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An Allegheny Township couple was charged with multiple felonies after their three children told police they are under near-constant video surveillance and most of the food in the house is kept locked up.
Leann Marie Lawson, 35, and Nevin A. Lawson, 51, of the 100 block of Indian Hill Road, were charged Thursday with three counts each of endangering the welfare of children.
Police began investigating the couple Jan. 18 after the children — boys in their mid-teens and a preteen girl — filed a ChildLine abuse report telling authorities their parents were intoxicated and arguing and they did not feel safe in the home.
The ChildLine report noted the older boy has “lost a substantial amount of weight” because he is confronted by Nevin Lawson whenever he attempts to get food from the kitchen, police said.
Over the course of several days, police interviewed the children separately at their schools, the complaint said.
They all told investigators their parents drink heavily and frequently argue, and Nevin Lawson is verbally and mentally abusive to the family.
Leann Lawson filed a complaint against her husband with Allegheny Township police Sept. 3 accusing him of physical and psychological abuse, police said.
The following day, she obtained a protection-from- abuse order against her husband for herself and the three children.
The older boy told police Nevin Lawson, who is not his biological father, has threatened to physically harm him and verbally abuses him regularly.
He said Lawson installed locks on the kitchen cabinets and locked a room containing two freezers full of food.
He said Lawson limits the amount and type of food the children can eat and he and his siblings are left to fend for themselves on things such as cereal, Pop Tarts, peanut butter and ramen noodles.
The teen also told police there are never any prepared meals and the children are not allowed to cook.
The boy said Lawson put locks on three of the four bathrooms in the house. The only one available to them to use is in the basement, according to police.
In addition, he told police his home life is so depressing he has been having suicidal thoughts because he does not feel safe. He said his mother, however, blamed him for the problems in the home, the complaint said.
The girl said one of the three cameras in the kitchen alerts her father if someone tries to take food, so she and her siblings took to temporarily unplugging the unit to “sneak food.”
She also corroborated her stepbrother’s accusation Lawson verbally abuses him and the boy doesn’t eat enough because he is confronted by the man when he goes to the kitchen.
When police spoke with the girl at her school Jan. 21, they questioned why she was only wearing a shirt as a dress that was “very short” with no leggings underneath on a day when temperatures dipped below 20 degrees.
She told them her oldest brother typically does the laundry but she did not have clean clothing for more than a week because her father caught the boy using the washer and shut the water supply off, the complaint said.
The younger boy said on a previous occasion, Lawson caught his older brother doing laundry and “threw his clothes out of the washer.”
He also told police about the locks in the kitchen and bathrooms as well as the cameras used to monitor him and his siblings.
In addition to arresting the Lawsons, police provided details of their investigation to a caseworker for the Westmoreland County Children’s Bureau who has been assigned to the case.
Both Lawsons were released from custody on a $25,000 nonsecured bond, according to court records.
Preliminary hearings on the charges are scheduled before District Judge Cheryl Peck Yakopec on Feb. 15.
