You couldn’t possibly make this story up.
A northeast Illinois man who had sewn his son’s buttocks shut has accepted a plea agreement and will not serve any time in prison.
Randy Swopes, 52, of Waukegan, Ill., entered an Alford plea Friday to aggravated battery for using using a needle and thread to sew his son’s butt closed. In an Alford plea, the defendant is not admitting guilt but acknowledges that prosecutors have enough evidence to possibly win a conviction. Swopes was sentenced to 24 months of probation and 250 hours of community service.
What you want to know is this: Why would a father ever do such a thing as close his son’s rectum so that he could not engage in normal bowel movements?
Swopes’ son reportedly suffers from a condition known as Crohn’s Disease. WebMD’s website list the condition is an inflammatory bowel disease that causes, “inflammation or ulceration of the digestive tract.”
In January 2008, the disease caused Swopes’ son, then 14, to develop a fistula. One Crohn’s information website describes a fistula as, “an abnormal tunnel connecting two body cavities that are not usually connected, such as the rectum and the vagina. A fistula can also be a body cavity to the skin such as the rectum to the outside of the body.”
Fistulas are often solved through medication and, in grave cases, surgery. Ouch
In the case of Swopes’ son, the fistula was on the boy’s buttocks. But instead of taking the ailing boy into the hospital treat it, Swope thought of a better idea: a needle and some thread. He would just close the orifice, as if the boy would never need that portal ever again, Lake County Assistant State’s Attorney Danielle Pascucci told the Lake County News-Sun.
The home remedy did not work (duh!) and the wound became infected. The boy was hospitalized for about a month while he recovered. The father, while free, is definitely guilty of stupidity in the first degree.
The aggravated battery charge normally carries a maximum sentence of five years in prison, but as a result of the Alford plea, Swopes granted 24 months of probation and 250 hours of community service. I guess they decided he was too dumb to survive in prison.
— terry shropshire
