Father Jailed for Leaving Girl in Doghouse

CHESAPEAKE, Va. — A father was ordered to spend 30 days in jail Thursday for forcing his 7-year-old daughter to sleep in a doghouse as punishment.

Christian Williams, 33, also must pay a $500 fine and take a parenting class after pleading guilty to felony abuse and neglect charges.

He told a judge he kept the child outside for two nights because less severe punishments had not deterred her bad behavior. He wanted her to understand that she could end up homeless if living with him didn’t work out, he said.

Prosecutors said the punishment lasted two weeks.

Williams and the girl’s stepmother, Jennifer Williams, were arrested Aug. 13 after a neighbor told police she heard the girl scream, “Please, Daddy, let me in.” The stepmother pleaded guilty to the same charges but has not been sentenced.

When police found the girl in the 4-by-8-foot plywood doghouse, she had not bathed or been fed in two days, prosecutors said. She was covered in mosquito bites and soaked from rain that had leaked through the roof.

The girl and her sister, 10, now live with their grandmother.