Kansas officials approved a $1 million settlement to the family of a 7-year-old boy whose body was fed to pigs after he was tortured under the care of his father.
Adrian Jones’ mother, sister, and grandmother filed a lawsuit in 2017 accusing the state welfare workers of failing to “step in” and save Adrian “at any point during the child’s lengthy, unimaginable ordeal,” The Associated Press reported. The settlement was announced last week, avoiding the trial that would’ve kicked off next year.
After his mother lost custody, Adrian started living with his father and stepmother before his death, The New York Post reported. Michael and Heather Jones are currently serving a 25-year to life sentence in connection to his murder.
According to the reports, Jones was beaten and left isolated in a locked shower stall for months while the couple was recording his worsening condition. Adrian, whose family said he had schizophrenia, was starved by the couple who went to extreme measures to restrain him. In 2015, his remains were discovered by police outside their Kansas City rental home in a pigpen.
The officers were initially responding to a domestic dispute between Michael and his wife.
AP previously reported that Michael explained that following Adrian’s death, they purchased the pigs that ultimately ate most of his remains. His bones, on the other hand, were placed in a tub. Jones used the excuse that Adrian was in a mental health facility to cover the truth.
Documents show that officials with the Kansas Department of Children and Families were notified about the ongoing abuse several times. Still, they didn’t have contact with Adrian for years before he died.
According to the AP, officials claimed that because Adrian, his father, and stepmother constantly moved between Kansas and Missouri, it was difficult to keep track of him.
Separately, Adrian’s family reportedly sued Jackson County, Missouri, officials in 2017 and reached an undisclosed settlement three years later.
“This has been a long journey for Adrian’s family,” Matt Birch, the family’s attorney, told the outlet. “The most important thing for the family was to hopefully make a change and make this less likely to happen in the future.”
Following the incident, state officials enacted “Adrian’s Law” in 2021 to improve the system. It “requires the Kansas Department for Children and Families (DCF) or a representative of the law enforcement agency investigating the report to both visually observe and interact with children alleged to be victims of abuse and neglect.”
