Inset, clockwise from top left: Donald Lantz (West Virginia Regional Jail and Correctional Facility Authority), Jeanne Whitefeather (WVRJ), and an interior photo of the shed taken by Whitefeather’s brother (WCHS). Background: The shed where the couple locked up their adopted children in 2023 (WCHS).
Five West Virginia children who were subjected to forced labor and horrific abuse by their adoptive parents won a $4.4 million settlement with the state over Child Protective Services’ handling of repeated reports about their welfare. The judge who presided over the parents’ criminal trial said the white couple used their adopted Black children as “slaves” before sentencing them to decades in prison.
Kanawha County Circuit Judge Maryclaire Akers approved the settlement Tuesday, resolving claims that state child-welfare officials failed to properly investigate warnings about the children before authorities discovered the abuse in October 2023, according to a report from West Virginia Watch.
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The $4.4 million will be divided among the five children and represents the maximum amount they could receive under the state’s applicable liability limits, according to West Virginia Watch. West Virginia Public Broadcasting also reported on the settlement.
The children’s attorney, Dante’ diTrapano, said the money will give them an opportunity to recover from what they endured.
“It means that these kids will have an opportunity to be children,” he said in a statement. “They were robbed of their innocence and robbed of their youth by the monsters that were their former parents.”
The settlement claims center on the state’s response to numerous reports about the children while they lived with Jeanne Kay Whitefeather and Donald Lantz in Sissonville. Neighbors repeatedly contacted CPS about conditions at the home but said they did not hear back about their referrals.
West Virginia Watch reported that the state did not produce documentation showing CPS made contact with the children while a referral concerning slavelike conditions was in the agency’s system. Trial testimony later established that a CPS worker had left a card at the family’s door.
DiTrapano also said CPS eventually interviewed the children but did so within earshot of their adoptive parents.
“There were a ton of calls that came in from neighbors, and I think only one visit out there,” he said, adding, “There should have been many more.”
As Law&Crime previously reported, the children’s ordeal came to light in October 2023, when law enforcement discovered that two of them had been confined in an outdoor shed at the Sissonville home. The shed lacked running water and a bathroom, and the children had been subjected to forced labor and other abusive treatment.
Whitefeather, 63, and Lantz, 64, were convicted and received sentences totaling more than 350 years in prison for their treatment of the adopted children.
The settlement does not touch the criminal case against the couple. It addresses allegations that the state’s child-welfare system ignored warnings and failed to protect the children.
The children have since been placed with new adoptive families, diTrapano said. Two of their adoptive mothers spoke at Tuesday’s hearing about the children’s current lives, including a recent beach vacation that starkly contrasted with their earlier experiences, according to a report from Charleston, West Virginia, ABC affiliate WCHS.
The state Department of Human Services declined to comment on the specific settlement or ongoing litigation. A spokesperson for Gov. Patrick Morrisey said the case predates the current administration and that the previous administration fired the employee involved. The spokesperson also cited changes to the state’s child-welfare system, including stronger training for frontline workers and implementation of the SAFE Model.
DiTrapano reportedly said his firm also plans to sue Washington state, alleging officials there let the children be transferred to West Virginia despite prior reports of abuse involving the family.
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