By
The Associated Press
Kansas will pay $1 million to settle a lawsuit over the 2015 murder of a 7-year-old boy, alleging the state's child welfare agency should have removed the child from an abusive home before he was tortured. and they would starve him to death and then his body would be thrown to pigs to be devoured.
The state's governor, Laura Kelly, and top leaders of the Kansas Legislature approved the deal during a brief public meeting Tuesday after consulting with Kris Kobach, the state's top deputy attorney general, for 30 minutes in private.
The lawsuit was filed in 2017 in Wyandotte County, in the Kansas City area, by
the boy's mother, maternal grandmother and adult sister
, and a trial was scheduled in district court for April 2025.
The boy, Adrian Jones, was living with his father, Michael Jones, and stepmother, Heather Jones, in Kansas City, Kansas, when he died.
Both are serving
prison sentences of 25 years to life in prison for the murder of the minor.
Authorities said the boy was beaten and locked naked in a shower for months while closed-circuit surveillance cameras recorded his deteriorating condition.
The boy, Adrian Jones, was living with his father, Michael Jones (L), and stepmother, Heather Jones (R), in Kansas City, Kansas, when he died. The Associated Press
The Kansas Department of Children and Families received reports that Adrian was abused for several years before his death, but her last physical contact with him was nearly four years before his death, according to more than 2,000 pages of records released in 2017 from the agency.
The files revealed that the three moved frequently between communities in Kansas and Missouri.
“This has been a long journey for Adrian's family,” said Matt Birch, an attorney representing the family members.
“The most important thing for the family was the hope that change would occur and that this would be less likely to happen again in the future.”
The family members' lawsuit argued that the state and social workers
could have “intervened and rescued” Adrian
“at any time during the boy's long, unimaginable ordeal,” but “chose to act as disinterested bystanders.”
The Kansas agency argued that the frequent transfers made it difficult to track the minor.
[They demand that the FBI declassify the files it compiled on Latino activists]
Dinah Sykes, Democratic minority leader in the Kansas Senate, and one of the legislators who approved the agreement, said this Wednesday that she believes the state faced “a lot of legal responsibility” for what happened.
But Kelly explained to reporters Wednesday that the issue was not the potential damages of a lawsuit, but that litigation was going to take the focus off “the mission itself,” which was to improve the child welfare system.
“It really had to do with the desire to reach an agreement and not waste time litigating in court for definitely months, maybe even years,” he said.
The resolution approving the agreement, made public this Wednesday, indicates that the department will pay half of the agreement and the other half will come from a special state fund that covers damages in court cases.
An attorney and his employees in the lawsuit did not immediately return a telephone message seeking comment Wednesday.
Kobach's office also had no comment.
The Democratic governor and leaders of the Republican-controlled legislature approved the deal during a public meeting, but the parts that were open to the public came less than five minutes before and after the closed-door session with Deputy Attorney General Dan Burrows .
[Democratic Senator Bob Menéndez, accused of corruption, evaluates running for re-election as an independent]
Although Kelly read the title of the lawsuit before the vote, neither she nor lawmakers discussed the details publicly on Tuesday, continuing a common practice for years.
Typically, there is no formal follow-up announcement to the public.
Told Wednesday of the million-dollar settlement, state Rep. Susan Concannon, R-Western Kansas, who chairs the Legislature's Joint Committee on Child Welfare Oversight, said: “
I'm a little surprised
let it be no more .
"
The child's death was followed by a multi-year legislative review of the child welfare system.
In 2021, Adrian's Law created the committee led by Concannon and required officials and social workers to visually observe children allegedly abused or neglected.
The state has also taken steps to improve training of doctors in recognizing abuse and to provide ongoing services to troubled families.
Birch assured that he and the family hope that through the lawsuit and the 2021 law “there will be more eyes on these children.”
[Massachusetts announces plan to grant pardons to people with marijuana possession convictions]
Adrian's relatives also filed a lawsuit in 2017 in Jackson County, Missouri, also in the Kansas City area, against officials in that state.
The case was resolved in 2020, but details of the case were not immediately available.
Birch said she could not comment.
Adrian's remains were found in November 2015
in a pig pen on a property rented by his father and stepmother, after police officers responded to a call about domestic violence.
Heather Jones accused Michael Jones of beating and choking her, according to affidavits and search warrants later released by authorities.
According to court records, the Joneses used increasingly harsh methods to control the boy's behavior, including tying him to a table, handcuffing him and shocking him with electric shocks with a device called the Zap Enforcer.
He was also suffering from “extreme starvation,” according to court records.