing the infant twins in the same violent manner a week before and admitted to squeezing both babies against his chest until they stopped crying.
Osborne had sole custody of the twins and was taking care of them on his own, because their mother’s rights were severed due to an ongoing drug addiction. Osborne also had a two year old son in the home that was checked by physicians and was physically alright. The boy was placed in foster care as the twin baby girls remain in the intensive care unit, slowly recovering from their injuries.
“Parents need to remember to take a step back and remember how precious they are, before reaching down and touching them or doing anything,” Trooper Brian Young said.
Richard Solomon Osborne was released from Central Regional Jail this weekend on $160,000.00 bond.
