Milwaukee Couple Arrested After 2 Children Escape House of Horrors, Prosecutors Say

Koch said she lived at the home with her boyfriend, 38-year-old Joel Manke, who referred to himself as the children’s stepfather. Manke allegedly told police he boarded up the windows in the children’s room to “keep the children from bothering the nosy neighbor.”

Manke said he locked the door to prevent the kids from walking around the house at night, police said.

Koch, police said, has been living with Manke for three years and during that time, she never took the kids to the doctor or enrolled them in school. The mother claimed she home-schooled the children, but she admitted she “doesn’t have a proper curriculum” for them, police said, adding Koch also acknowledged that the “home is not habitable.”

Assistant District Attorney Mallory Davis told WISN-TV that the situation was “something out of a horror movie.”