Tierney said two other children were said to be favorites of the couple and were spared abuse.

The Dollars are accused of forcing the five children to sleep in a closet in the master bedroom with a “wind chime affixed to the door so that the Dollars would know if they tried to get out of the closet,” Tierney said.

In addition, they are accused of using a cattle prod or some sort of stun gun to shock the children, securing them to spots in the house with chains, striking their feet with hammers and pulling the children’s toenails out with pliers.

It’s hard enough to believe in the common American god when you live day-to-day with the joys of depressive episodes waiting around random corners. Not a higher power, or a greater being, but at least, the kind who gives a damn about human affairs and existence. And you see the people that I know, and watch the misery they are in just living, trying to make it from day to day, and the willingness to put faith in such a being erodes, crumbles, falls away like ash in wind.

And then you read about something like this, and know that ten times this and worse is happening as you read.

Ash in wind.

I think it would be even worse to find out that I’m wrong.