Well that's a bummer - I can't access either one of the articles you posted. Could you give a 10% synopsis on what is being said? TIA!
AND!! Are there any court dates in there?
I have been checking the jail site and still no court date. The hands of time turn slowly in Effingham.
More than 10% but...from SMN.
This time six years ago, a talkative Elwyn Crocker Jr. recounted to a case manager the tons of toys he got for Christmas — many were provided by the school he attended.
Elwyn Jr., or “J.R.” as he was called, was eating well, sleeping well and doing exceptionally well in fifth grade.
The report, and the facts it relied on, helped to persuade the Georgia Division of Family and Children Services to close the Crocker case in February 2013, despite a number of reports from the previous summer and fall indicating a troubled home life for J.R. and his sister Mary.
After an alleged June 2012 beating by J.R.’s step uncle prompted DFCS to open a case, a counselor noted in August, “J.R. is not the person who needs sessions. They do,” meaning his father, stepmother and other adult relatives.
Fast forward to this past Dec. 20, when the
bodies of J.R. and Mary were found buried in the back yard of their home in the Guyton area. Now neighbors and others are asking how two deaths so horrendous could have happened so close to them.
Sheila Dease-Dinkins, a regional director for DFCS in Springfield, said the agency will review the case because of the deaths and determine what, if anything should be changed. But she said she couldn’t point a finger to say the agency should have done something differently.
“It’s not just one agency’s responsibility,” Dease-Dinkins said. “It takes a village.” She encouraged the public not to hesitate to report a concern or suspicious activity involving children.
But in 2017 when a student reported an incident about the Crockers that had happened a year earlier, the DCFS professionals who reviewed it considered it historical so the case was not reopened.
“The report was about something that happened in the past. We had no information any of that was ongoing,” said Walter Jones, director of communications and legislative affairs for the Georgia Division of Children and Family Services in Atlanta.
DFCS will review the case after “the emotions are not quite so raw,” Jones said, to look at it objectively about what the policy should be. Immediately after a child’s death, the natural reaction is, “That’s horrible. We should have done a million things differently,” he said.
Neighbors who lived near the Crocker children on Redbud Lane said the family wasn’t friendly. Several people recalled run-ins with the parents about the pit bulls they owned. Others said the children’s step grandmother told them she didn’t want the children mingling with the neighborhood kids.
But several said they noticed Mary, who was 14 when she was last seen in October, had a look of fear on her face whenever they saw her. No one knows exactly what happened to Mary or J.R. The cause of death hasn’t been determined, but authorities have charged four relatives with child cruelty and concealing a death.
A
fifth person was charged with cruelty to children, according to the Effingham County Sheriff’s Office.
Knowing the children’s bodies were pulled from the backyard next to his is troubling to neighbor Gary “Donny” Bennett. “I feel so bad about those kids.”
Bennett said he can’t go out in his yard without looking at the spot where Mary and J.R. were buried. “I see it every day and it bothers me. It really bothers me. Really bad.”
He said the Effingham County Sheriff’s Office told him people should have reported incidents when they heard or saw them, but it wasn’t obvious what was occurring because the family kept to themselves, Bennett said.
He said the sheriff’s deputies were out about two to three weeks ago talking to neighbors but he hasn’t heard from them since. He wants to know what’s going on with the case.
“At first when it happened, I couldn’t talk about it. It upset me so much. That little girl didn’t deserve it. She was like a perfect child. She never did no wrong.”
Now Bennett hopes others will talk to the police to move the case along. “If people know, they really need to speak up,” he said.
