Pittsburgh-Area Mother Chained Special Needs Daughter To Bed: Police

FAYETTE COUNTY, PA — An Upper Tyrone Township woman kept her adult special needs adopted daughter chained to a bed in deplorable conditions, according to Pennsylvania State Police.

Marylou Dewitt, 53, faces a host of criminal charges after being apprehended Tuesday night as she was driving near the Fort Pitt Bridge in Pittsburgh.

According to police, the victim's sister contacted them shortly before 2 a.m. Wednesday after arriving at the home and hearing her 22-year-old sister screaming from an upstairs bedroom. She found the woman restrained with chains wrapped around her waist, neck and hands.

The sister told police she freed the adopted daughter after locating the keys.

Dewitt was not present at the time. She returned home a short time later, but fled after learning that police were on their way to the home. She took with her the chains and locks that her daughter put in a box after removing them from her sister.

Police used her cell phone pings to track Dewitt's location and persuaded her to surrender.

Dewitt has been charged with simple assault, recklessly endangering another person, false imprisonment, unlawful restraint, harassment, neglect of care-dependent person and endangering the welfare of care-dependent person.

Dewitt is being held without bond in the Fayette County Prison. She faces a preliminary hearing on June 12.