UNNAMED SISTERS - 11 and 5 yo/ Accused: Parents; Melvin and Pauline Morse - Georgetown DE

UPDATED: Del. Pediatrician, Wife Accused of Endangering Their Children

Posted: Aug 08, 2012 10:51 AM CDT
Updated: Aug 09, 2012 7:37 AM CDT
By Corrina Pysa

GEORGETOWN, Del. (WBOC/AP)- A Georgetown pediatrician and his wife have been charged with recklessly endangering their two daughters, including the use of a form of discipline that police say the man called "waterboarding."

Melvin L. Morse, 58, and Pauline L. Morse, 40, are each charged with four counts of first-degree reckless endangering (felony), second-degree conspiracy (felony) and two counts of endangering the welfare of a child (misdemeanor).

Police said the arrests stemmed from an investigation that got under way after detectives were notified about a domestic assault incident that occurred on July 12, in which Melvin Morse grabbed his 11-year-old daughter by the ankle and began dragging her across a gravel driveway at their home. According to investigators, Melvin Morse then brought the child inside the home and began spanking her. Morse was arrested on July 16 and charged with two counts of endangering the welfare of a child and one count of third-degree assault in connection with the alleged incident. He was later released after posting $750 secured bail.

Troopers said that on Aug. 6, the 11-year-old was brought to the Child Advocacy Center where she was interviewed. According to police, the girl informed detectives that over the course of a two-year period, beginning in May 2009, she was disciplined by her father by what he called "waterboarding." Police said this act was performed on her by her father holding her face under a running faucet, causing the water to go up her nose and all over her face. This form of punishment was used on her no less than four different occasions, investigators said.

"I believe if there's a need to punish a child, punish your child but don't torture your child," said Charity Truitt, who lives in the same neighborhood as the Morse family.

"Going overboard and dragging, trying to drown a kid, that's too far," added neighbor Daniel Ramseur Jr. "That is too far and in my opinion, the guy should be locked up without bail."

Police said the victim's mother, Pauline Morse, witnessed a few of these incidents and failed to stop Melvin from performing the act.

Melvin Morse operates a pediatric practice in Milton, and is also known around the world for his research on near-death experiences. Police said state medical regulators have been notified about the arrests.

"I heard about this similar happening in Lewes with the doctor there and now, to have somebody just down the street do something like that to a young kid, it's ridiculous," remarked Ramseur.

Yvonne Dodd, of La Red Health Center in Georgetown, has spent 30 years in social work and says she has never heard of a cast like this. According to Dodd, Dr. Morse's daughter will likely suffer for the rest of her life.

"The definition of trauma is usually when someone's in fear of their life for themselves or someone that they love, so if that caused trauma, which that probably caused trauma in her, she'll be living with those effects for a long time," she said.

Melvin and Pauline Morse were arrested at their home on Aug. 7 and brought back to Troop 4 where they were booked on the aforementioned charges. Melvin Morse was ordered held on $14,500 secured bail. He was issued a no contact order with either of the children and Pauline. Pauline Morse was released on $14,500 unsecured bail was ordered to have no contact with either of the children or Melvin.

The children are currently in the care of Division of Family Services, police said.

http://www.wboc.com/story/19227061/georgetown-couple-arrested-for-endangering-their-children

Parents Arrested, Dad Accused Of 'Waterboarding' Daughter

Posted: Aug 08, 2012 10:42 AM CDT
Updated: Aug 08, 2012 10:42 AM CDT

GEORGETOWN, Del. - A Delaware man accused of "waterboarding" his daughter faces reckless endangerment, child endangerment and conspiracy charges along with his wife, state police said Wednesday.

Charged with seven counts each are Melvin L. Morse, 58, and Pauline L. Morse, 40, both of Georgetown.

Police said the victims in the case are their 11- and 5-year-old daughters.

The alleged incidents occurred between May 2009 and May 2011 on the 20000 block of Lewes-Georgetown Highway, authorities said.

The father is being held at the Sussex Correctional Institution on bail set at $14,500, while the mother was released on bond of the same amount.

Police said their investigation began after detectives were informed of a July 12 domestic assault during which Melvin Morse allegedly grabbed the 11-year-old by her ankle and began dragging her across a gravel driveway. According to police, he then brought the girl inside the home and began spanking her.

The father was arrested on four days later on two endangerment and assault counts and was released after posting $750 bail.

Then, on Monday, the 11-year-old was brought to the Child Advocacy Center, where she was interviewed and told detectives that over a two-year period she was disciplined by her father using what he called "waterboarding." She alleged that her father, on at least four occasions, held the her face under a running facet, causing the water to go up her nose and all over her face.

The mother is accused of witnessing a few of these incidents and failing to stop her husband, police said.

Both parents were arrested Tuesday at their home. At their arraignment, they were ordered not to have any contact with each other or their children, who are now in the care of Division of Family Services, police said.

http://www.myfoxphilly.com/story/19226874/couple-arrested-dad-accused-of-waterboarding-daught

I personally don't believe waterboarding is torture, from a political pov, but it certainly shouldn't be uses a form of discipline. It should be reserved for terrorists when getting information from this is a matter of life and death for our military. However, my opinion on the matter is irrelevent because if I'm not mistaken the US gov't has decided it is torture and therefore, if we can't use is on enemies of the state, how in the hell can a pediatrician justify using it as a form of discipline on children?

Gingernlw wrote:I personally don't believe waterboarding is torture, from a political pov, but it certainly shouldn't be uses a form of discipline. It should be reserved for terrorists when getting information from this is a matter of life and death for our military. However, my opinion on the matter is irrelevent because if I'm not mistaken the US gov't has decided it is torture and therefore, if we can't use is on enemies of the state, how in the hell can a pediatrician justify using it as a form of discipline on children?

It is torture. That was established decades ago when the Geneva convention declared it illegal.

That is why it is done, to torture. Whether or not that is proper is another argument. It is torture. People die from it. The US considered it torture when it was done to our citizens.

This man is insane and needs to be caged like the animal he is.

Um, yeah, that's pretty much what I just said.

Gingernlw wrote:Um, yeah, that's pretty much what I just said.

Funny, this is what I read posted under your name:

I personally don't believe waterboarding is torture, from a political pov

Well, see that's the problem with taking something out context. I went on to say

Gingernlw wrote:However, my opinion on the matter is irrelevent because if I'm not mistaken the US gov't has decided it is torture...

I specifically said it was from my political POV that I don't believe it qualifies, but that my personal opinion on the matter doesn't matter. I don't feel the need to get into a political debate or defend my position because that's not the purpose of this board. However, I am entitled to my opinion and I am entitled to mention it in posts as it may be relevent to what I'm saying. I'm certainly not the only person in this country who feels this way.

You can have your opinion. But you replied to my post that it was pretty much what you said. It was not.

You said you don't consider it torture. Which doesn't resemble what I said in the slightest. I do consider it torture.

I'm pretty much deleting my response. I didn't want to outright delete in case someone saw it and got confused or something. Anyway, just decided to wasn't worth it.

Torture or not it's still child ABUSE. That's just unacceptable.
Good that they are barred for seeing their kids.
The kids will still have psyc issues to deal with. But at least they
are alive. That could have gone bad. I mean water up the nose.
She could have died with water in the lungs.

William

Records show troubles for 'waterboarding' doctor

Source: United States News
Originally published: Aug 15, 2012 - 8:03 am

DOVER, Del. (AP) - To many people, Dr. Melvin Morse was a brilliant pediatrician at a renowned children's hospital and a best-selling author who parlayed his research on near-death experiences into appearances on "Larry King Live" and "The Oprah Winfrey Show."

Away from the spotlight, however, Morse was tormented by personal and financial problems and, according to court records, wrestled with depression, substance abuse and even suicidal thoughts. His latest trouble involves allegations of waterboarding his 11-year-old stepdaughter, using the simulated drowning technique to bring her to "a possible near-death state," police have said.

Based on his work involving children's near-death experiences, police suggested he may have been experimenting on her.

Morse, 58, was accused in July of grabbing his daughter by the ankle and dragging her across a gravel driveway. When police did a follow-up interview last week, the girl said Morse had held her face under running water at least four times since 2009, using faucets in the kitchen, bathroom sink and bathtub. Her mother, Pauline Morse, witnessed some of the waterboarding but did nothing to stop it, police said.

Both Melvin and Pauline Morse are free on bail. They face a preliminary hearing Thursday on felony endangerment and conspiracy charges.

In an interview with The Associated Press, Melvin Morse called the charges an overreaction by authorities. An attorney for Morse, Joe Hurley, said the idea that Morse was experimenting on his own daughter was "the sheerest of speculation."

Morse began researching near-death experiences in children about three decades ago after the near drowning of one of his patients. He was fascinated by the spiritual experiences the girl, and other children, described to him, including images of light, heaven and tunnels.

He sought to prove that drugs were causing the hallucinations, though he said his research proved otherwise. In 1990, he published "Closer to the Light," which spent several weeks on the New York Times bestseller list. He was featured in a Rolling Stone magazine story, and television shows had him on to speak about paranormal experiences.

He worked for Seattle Children's Hospital and Seattle Magazine listed Morse among the city's best doctors for more than a decade beginning in 1995, according to Morse's website. But by 2007, Morse had retired from full-time medical practice and moved to Delaware. Hepatitis C that he contracted in 1998 while treating children became too much of a toll on his health for him to continue working full time and he was declared disabled, he said.

While Morse once earned a six-digit income, he has struggled financially for years and owes tens of thousands of dollars in back taxes.

"I have the most ordinary reasons for that- the collapse of my income and my first divorce," Morse said. "I do not have an adversarial relationship with the IRS. ... I'll eventually repay my taxes."

Morse's financial problems are outlined in court records from a contentious divorce and custody battle with his first wife that stretched on for nearly a decade.

Morse's ex-wife, Allison Morse, claimed her ex-husband has abused prescription drugs and made false accusations against their adopted children that have led to criminal charges against them.

"He is a pathological liar and he makes stuff up about his own children," she told the AP.

At the same time, Allison said Morse was a good dad and never abused their three adopted children during their marriage of almost 20 years.

As the marriage began to unravel in the late 1990s, however, he became more and more emotionally unstable, she said.

"He was just angry all the time and just really had some severe emotional problems going on," she said.

Allison said she was never able to find out why her husband was so troubled.

In 2006, Morse said in court papers he was once the subject of an inquiry by the Medical Quality Assurance Commission in Washington, which he blamed on stress from his marital problems. Morse said he accepted three months of psychiatric treatment.

In that same court filing, he denied that he had a history of multiple suicide attempts but said he made a "suicide gesture" when his marriage was falling apart by swallowing prescription pills.

In separate court filings, Morse referred to an earlier suicide attempt and being taken to an emergency room in November 2001 for "drug overdose, alcoholism, and depression."

Morse has published several books over the years, and writings include a quasi-autobiographical story in which he describes how an imaginary falcon told him to move "quickly in the dark of night" to the East Coast, where his destiny lay and where he could find rich soil for his "BIG IDEA" to grow.

Morse, who said he uses "a lot of irony and a lot of tongue-in-cheek" expressions when he writes, told the AP his "BIG IDEA" involved a theory of consciousness based on his study of children who have suffered cardiac arrest.

"These children made it clear that consciousness persists despite having dying, dysfunctional brains," he said. The theory is that brains are linked to "a non-local consciousness and a timeless, spaceless reality," which Morse calls the "God Spot."

Morse currently lives with Pauline Morse in Delaware with their two children, the 11-year-old girl and her 6-year-old sister. Their marriage was at one point dissolved, and it's not clear if they remarried. Their children have been placed in state custody.

Just before Melvin Morse's arrest last month, P.M.H. Atwater, a fellow researcher into near-death experiences, said she saw him at a conference in Montreal.

"He gave one of the best keynote addresses he has ever given in his life," she said.

But when she went to hug Morse, Atwater sensed something was wrong.

"I just picked up a lot of worry, a lot of stress, a lot of problems," she said.

http://ktar.com/23/1567020/Doctor-in-waterboarding-case-State-overreacting

Doctor, wife take case to Superior Court
Accused of endangering their daughter, Morses waive hearing

By Melissa Steele | Aug 16, 2012

Lawyers for Melvin and Pauline Morse, parents accused of using waterboarding techniques to discipline their 11-year-old daughter, waived a preliminary hearing in Court of Common Pleas Aug. 16, moving the case to Superior Court.

Joseph Hurley, attorney for Melvin Morse, withdrew a motion to allow Melvin Morse have contact with his wife. An order that the two have no contact is part of their release from custody on felony charges of first-degree reckless endangering involving their 11-year-old daughter filed against them Aug. 7. Melvin Morse was released Aug. 10 on $14,500 secured bond; Pauline Morse on $14,500 unsecured. Both are prohibited from contacting their daughters, 11 and 5, who are in foster care.

Read More: http://capegazette.villagesoup.com/news/story/doctor-wife-take-case-to-superior-court/884383

April 11, 2014, 1:42 PM
Doctor going to prison for waterboarding girl, 11

Melvin Morse, 60, was sentenced to three years in prison on Friday, April 11, 2014, for waterboarding the daughter of his longtime companion by holding her head under a faucet CBS News


GEORGETOWN, Del. - A former Delaware pediatrician has been sentenced to three years in prison for waterboarding the daughter of his longtime companion by holding her head under a faucet.

A judge also sentenced Melvin Morse, 60, to probation on Friday for other charges related to the then-11-year-old girl's abuse. Morse was charged with three felones, one for waterboarding and one for suffocation by hand, after the girl ran away in July 2012 and told authorities of the abuse she had suffered.

On Feb. 13, he was convicted of one felony - waterboarding in the bathtub - and five misdemeanors.

Morse, whose medical license was suspended after his arrest, has written several books and articles on paranormal science and near-death experiences involving children. He has appeared on shows such as "Larry King Live" and the "The Oprah Winfrey Show" to discuss his research, which also has been featured on an episode of "Unsolved Mysteries" and in an article in "Rolling Stone" magazine. Morse denied police claims that he may have been experimenting on the girl, now 12.,

The girl's mother, Pauline Morse, 41, pleaded guilty last year to misdemeanor endangerment charges and testified against Melvin Morse.
Pauline Morse and her daughter testified that Melvin Morse used waterboarding as a threat or a form of punishment. Waterboarding as used in the past by U.S. interrogators on terror suspects simulates drowning. Many critics call it torture.

According to testimony, the allegations of waterboarding surfaced after the girl ran away. She went to a classmate's home the morning after Morse grabbed her by the ankle and dragged her across a gravel driveway into the home, where she was spanked and warned of worse punishment the next day. When investigators questioned the girl, she told them about what she called waterboarding.

Defense attorneys said "waterboarding" was a term jokingly used to describe hair washing.

The girl and her younger sister remain in foster care but are allowed supervised visits with Pauline Morse. Pauline Morse said she hoped her cooperation with prosecutors will bolster her chances of being reunited with her daughters.

Melvin Morse's attorney had asked the judge for mercy, saying his client is suffering from prostate cancer and other health conditions. But prosecutors said Morse deserved prison time for years of emotional and physical abuse of the girl.

Before he was sentenced, Morse turned to the girl, apologized and told her he hopes that one day she can forgive him.

http://www.cbsnews.com/news/doctor-going-to-prison-for-waterboarding-girl-11/