Montco Man Pleads Guilty After Using Shock Collars On Kids

LOWER PROVIDENCE, PA — A Montgomery County man has pleaded guilty to numerous charges after torturing his wife and children with a variety of horrific methods over a period of six years.

Joseph Myhre, 44, of Lower Providence, will spend the next 20 to 40 years in prison after a plea deal saw him enter a guilty plea for aggravated assault, simple assault, endangering the welfare of children, and related counts, according to court documents.

Myhre, who was arrested in April 2017, had originally planned a not-guilty plea. That apparently changed, as the evidence stacked against him was extreme.

Authorities said that Myhre executed a wide range of brutal assaults on his two young children, aged 13 and 11, including jumping on their stomachs, slamming their heads into the ground, kicking them in the stomach, and using dog shock collars on them, according to the DA.

Myhre also beat his wife, hitting her so hard on one occasion that she fractured her skull, police said. That injury is what led her to the hospital to report what was happening to her family.

Another of Myhre's tactics involved hitting the heads of the children with a wooden stick or PVC pipe, often causing them to see stars or go to "dream land," according to the criminal complaint.

On other occasions, he would strap the dog shock collar to their neck or around their stomach, the complaint states. The collars had a setting of 1 to 100, and when Myhre would turn the setting to 100 it would cause them to lose all feeling in their legs. According to the criminal complaint, while the children would be screaming in pain, their father would be standing around "acting completely normal."

Assistant District Attorney Alexandria Theresa Macmaster-Ho prosecuted the case. Judge Wendy G. Rothstein handed down the sentence.

See the original story here.

Image courtesy Montgomery County District Attorney's Office