Henderson parents arrested after 11-year-old was held in makeshift ‘jail cell’ for 6 years

LAS VEGAS (KLAS) — Two Henderson parents were arrested Tuesday after an 11-year-old child diagnosed with autism was found in a makeshift “jail cell” after missing school, documents show police records obtained by 8 News Now.

On April 23, at approximately 10:15 a.m., officers from the City of Henderson Police Department and the Clark County School District Police Department conducted a welfare check in the 2000 block of Silverton Drive, near Wigwam and North Green Valley Parkways.

The welfare check was requested due to a truancy or absence from school issue involving a student. The truancy officer told police that when they knocked on the door, no one answered, but they could hear a child screaming and a gate slamming inside, according to a truancy report. ‘arrest.

When police arrived, Jeffery Scanlan, 41, opened the door about 40 minutes later. He told police his children were absent from school because they were sick, according to the report.

When police asked Jeffery if they could watch the children, he agreed and led them inside, where police found an 11-year-old boy in a “large metal enclosure” with metal bars and locked doors, “similar to a prison cell”. ” according to the report.

The boy was wearing only a diaper and the enclosure had feces on the floor and walls, the report states. Jeffery told police the child had been diagnosed with “severe autism spectrum disorder.”

Three other children were in the house when police arrived. While police were at the home, Jeffery’s wife, Misty Scanlan, 46, was returning home from work.

Officers said the home was “in extreme disarray and smelled of feces,” the report states. While searching the house, police found two bedrooms with little or no furniture and feces on the walls, ceilings and floors. Both bedrooms had exterior locks with no ability to open from the inside, according to the report.

One bedroom had a single mattress on the floor while the other bedroom had no furniture.

Jeffery told police the child in the enclosure was “big and strong” and could be very aggressive, destroying the house, punching holes in the wall and trying to run away to neighbors’ homes.

Jeffery added that the child attends school and “does well there, but often has difficulty at home,” the report states.

He said the child “prefers” the enclosure to his bedroom and will sleep on a couch there. He told police his enclosure had two doors, one that is permanently locked and another that is closed with a string because the child “hasn’t figured out the knots yet” and can’t open the door .

When asked if the child would be able to go outside in an emergency, Jeffery said someone would have to let him out.

One of the children told police he believed the pen had been in the house for “about two years.” Jeffery later told police he was actually there for six hours.

Two children and Misty told police they had tried to clean both the enclosure and rooms “once a week” but it had been several weeks since their last cleaning.

Jeffery and Misty said one of their other children, who was also diagnosed with autism, was “an escape artist” so they would lock him in his room when it was time to sleep and tape the top of her shirt on her diaper so she couldn’t collect feces from it until it was changed, the report states.

Jeffery and Misty told police they had received referrals from the child’s school, but did not request one for any of the children in the home because they “didn’t know where to start” or “wanted strangers in (their) house,” according to the report.

Police took Jeffery and Misty into custody and booked them into the Henderson Detention Center on charges of child abuse/neglect.

The 11-year-old boy was taken to a local hospital and Child Protective Services took the other three children into their custody.

According to court records, both men posted bond Wednesday morning. The next court appearance is scheduled for May 14.

Anyone with information about this case is asked to call the Henderson Police Department.
at 702-267-4911, 3-1-1 or, to remain anonymous, call Crime Stoppers at 702-385-5555
or visit the Crime Stoppers website.

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