A Boone County father admitted to repeatedly suffocating his 3-month-old daughter by covering her mouth and nose for periods of up to 13 seconds at a time in an effort to “train” her behavior, according to police.
Video footage captured the abuse, which was reported by the parents’ family who live out of state. The incident also included the father slapping his daughter with an open hand while she lay on the ground crying.
Shaun Webb, 36, told officers that his daughter’s crying triggered him like “nails on a chalkboard” and he described children as needing to be trained by setting boundaries through such actions. He stated, “You have to train them and set boundaries.”
Webb was arrested at the end of police questioning and charged with 10 class B felony counts of first-degree criminal abuse. His wife, Carleena Webb, 33, was also arrested three days later for leaving her child in her husband’s care after the incident. She did not report the abuse to police or seek medical treatment for her daughter.
“We get to the house as quickly as we can to get those children out of that environment and certainly separated from the person who is perpetuating some pretty horrific violence against them,” said Boone County Sheriff’s Major Philip Ridgel.
