Lincoln Co. Parents Arrested, Accused Of Abusing 5-Week-Old Twins

A Lincoln County couple is accused of beating their twin 5-week-old babies. 

Investigators said it happened at a home in Prague, and the injuries were horrible.

Both had broken bones; one could have head trauma; and the other had both of his little legs snapped like twigs, investigators said.

“One of them had two broken femurs, but there’s calcification so the femurs had already started to heal. But then there were some recent, current fractures,” said Lincoln County district attorney's office investigator Ben Henderson.

The parents, Joseph Corem, 20, and Mina Arnold, 19, are being held in Lincoln County jail. Law officers said they admit to the abuse.

“So at first, the parents, the bio parents, were blaming other members of the family, but when investigators got them into an interview room and began talking to them, they confirmed a lot of what we had already known,” Henderson said.

Corem’s mother, Melissa Corem, said she didn’t know about the abuse until it was too late, and her son and daughter-in-law kept it hidden.

“And at night, behind the closed doors, they turned the baby monitors off and I didn’t realize. I thought the baby had a belly ache until I seen the physical marks and I made them go to the hospital at that point, because the babies didn’t deserve it,” Melissa Corum said. “I was sickened. I was devastated. I was almost physically throwing up that somebody could hurt a poor little child like that.”

Especially hard when that somebody is her own son.

“Extremely hard. I just wanted to do the best for everybody, for my grand-babies. I love them dearly,” Melissa Corem said.

The babies' great-grandmother wasn't so forgiving. 

“It’s sickening. We have no answers for it. He was raised in church. We brought him up best we could as a family, and it’s sickening,” the great-grandmother, Penny Scott said. 

The babies have been removed from the home and are safe. Corum and Arnold are behind bars and that’s where their family says they should stay.

“Absolutely they should pay for this,” Melissa Corem said. “Anybody that could hurt a child should pay for this.”