A white West Virginia couple held black children as slaves in a dilapidated barn

A white West Virginia couple has been arrested for adopting black children to use as slaves and letting them live in a dilapidated barn behind their property.

Donald Ray Lantz, 63, and Jeanne Kay Whitefeather, 62, are accused of locking the five adopted black children in a “deplorable” shed behind their home in Kanawha County, West Virginia, about 15 miles south of the capital, Charlestonaccording to the New York Post.

The suspects pleaded not guilty Tuesday to multiple crimes, including human trafficking of a minor child, use of a minor child in forced labor and child neglect creating a significant risk of serious bodily harm or death.

“(The plaintiff) alleges human trafficking, human rights violations and the use of forced labor,” the spokesperson said Kanawha County Circuit Judge Maryclaire Akers. “Human rights violations specifically related to the fact that these children were targeted because of their race and effectively used as slaves, as alleged in the indictment,” the complaint said. WV Metro News.

The couple was originally arrested in October 2023 when authorities conducted a welfare check after a neighbor said the couple was keeping the five children – ages 6, 9, 11, 14 and 16 — in a shed on their property Sissonville, West Virginia.

Months after the couple posted bail, they were arrested again when police found the two eldest children locked in the shed wearing dirty and torn clothes. Police said both teens smelled of body odor, were forced to sleep on the floor, had only a dixie to use and no running water. The teenage boy had scratches and sores on his feet because he had no shoes, WV Metro News reports.

When the children were interviewed by authorities, they reportedly spoke of systemic abuse by the parents on the Sissonville estate and in their home in Tonasket, Washington. The New York Post reports that prosecutors have evidence that the couple sold their home and fled to West Virginia because they were under investigation in Washington state.

Kanawha County Prosecutor Christopher Krivonyak successfully petitioned the judge in the case to increase the couple’s bond. He argued that for the first time, they could secure bail by using the fruits of their crime – alleged slavery and human trafficking – to get out of temporary confinement.