STRATTON – A 39-year-old mother is accused of causing burn marks on her 4-year-old daughter’s legs as punishment for “being bad.”
The mother, Jessica LaPlante of Dead River Road was arrested and transported to the Franklin County Detention Center on Tuesday, charged with Class C, felony assault.
The investigation began on Tuesday morning when Franklin County Sheriff’s Detective Ken Charles was notified by the state’s Department of Health and Human Services of alleged child abuse in Stratton.
The father of Rangeley, who is divorced from LaPlante, “brought his 4-year-old daughter to the family doctor with what looked like burns on her legs,” said Sheriff Scott Nichols in a news release Wednesday morning. The child had reportedly disclosed to the father that her mother had burned her because she was “being bad.”
The family physician verified to investigators that the wounds on the child were consistent with burn marks. Charles believes “the method used to burn the child was an electric wood burning engraver tool,” Nichols said.
Following interviews, LaPlante was charged with felony assault and taken into custody. She remains at the jail with no bail set until she has her initial court appearance today.
Additional charges may be forthcoming after the case is reviewed by the District Attorney’s Office, Nichols added.
in the interest of innocent untill proven guilty—I’m just going to say that burning a child with a wood tool is so horrendous, terrible, I just can’t imagine what a person could have going on in their head to do something like that. But, usually and adult who acts out abuse such as this….had similar abuses acted out on them. Child abuse is a “learned behavior”.
WOW , So Sad…….
How could anyone do that to a child?
People need to stop and think of what the consequences will be before treating others in such a cruel manner!
I think the community needs to take a long hard look at it’s culture/ psycho-social traditions. This is common here. There is so much abuse and neglect of animals, children, elderly—- it stems from an inability to appropriately care for/ understand the needs responsibilities of “things in your care that you have power over”. People who inflict harm and neglect on any kind of “dependent” typically don’t invent these behaviors themselves—they are the product of multi-generations of maladaptive psycho-social norms/ behavior passed around person to person, generation to generation, wash rinse repeat.
Come on Franklin County—-we all have heard the stories whispered about atrocious abuses, drug and alcohol issues, sexual exploitation, animal abuse— about people we know, our family relations—there is a sad and violent history woven in the fabric of this region going back a long time—unless we of the 21st century stand up and refuse to keep brushing things under the rug, enabling, minimizing, pretending things here aren’t as bad as they truly are——–nothing will ever change and this area will remain an icky little testament to the dark side of the industrial revolution and history of rural Maine
Irene, this behavior is not distinct to Franklin County. It happens all over the Country, all over the World. It is unfortunate and unacceptable, but don’t presume to soil the reputation of small-town Maine. There are many families who have instilled good values and good morals in their children.
Irene, you need to find new people to hang out with.
Well said Irene.