Feb 1, 2023 4 min read

The Greene County father accused of burying his 7-year-old daughter in a hole filled with raw sewage as punishment also allegedly beat her so severely that she had dark bruises across her face and body, according to child protective workers involved in the family’s case.

Workers with Greene County Children & Youth Services who testified at Tuesday’s preliminary hearing for John Edward Kraft said they found serious injuries on the girl after they were notified of potential abuse in September.

While the tip alleging abuse came from an anonymous phone call forwarded to CYS, it was the girl’s mother, Frankie Kraft, who took the two caseworkers aside during their Sept. 21 visit to the family’s Franklin Township home and told them her daughter was in danger.

“She whispered and was visibly shaking,” CYS supervisor Tiffany Baker testified.

“Please help her. She’s not safe,” Baker recalled hearing Frankie Kraft tell her and fellow CYS worker Gianna Bugliano about the abuse. “You have to get her out of here. She’s not safe with him.”

The mother later told CYS case manager Jessica Welsh that Kraft threw their daughter against the floor and wall while also choking her, causing bruising across her face and jawline during the incident in September, according to testimony. Frankie Kraft also told Welsh that she intervened to stop her husband as her daughter’s eyes rolled back into her head and she developed a bloody nose during the beating.

“Somebody’s going to get hurt,” Welsh said Frankie Kraft recalled saying to her husband. “You can’t do this.”

Investigators also found the girl had severe bruising to her buttocks that appeared to go beyond normal discipline. Photographs of the girl’s bruised face and other injuries were shown during the hearing before District Judge Glenn Bates.

“Daddy hurt me,” Welsh testified to what the girl told her about the alleged assault.

“It was very traumatic for (the girl) when this happened,” Welsh said.

The girl and her two brothers were removed from the home that night and have been living with a foster family in Lawrence County.

Subsequent interviews with the girl and her mother revealed the accusation that John Kraft had punished his daughter for lying to him by taking her out to the backyard and burying her in a small hole for at least 30 minutes on a cold and dark night. That section of the yard was surrounded by raw sewage, and Frankie Kraft told the CYS caseworkers that she had to bathe the girl four times to cleanse her from the putrid smell.

State police Trooper Matthew Rucinski, the investigator who filed charges against Kraft, said that when police went to the family’s home at 311 Tollgate Run Road, they were searching for a “grave or burial hole” on the property and found a muddy area in the back that appeared to have freshly dug dirt. He described what appeared to be an area about 2 feet by 18 inches that had clumps of mud on top.

“(The girl) would’ve smelled like sewage,” he testified. “That entire area smells like sewage.”

State police arrested Kraft, 50, exactly a month after the CYS visit and charged him with multiple felony counts, including aggravated assault, reckless endangerment, false imprisonment and unlawful restraint, along with several misdemeanor charges.

His defense attorney, John Headley, argued at the end of the preliminary hearing that there was no direct testimony about the alleged abuse since the children weren’t called to the stand. He attempted to call Frankie Kraft to testify, but her defense attorney, Joseph Zupancic, blocked that move, citing his client’s Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination.

“The bulk of the commonwealth’s case rests on hearsay and double hearsay,” Headley said.

Greene County District Attorney David Russo countered that this was one of the worst child abuse cases he’s seen in the county due to the extensive injuries to the child.

Bates agreed and ordered Kraft to stand trial on charges. He is free on $125,000 cash bond while awaiting trial.

Frankie Kraft, 45, was charged by state police Dec. 14 with child endangerment and multiple counts of conspiracy in connection with the abuse. She agreed to waive her right to a preliminary hearing before it was scheduled to take place before Bates, although she remained in the courtroom for her husband’s hearing.