Minnesota – Two people who worked at a daycare in Minnesota have been arrested for severely abusing babies at a nearby childcare center. The workers, identified as E. Wiemerslage, 22, and C. Johnson, 24, are facing several charges, such as intentionally hurting a kid and assaulting someone under the age of 4.
Authorities made the disturbing finding that a 5-month-old baby had strange injuries on its body, which led to the arrest. This led to an investigation that found surveillance tape from the childcare center that showed the abuse.
On July 16, hospital staff told the daycare center about marks on the legs of a 5-month-old baby. This set off a chain of events. Worried parents saw new wounds on their child when they picked her up from daycare and called right away to find out what was going on. At first, people who worked at the daycare thought that the injuries might have been caused by the chairs or swings that were there. When detectives talked to the accused workers, Johnson and Wiemerslage, they said the same things that the daycare had said at first, which was that the injuries were caused by regular daycare activities. However, the truth was much scarier, as shown by the daycare’s surveillance film.
The surveillance films showed very upsetting things. In one video clip, Johnson is seen hitting a baby too hard. The woman grabs the child by the upper thighs and roughly flips her back and forth. As the baby cries out, her head keeps hitting the floor mat. Johnson was seen on another video putting a cloth over the mouth of another crying baby. What Wiemerslage did was just as shocking. You can see her on video picking up a crying baby by the arms, pulling it across a floor mat, and then slamming it against a pillow. These bad things happened while Wiemerslage and Johnson were taking care of both babies. They were the only adults in the room.
After being arrested, both Wiemerslage and Johnson were freed on bond, which made the families of the victims and people in the community very angry. Parents of the mistreated children, including the parent whose 5-month-old son was one of the victims, have taken to social media to say how shocked and angry they are and to demand justice and more attention. Authorities have called what the daycare workers did “extraordinarily shocking,” which emphasizes how parents’ trust in childcare providers was broken. Captain M. Boerboom was sad that he knew people who were supposed to guard and care for children were doing such horrible things.
While the cases are still being heard in court, the community and the families of the victims are left to deal with the abuse’s reality. This story shows how important it is for childcare facilities to have strict rules and oversight to stop horrible things like this from happening. The charges against Wiemerslage and Johnson are very serious and carry long prison terms, which shows how bad their acts were. Even though the community is upset, they are still hoping that justice will be done and that future generations will be safe from such terrible harm.
