Homeschooling’s 

Invisible Children

Children of Martin and Kathleen O'Brien

Six children, ages 9 to 17, were abused by their adoptive parents, Martin and Kathleen O’Brien. Some of the children were homeschooled. The O’Briens’ three biological children (an adult daughter, Diane, and two minor sons) were not abused and were sometimes forced to participate in the abuse. Four of the children were biological siblings from […]

Girl by James Monson

A 16-year-old girl was raped approximately 10 times by her homeschooling teacher, pastor James Monson of Gaining Ground Community Church. Pregnant with her boyfriend’s child, the girl ran away from her home in Texas in December 2011 to live with Monson, a family friend. Monson raped her in the bed they shared; she was afraid […]

Madeline Kara Neumann

Madeline Kara Neumann, 11, died of undiagnosed diabetes at the home of her parents, Leilani and Dave Neumann. She had been growing weak for several weeks prior to her death, but her parents—Pentecostal Christians who were associated with the Unleavened Bread Ministry—declined to get medical help for her due to their belief that visiting a […]

Jessyca Mullenberg

13-year-old Jessyca Mullenberg was kidnapped from her father’s home in Eau Claire, Wisconsin, by her writing teacher, Steven Oliver, on September 16, 1995. Oliver and Jessyca drove to Kansas City, Missouri, and then flew to Houston, Texas. Oliver took Jessyca from motel to motel, presenting himself as her father and physically, sexually, and mentally abusing […]

2 Children of Paul and Amanda Lavoe

Paul Lavoe beat his teenage daughter and a teenage relative adopted from Ghana with electrical cords in what one doctor called an “extremely violent assault.” The two girls were enrolled in a virtual school but quickly fell behind in their work because their parents expected them to watch their three younger children while both parents […]

Child of Lee Ann and Troy Miller

On March 12, 2004, law enforcement found Lee Ann Miller’s 17-year-old daughter living in squalor in the basement of the family home. The girl had been withdrawn from public school 3 years prior, supposedly to begin homeschooling. Soon afterwards, Miller and her husband Troy moved the family—they had 3 children together; the abused girl was […]

Child of Kathryn and Kenneth Kreier

Kathryn Kreier punished her 14 year old adopted daughter by depriving her of food, forcing her to sleep outside naked, and fracturing her fingers. Her husband Kenneth Kreier, the girl’s biological father, did nothing to stop the abuse. The abuse took place between September 2007 and December 2008, during which the girl’s weight fell from […]

Child of Chad Chritton and Melinda Drabek-Chritton

A  severely malnourished 15 year old girl was found wandering barefoot on the side of a road in the middle of a Wisconsin winter, crying, after escaping the basement dungeon where she had been confined for the past six years by her father, Chad Chritton, and stepmother, Melinda Drabek-Chritton. The girl had been pulled from […]