How Could You? Hall of Shame-Cheryl Lane UPDATED

This will be an archive of heinous actions by those involved in child welfare, foster care and adoption. We forewarn you that these are deeply disturbing stories that may involve sex abuse, murder, kidnapping and other horrendous actions.

A September 2013 case has come to light.

From Tyler, Texas, foster mother Cheryl Lane is accused of “abusing her twin foster sons.”

The son, who was in his early teens in September 2013 when the alleged incidents occurred, testified that Cheryl Layne and her husband were responsible for multiple instances of abuse. The first incident he described took place after he said Layne became angry at how dirty the room was that he shared with his twin. The son said Layne grabbed his twin by the hair and smashed his face into a wall before throwing him to the ground. When Layne returned to the room sometime later, the son said she grabbed archery arrows and began whipping the boys with them, telling them to work faster. The son said they were left with bruises and and red marks on their arms and back. The son said Layne returned a third time and told the boys they “don’t deserve” to be in the room and made them swap rooms with other siblings. The son said he “felt pain” watching his brother get hit.

Another incident described by the son took place after Layne and her husband returned from eating out. The son said his twin and their siblings did not eat with their parents and instead ate at home. The son said it was his responsibility that night for cleaning up the kitchen, so he threw away leftover food in the garbage can. However, when his parents returned home, the son said his father saw the food in the garbage can and smashed the boy’s face into it multiple times, allegedly resulting in a nosebleed, leaving blood on his face, the floor and on the food in the garbage can. The boy said he felt “hurt, ashamed and disappointed” in himself.

The son said his father then called Layne to come downstairs, at which point his mother observed he was bleeding and crying and said “it’s my turn for the beating, go get the belt.” “Discipline with a belt” was described as a regular occurrence in the house. The son said he retrieved a belt from his father’s closet and was instructed to pull his pants down. He said his mother proceeded to hit him on his back, arm, neck, rear end and bare skin. The son said he ran away to make the beating stop and that there were marks on his back, arms and neck. The son said Layne then grabbed the food out of the garbage can and told him that he had to eat the food before he was allowed to go to sleep that night.

The son said he was forced to wear worn out clothes to school the next day as a form of punishment. He said he went to the bathroom at school with his brother and a friend to observe his injuries, at which point the friend convinced the boys to speak up about what happened. The son said he and his brother were afraid to do so because he said Layne threatened to kill them if they notified Child Protective Services. The boys ultimately notified a school counselor, nurse and school police office.

Photographs of the bruises and house were shown, as were the arrows, pillows and belt.

As the defense began cross-exmaination, they argued the witness should be dismissed due to allegedly biased answers. The defense claimed the son was known to have been in possession of steroids on July 16, 2022, and to have committed a burglary to steal beer. The son said he was aware of the accusations and that they could lead to criminal prosecution, but insisted those factors didn’t bias his testimony today.

The second foster son spoke next. He said being hit with the archery arrow was not a routine occurrence — that it was what Layne found to use on that particular day, when she allegedly said they would get less beatings if they quit football. He also spoke about the incident in which Layne’s husband allegedly held one of the sons down over the garbage can, yelling about wasting food. The second son said he saw the incident, and watched Layne give his brother “a whooping,” telling him to “stop moving, stop screaming.” He said he didn’t feel good when he saw it happening.

The twin who was testifying said he saw the marks on his brother’s back, thighs and arm that night, which made him feel so afraid he wondered if he needed to find somewhere to go. He reiterated that the boys were required to wear old clothes that weren’t theirs to school the next day: old work shoes with broken laces and shorts, despite the cold.

When he was called into the counselor’s office, he said his fear and anxiety “shot through the roof,” to the point he couldn’t control his shaking. “I couldn’t speak, and it felt like my throat was about to explode,” the boy said.

During cross-examination, the defense pursued greater specificity from the son, asking about incidences of “pushing” versus “shoving,” along with how many times and where the boys were hit with the arrow. The defense attempted to contrast the son’s current description with testimony he gave during a deposition two years ago. They showed diagrams of a bedroom, asking the son where each person was when the arrow hitting incident happened.

The defense also asked about non-corporal punishment, and the son said they had been required to work on fences or the barn, even in extreme heat, and had been barred from seeing friends. The son claimed the parents never worked outside on the harder tasks.

He also described feeling hatred towards Layne’s biological children since he and his brother were allegedly treated differently. The defense asked if there were other ways the boys were treated unequally, in relation to vacations or summer camp, and the son said yes, there were.

A technical supervisor from a DNA testing lab then spoke about blood samples taken from a pillow and the home’s laundry room floor, which she said tested positive for DNA shared by the twins. She said the kitchen floor swab tested negative for blood, and confirmed for the defense that there is no way to determine how old a blood sample may be or what caused a person to bleed in the first place.

The state then rested.”

Foster son testifies in trial of Whitehouse woman accused of child abuse

[KLTV 5/17/23]

REFORM Puzzle Piece

Update:“A Smith County woman has been found guilty of abusing her adopted twin teenage sons in 2019 following a four-day trial and hours of jury deliberations.

Cheryl Layne, of Whitehouse, who is a nurse practitioner, was charged with four counts of injury to a child with the intent to cause bodily injury in September 2019.

Her trial began Tuesday and jurors started deliberating around 11 a.m. Friday. They returned almost six hours later to convict Cheryl Layne of injury to a child.
Judge Austin Reeve Jackson said the sentencing phase of the trial will begin Tuesday morning. The defense asked for the jury to be polled to see if that was each of their verdicts, and each of them raised their hands that it was.

She and her husband, Mark Layne (a Tyler Police Department officer at the time), were both arrested in September 2019 after the 13-year-old twins reported being abused by their adopted parents to a school resource officer.

Mark Layne has not yet been indicted (formally charged) in this case and has had no court dates.

The arrest affidavit details allegations of abuse, including beating the children with an archery arrow, a belt and their hand and making them eat out of the trash. The document states the children showed bruising and redness.

On Thursday, Cheryl Layne took the stand, admitting she hit one of the twins with an archery arrow, but she claimed it was reasonable corporal punishment.

Cheryl Layne said she had to use corporal punishment in the past with all her children by using a belt, a fly swatter, a spoon, grabbing them by the ear, or by something that was handy.

During closing arguments Friday, Smith County Assistant District Attorney Emil Mikkelsen brought up part of her testimony, in which she agreed she had left belt marks on her kids before. He also raised the question of how you get an arrow mark bruise without getting hit with an arrow.

He called this punishment disturbing because the twins were take out of an already troubled household, which is why they were fostered, then adopted by the Layne family.

“They deserve justice, and you’re the only one who can give it to them. They told the truth, they asked for help,” Mikkelsen said to the jury. “Are they going to get it? They’re the kind of people that people don’t believe foster kids. Liars.”

“Defense attorney Beau Sinclair told the jury Cheryl Layne’s punishment was within reason for the twins’ behavior.

The defense claimed evidence from the start of this investigation was flawed, adding witness testimonies are inconsistent. He added that Cheryl Layne used an arrow with an intent of corporal punishment, not abuse.

“She had to look at you in the eye. And she told you, this was reasonable disciple as she went through all these things. This was reason discipline. Yeah, I did that, but that was reasonable discipline,” Sinclair said. “These were teenagers who needed a loving and firm hand.”

The state used the arrow to show the jury the “whooshing” sound — a sound they said is what the twins heard when she hit one of them. The prosecution disagreed with the defense saying all the witnesses corroborated the story the twins testified in court on Wednesday.

Cheryl Layne on Wednesday told the court the accusations made against her hurt because they were coming from her own sons. She also denied that the twins were treated like slaves.

She added that all her kids had more chores than others due to the fact that there were so many of them in one household.”

Jury finds Whitehouse woman guilty of abusing her adopted teenage twin sons
[CBS 19 5/23/23 by Zak Wellerman and Jesus Martinez]