Perryopolis mom charged with beating son with metal hardware
Perryopolis Police issued an arrest warrant Thursday for a woman who allegedly beat her son with a piece of metal hardware, causing severe bruising.
Shannon J. Williams, 43, reportedly admitted she hit her 11-year-old son with a metal drawer slider, saying she “is allowed to punish her child however (she) wants,” according to the affidavit of probable cause filed in her case.
Fayette County Children and Youth Services petitioned to have the boy removed from the home after Williams spoke with case workers and an officer, police said. The boy was not identified in court documents.
His grandmother, Melissa Trimbath, reported suspected abuse to Perryopolis Police Feb. 26. She said she picked up her grandson from his mother’s Hancock Street home and he told her his leg hurt, asking if she would look at it. “She saw significant black and purple bruising from the child’s left knee all the way up to his groin,” and called police, Officer Ashley Sousa wrote in court documents.
Sousa met with the boy at his school Feb. 28. He reportedly told her his dresser drawer broke off its sliding rails because of weight. When he told his mother, “she was upset, screaming at him” and hit him several times in the leg with the metal slider, police alleged. He described the material as a “really hard metal, like iron,” the affidavit said. He said the incident happened a few days before his grandmother picked him up.
CYS and a Perryopolis officer conducted a home visit March 4 after police were unable to make contact with Williams, police said. She reportedly admitted to hitting the boy several times.
Police did not detail the extent of the boy’s injuries or whether he required medical treatment.
Williams is charged with aggravated assault of a person less than 13, endangering the welfare of children and two counts of simple assault.
Charges were filed Thursday before Magisterial District Judge Richard A. Kasunic II.