Relatives: Boy Missing for 10 Years Was Abused

Jan. 7, 2009— -- A young boy who was not reported missing for nearly 10 years after he disappeared was abused by his adopted mother before he vanished, several relatives alleged on Tuesday.

Police in Kansas are searching for Adam Herrman, who was 11 or 12 when he was last seen in a mobile home park in Towanda in 1999. Authorities received a tip about a month ago that Herrman had not been seen in more than nine years.

Butler County Sheriff Craig Murphy said Monday that his office was investigating the case as if it were a death investigation, but said it is possible Herrman is alive. He asked the public for help locating him.

Murphy said the boy's adopted parents, Doug and Valerie Herrman, were considered "people of interest" in the case, though they have not been arrested or charged with a crime.

Through their lawyer, the Herrmans have denied harming the boy. But several immediate family members claim Valerie Herrman mentally and physically abused the boy, at times hitting or slapping him, refusing to feed him and making him sleep in the bathtub without a pillow or blankets.

The Herrmans, who adopted Adam when he was about 2 years old, could not be immediately reached for comment. In an interview with the Wichita Eagle published Wednesday, Valerie Herrman denied that she hit Adam, refused to feed him or kept him chained to the tub, as some of her relatives have alleged.

"They make it sound like I tortured him, but I loved him," she told the newspaper.

On at least two occasions, in 1996 and 1998, police investigated allegations that Adam was abused. Relatives said suspected abuse was reported to child protection officials at least three times, though Adam Herrman continued to live with his adopted family.

"She would punch him, pull his hair, use wooden spoons to spank him, push him," said Justin Herrman, one of the Herrmans' biological children, who is now 29. "He wasn't allowed to play. She locked him up in the bathroom, made him do housework all day long."

"When she's not acting crazy, my mom is actually a good person," he said. "But when she's in a bad mood, she's a monster."

A spokeswoman for the Kansas Department of Social and Rehabilitation Services said state privacy laws prevented her from disclosing whether any alleged abuse had been reported to the office. She said that extensive background checks are done on prospective adoptive parents and that the department investigates allegations of abuse or neglect.

According to local police, the police and Social Rehabilitation Services investigated a report of suspected abuse in 1996. The matter was referred for counseling through Social and Rehabilitative Services, according to the Derby police.

In 1998, police investigated a second suspected abuse call reported by Adam Herrman's school. The investigation showed that his injuries were from playing sports with his siblings, the police said.

The Herrmans' attorney, Warner Eisenbise, said his clients did not harm Adam and were not involved with his disappearance. He said they admitted that they failed to file a police report when Adam disappeared, which is illegal in Kansas, and that they continued to collect state adoption subsidy payments for Adam until he would have turned 18.