The Democratic mayor of Atlantic City, New Jersey, and his wife have been indicted on child endangerment and other charges for allegedly beating their teenage daughter.
Marty Small Sr. and his wife, La’Quetta Small, the city’s superintendent of schools, were indicted by a grand jury Tuesday. The mayor was also charged with assault and making terroristic threats.
Prosecutors accuse the couple of physically abusing their daughter, who was 15 or 16 years old at the time, on multiple occasions from December 2023 to January 2024. However, their daughter remains at home with them, according to the mayor.
“This indictment has absolutely nothing to do with Marty Small’s tenure as mayor of Atlantic City,” Ed Jacobs, the couple’s lawyer, told the Associated Press. “There’s no charge of corruption or any official misconduct. Marty and La’Quetta Small don’t need the Atlantic County Prosecutor’s Office meddling into a private family matter.”
Prosecutors accused Marty Small Sr. of hitting his daughter in the head with a broom, causing her to lose consciousness.
Just before, Marty Small Sr. allegedly grabbed his daughter’s head and threw her to the ground, also threatening to throw her down a flight of stairs and saying he would “smack the weave out” of her head.
La’Quetta Small is accused of punching her daughter in the mouth and chest, leaving bruising, as well as dragging her daughter by the hair, according to prosecutors. They also alleged that La’Quetta Small struck her daughter on her shoulders with a belt, leaving wounds.
Last week, the principal of Atlantic City High School, which the couple’s daughter attends, was indicted after allegedly failing to report the abuse.
Principal Constance Days-Chapman has been charged with misconduct, child endangerment, and other charges after she allegedly did not report the abuse to authorities, which is mandated by law and school district policy.
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The daughter allegedly told Days-Chapman that she was suffering headaches due to her parents’ abuse.
Days-Chapman, a friend of the Small family and also a subordinate to La’Quetta Small, has been accused of not reporting the abuse, instead talking with the Small family herself.