A New Jersey youth facility counselor
arrested had been caught on video slamming a child’s head into a wall and kicking another child so hard he fell down stairs, according to court documents.
Karl Lancaster, 48, admitted to one of the assaults, but claimed the other boy fell down the stairs after Lancaster accidentally tripped him, police said in the court records. Police said the surveillance footage tells a very different story.
The two alleged victims were vulnerable boys in custody of the state living at a home for traumatized children in Edison called Laurie Haven Home, according to authorities.
Lancaster was suspended without pay when the boys reported the alleged attacks to a clinician at the home, DeFalco said. Staff alerted state authorities and police began investigating April 14. DeFalco said Lancaster was fired as soon as he was charged.
The assaults occurred Jan. 22 when Lancaster brought the boys to the Metuchen YMCA for recreation, according to the Middlesex County Prosecutor’s Office. According to the criminal complaints, Metuchen police interviewed the boys and obtained surveillance video.
The video backed up one boy’s report of being picked up by his shirt, smacked in the head and having his head slammed into a wall, Det. Joseph Keane wrote in court documents. He said the boy reported his head hurt and he had trouble sleeping after the incident.
In the case of the second boy, Keane wrote, “The video revealed that the defendant kicked the victim in the shoulder/upper body area which resulted in the victim falling down three to four stairs.”
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