The HUGHES Children - 7, 4 and 3 yo - Lantana (S of Lake Worth) FL

A Lantana man who police say left his home and three young children
neglected and covered in filth faces child cruelty charges.
This morning, Michael Jacob Hughes, 27, was ordered held in lieu of $9,000 bail.
Palm Beach County Circuit Judge Ted S. Booras also ordered he have no
contact with the children.



"It's one of the worst conditions I've ever reviewed," Assistant
State Attorney Mary Ann Duggan told the judge.
She said Hughes' 7- and 4-year-old sons, and 3-year-old daughter had
been turned over to his mother-in-law. A a hearing on their custody was set
for today at the main courthouse downtown.
"I have no one to blame other than myself. I can't believe I let this go
so far," Hughes, listed as an unemployed fisherman, told Lantana
police, according to a report. "I am a horrible father."
The report said authorities plan to also charge Hughes' wife, Kaye Fox Hughes,
with child neglect, but jail records today did not yet show her having been arrested.
The police report said the Florida Department of Children and Families also
came to the home in November 2009.
Just after noon on Thursday, a DCF investigator called officers to the
home, in the 900 block of West Bloxham Street, the police report said.
According to the report, Hughes answered the door, then shut it. He eventually relented.
A Lantana police officer said the home was filled with trash both inside
and outside, with clothes and other items spread throughout.
The officer found dirty floors, rotting garbage, and filled and unfilled
prescription bottles of oxycodone and other medications.
The children appeared to have been wearing the same clothes for a long time,
and while there were piles of dirty and soiled laundry, the officer could
find no clean clothes.
According to the report, officers wrote of finding two small dogs, a cat
and several kittens, and several piles of pet waste - including one in a
child's bed - "which appeared to have not been discarded in weeks."
In court this morning, prosecutor Duggan told the judge Hughes had
previous arrests for felony burglary and grand theft and had been charged with a
probation violation in 2007.