Daily Struggles

Mythbusters discusses this

http://www.youtube.com/watch_popup?v=FMqQLgw7Uz4&vq=medium#t=15

follow the link above to the video

YORK, Pa. – They lived outside society, hidden from the world in a squalid row house with no heat, electricity or running water. They had no birth certificates, no schooling, no immunizations or evidence of medical care — nothing whatsoever to prove their existence.

Police in this south-central Pennsylvania city are still piecing together how the parents of five children — ranging in age from 2 to 13 — managed to conceal them for so many years. And why.

“I don’t know what would possess them at all,” said detective Dana Ward Jr., who tracked down the children after a child welfare agency received an anonymous tip about the clandestine family.

How could this couple keep them HIDDEN , It’s hard to imagine that to go on for so many years

Nobody knew this , I can not FOR the LIFE of me …….Understand !

I am glad that somebody found them and reported this kind of situation , FOR KIDS AKE as you may say and in this case it was ALL about them .

Ward charged Louann Bowers, 33, and Sinhue Johnson, 45, with five felony counts of CHILD ENDANGERMENT

Louann Bowers ran away from “a very chaotic household” when she was 16 and “didn’t want to be found,” attorney Ronald Gross said .”I think, unfortunately, Mom’s desire to not be found by her family impacted the children’s growth,” he said. “She realizes now, `I should have done it differently.’”Johnson’s public defender did not return a phone message seeking comment on the case, which was first reported by The York Dispatch and York Daily Record.

“None of the children are at their expected education levels, and there are possible mental health issues. “Years of isolation have taken their toll on the siblings. Now living in foster homes, “some of the children suffer health and vision issues “. Since their discovery, the children have been vaccinated and the older ones have been enrolled in school .

Ward said it appeared that all seven family members had lived in a single room on the second floor. He said all the utilities were shut off. Rainwater came through the leaky roof and was collected in buckets.

Police tracked the family to a hotel outside York. Johnson was gone, but Bowers opened the door, her head concealed by a dark veil. The detective found the children hiding in a bathroom, three girls and two boys. They hadn’t bathed and appeared unkempt. They left with investigators without saying a word — and refused to provide any information.

“They did say that they were not permitted to talk about the family or the living conditions,” Ward said.

“There are still a lot of unanswered questions from our end,” Ward said, “because no one will talk to us.”