Something was indeed terribly wrong with Bruce, who at less than 4 ft. tall and 45 lbs. looked like a skinny 10-year-old but was actually 19 and woe-fully malnourished. On Oct. 10 police found him rooting through a neighbor's garbage for food and quickly removed him and six other nonbiological children from their home in middle-class Collingswood. They later arrested the boys' adoptive parents, Ray and Vanessa Jackson, charging that they had starved the children for several years. According to investigators, the boys—ranging in age from 9 to 19 and weighing about a third of what they should have—were fed uncooked pancake batter, peanut butter and cereal and kept out of the family's pad-locked kitchen; some of them may have resorted to eating wallboard and insulation. The case, said shaken Camden County Prosecutor Vincent Sarubbi, is "the most horrible we have ever encountered in our child-abuse unit."
It is also an unusually baffling saga of child endangerment. Raymond Jackson, 50, and Vanessa, 48, seemed to many to be excellent parents. They were admired in their church and community; their children, all but one of whom were homeschooled, were well-behaved. But the Jacksons apparently favored their four biological children (including one son) who lived in the house, two adopted girls and one foster daughter, all apparently healthy. "The girls look like your average kids, while the boys were bony and gaunt, with a vacant look in their eyes," says someone close to the investigation. "The difference is striking." What's more, four caseworkers and one inspector from New Jersey's Department of Human Services paid 38 visits to the Jacksons' three-story, five-bedroom home since 1999. Not one "voiced any concern or took any action to follow up on the condition of the boys," the division's commissioner Gwendolyn Harris said last week. "This is unacceptable."
Friends and neighbors, too, accepted the Jacksons' explanation for their sons' haggard appearances: Bruce, Keith, 14, Tyrone, 10, and Michael, 9, suffered from severe eating disorders even before they were adopted between 1995 and 1997. "When we had them over to our house, they seemed like normal kids to me," says one family friend. "I admired Ray and Vanessa for taking in children who had medical problems." The Rev. Harry Thomas, 60, pastor of the Come Alive New Testament Church in nearby Medford, which the Jacksons regularly attended, remembers them describing Bruce's eating disorder. "They said he would eat litter, eat the walls, and not because he was hungry," says Thomas, who believed Bruce was only 10. "He'd eat it, throw it up and chew on it like cows chew on cud."
Many who knew the Jacksons insist that, with the exception of Bruce, the boys appeared active and even energetic. They were hardly kept hidden from view and often attended church and community events. "They would do dance routines, and the older kids would make up choreography for the younger ones," says Anne Ricchini, 36, who saw them at church talent shows. "They always hugged me, and they were always affectionate."
Officials finally became aware of the abuse on Oct. 10 when a neighbor called police at 2:52 a.m. to report a child foraging through his trash. Officers found Bruce and later questioned both parents, who claimed their sons ate sparingly because they suffered from acid reflux but admitted the boys hadn't seen doctors for five years. An investigation revealed two of them had eating problems when they joined the family and the other two were born with fetal alcohol syndrome. Yet doctors ruled out the ailments as the cause of their being malnourished, and on Oct. 24 police arrested the Jacksons.
Why they might have starved their sons remains a mystery. The Jacksons received as much as $28,000 a year from the state for taking in the children, including $700 a month toward their $1,000 rent. Still, they owed $9,000 in back rent and had had their electricity cut off in June (their church recently paid their $1,900 bill). The Jacksons are now in the Camden County jail, while foster families are caring for their nonbiological children. Meanwhile, five child-welfare field-workers and four managers have been fired because of the case.
The boys, at least, have benefited from the swirling scandal. Bruce remains hospitalized, but he has already gained 8 lbs. The other boys are also putting on weight and even recently attended a birthday party. "The prognosis for these kids is really good," says Laurie Facciarossa, a spokeswoman for New Jersey's Department of Human Services. "They need a little love, care and attention and proper nutrition." While they continue to recover, others are searching hard for answers to disturbing questions. "How could we have them in our church and never see this?" the Rev. Thomas says community members have been asking him. "This is not the family we know, not at all. We are all hoping the truth will soon come out."
ALEX TRESNIOWSKI
Diane Herbst in Collingswood and Liza Hamm and Sharon Cotliar in New York City
- Contributors:
- Diane Herbst,
- Liza Hamm,
- Sharon Cotliar.
Saved by the Bell Reunion
The hookups, the meltdowns, the memoires
The case reveals what was really going on what they think of each other now!
