Background: The home where children were allegedly found living in squalid conditions in Chattanooga, Tenn. (WTVC). Insets, top to bottom: Leon Woods and Carol Phillips (Hamilton County (Tenn.) Sheriff's Office).
A Tennessee couple is accused of keeping two children in severely squalid conditions in a roach-filled home that was so filthy and cluttered, tables apparently blocked the front door from opening.
Leon Woods, 65, and his girlfriend Carol Phillips, 36, are each facing two charges of child neglect after law enforcement officials in Chattanooga discovered the children — both of them still in diapers, with one just 1 year old — during a wellness check at the couple's home.
Police were called to the residence on Nov. 21, for an argument between the adults, according to local ABC affiliate WTVC.
Love true crime? Sign up for our newsletter, The Law&Crime Docket, to get the latest real-life crime stories delivered right to your inbox.
The TV station, citing a probable cause affidavit, said that police officers could not get to the front door because several tables were in the way, and officers had to knock on the window instead. Woods eventually appeared to open the door.
Once inside, the officers were reportedly horrified by what they found.
The smell of rotting food and body odor reportedly permeated the air, and the house was so filthy, there was no clear walkway throughout the house, law enforcement claim. Roaches covered the items that sat on the front porch and the food in the refrigerator — and were also crawling on the officers as well, according to the report.
Police reportedly spotted one child in the house wearing only a diaper, crawling around the floor — which, the officers, noted, was also covered in roaches. That's when Woods allegedly told the officers that there was another child in the house — a 1-year-old found lying face down on a dirty mattress in a bedroom.
The house was said to be filled with dangerous clutter, including a sharp metal gate and nails on the floor, according to police.
A neighbor told the TV station she had spent weeks worrying about the safety of the children, and said police had visited the house multiple times before the parents were finally arrested.
"This child would just scream, and we would report it, and the police would go, and then the police would leave, and I never understood why nothing was getting done," said the neighbor, who did not want to be identified. She also reportedly filed two child abuse reports in recent months.
Court records show Woods and Phillips have a court date scheduled for Dec. 5.
Woods is listed on the Tennessee sex offender registry as an "offender against children" and has also been charged with violating his conditions of supervision.
