6 Children, 4 Teens in Captives Case

Police removed 10 children and teenagers Tuesday night who had been in the care of Linda Ann Weston, the woman charged this week with enslaving four mentally challenged adults in a Tacony basement, and said the group showed signs of abuse and malnutrition.

Among the group was Beatrice Weston, 19, a niece reported missing in 2009.

Investigators are trying to find the parents of the children, and police said two of the children may be related to one of the adult victims kept in the basement. Others may have been kidnapped.

"This is a very complicated case," Police Commissioner Charles H. Ramsey said Tuesday night. "This is a very sad story. It makes no sense. When you look at the kids, the psychological trauma is pretty apparent. It's some of the worst things I've ever experienced."

Police took some of the 10 - ranging in age from 2 to 19 - into custody about 5:30 p.m. in front of the Longshore Avenue apartment building where the basement dungeon was discovered.

Police found Beatrice Weston in the city's Frankford section. Police said she had "old injuries and new injuries."

The revelations came as authorities in at least four states - Pennsylvania, Florida, Virginia, and Texas - were trying to piece together the path and alleged crimes of Weston and two accomplices.

"This is a long-term case. It'll take some time," Ramsey said. "I wouldn't be surprised if we find other things along the way."

The four adult victims were found Saturday after a landlord at the apartment house on the 4700 block of Longshore Avenue discovered them and two small dogs behind a locked steel door. The adults, ranging in age from 29 to 41, lived in the fetid boiler room without light or bathrooms.

Police have since discovered that Weston had identification documents for as many as 50 people, leading them to suspect she has been running a wide-ranging fraud operation for years.

Weston and two men - Gregory Thomas, 47, described as Weston's boyfriend, and Eddie Wright, 49 - have been charged with kidnapping and related offenses. Each is being held on $2.5 million bail.

Meanwhile, grim new details emerged of the captives' lives.

One of them, Darwin McLemire, 41, had been confined to a closet by Weston for almost a year in a West Palm Beach, Fla., house, according to a police affidavit. He was found chained to a boiler pipe in the Tacony basement.