Investigations don’t usually end up in adoptions. This story is an exception. Officer Jody Thompson, who works with the Poteau Police Department in Oklahoma, adopted a boy he helped save from child abuse, he told KFSM.
From what Chief Stephen Fruen the outlet, the 8-year-old child’s situation was in nothing short of a horror story.
“Based on some of the case facts, when we found him he was bound by his hands and feet with rope and had been submerged in a trash can, held in the shower,” Fruen said. “They [the biological parents] weren’t feeding him. He didn’t have much to eat. I think what he did get to eat, he got at school. Bruises: He was covered in bruises from head to toe.”
Thompson showed up to the scene to help out the other officers, and instantly knew that he’d become this kid’s father.
“When I seen him,” he said. “When I seen him in that house, I knew.” Thompson accompanied the boy to the hospital, and stayed by his side at the intensive care unit.
Now they’re officially a family. He and his wife have taken in John as their son.
“He was helpful to me,” the boy, now 10, told the outlet. “He’s the reason why I’m here right now.”
Officer Thompson said his son is pulling in straight As, and is part of the gifted and talented program at school.
The family also took in John’s little sister after his biological mother gave birth in jail.
[Screengrab via KFSM]