MYRTLE BEACH, SC (WBTW) – A Myrtle Beach couple is in jail after police found two children covered in bed bug bites and living in animal feces inside a Socastee home.
Horry County police officers went to a home off Enterprise Road in the Socastee area of Horry County Monday afternoon at the request of a DSS agent. When officers arrived, a man was removing bags of trash from the home, and told officers he lived there with his girlfriend and her two children.
Officers began to enter the home to determine if living conditions were appropriate for the two children. The police report says officers noted a “strong odor of cat urine” while they were standing on the porch, which was covered in “piles of trash with maggots and a large pile of cat litter that contained feces.”
Several cats were seen freely walking in and out of the home through a hole in the kitchen window. The report says there was no air conditioning in the home and the floor was covered in animal urine and feces.
More animals were living inside the home, including a pit bull, wild squirrel and “a cat with an infected wound on its head.” Piles of dirty dishes, bugs, and trash covered the kitchen. There was no space for the children to sleep as every inch of the bedrooms was covered in trash and dirty clothes, according to the police report.
“The odor was unbearable,” the officer writes.
The children’s mother, identified as Jenny Lynn Paradis, 43, of Myrtle Beach, said she realized the living conditions were unsuitable for the kids, but “she just didn’t feel like cleaning due to being tired.”
Officers note that the kids, 9-years-old and unknown age of the second child, were covered in bites and sores from bedbugs and fleas in the home. The kids told officers that they did take baths but the bathroom is full of spiders. One child was wearing the shoes of Paradis’ boyfriend because he didn’t have any of his own.
Both children were taken into DSS custody and received medical treatment for their poor health conditions. The malnourished animals were also removed from the home.
Paradis and her boyfriend, 22-year-old Joshua Palmer Vaught, of Myrtle Beach, were arrested and charged with two counts each of unlawful neglect of a child. Paradis also faces one charge of mistreatment of animals.
