Joe Harker
Warning: This article contains discussion of child abuse which some readers may find distressing.
A Pennsylvania couple have been arrested after police found five children trapped in 'deplorable living conditions'.
65-year-old James Russell Kahl and 41-year-old Carly Kahl were charged after police investigated a home in Redstone Township and found the couple's five children living in a room described as a 'dungeon'.
According to KDKA News the children were kept in a room with no beds and boarded up windows which was infested with fleas and faeces smeared on the walls.
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Police say the bedroom door locked from the outside with three deadbolts and there was no handle on the inside, meaning the children could not get out of there.
Cameras were also installed in there which authorities said were hardwired to James Russell Kahl's room.
State troopers were deployed to the house on 8 August after a complaint was raised about the children by a relative, who are aged between five and 14, with them finding 'deplorable conditions'.
The five children were taken out of the house and placed with Pennsylvania's Children and Youth Services where they currently reside.
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Fayette County District Attorney Michael Aubele said: "We are very, very happy that a family member was willing to come forward and report this to us.
"We are very happy with our Children and Youth Services, who removed these children, and our Belle Vernon state police, that continued this investigation long after the children were removed to make the arrest that they did today."
The parents were taken into custody and investigators found a stun gun, a replica gun, drugs, drug paraphernalia and a surveillance camera in the house.
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They are facing a number of charges including aggravated assault, reckless endangerment and endangering the welfare of a child.
Among the accusations arrayed against the couple is that they used the stun gun to 'punish' one of the children, while a judge has denied the parents bail.
There are similar cases of children kept locked in the home by their parents, with the ordeal taking a serious toll on the children involved.
One man who was allegedly held captive by his stepmother spent over 20 years locked away from the rest of the world, with him reportedly shut in his own room since he was around 10.
Though officials made over 20 attempts to contact him he was always told to lie to the police and he eventually escaped by starting a fire.