Cmdr. Floyd Higdon, Merced Police Dept.: "We received a call of a small child asking people to call 911."
The man who lives here says he saw the scared young boy when the couple, Bobby Lee Kinder and Felicia Long, came to his apartment Saturday morning. He says kinder kicked in his locked bedroom door to steal some small electronics and made the ten year old carry certain items away. One witness told police kinder also knocked the child to the ground and kicked him several times.
Cmdr. Floyd Higdon: "The amount of injuries to this child was from almost head to toe."
Commander Floyd Higdon says it appears the young boy had suffered a history of abuse. The ten year old and his seven year old sister were both taken into child protective custody. Meanwhile officers arrested kinder and long on several felony charges, including child abuse.
Cmdr. Floyd Higdon: "It's totally abnormal for a parent to want to injure a child and use him to commit crimes. It just goes against everything we stand for."
