A Kings Mountain, North Carolina neighborhood is coming to grips with the fact that a disturbing case of child trafficking was occurring right under their noses for literally YEARS and they knew absolutely nothing about it.
Needless to say, the neighbors are in shock over the fact that some horrific crimes were going on just down the street from them and they just didn’t have a clue.
“I have to find it very disgusting that a person like that was living so close to us,” one of the neighbors told the local Fox television station.
In writing a story as delicate as this one, we can’t emphasize enough that on the surface, the neighborhood where this sick dude resided seemed like just another small-town quiet area.
It was just down the road from the Kings Mountain Police Department, and it was where 31-year-old Anthony Nealy called home. However, the shame from this incident is palpable, and the great majority of individuals interviewed about this case wanted to remain anonymous.
“He just didn’t stand out, not one bit. He just seemed like that type of person. Very easygoing,” one person said.
Nealy was well-liked by the neighbors and nothing about him appeared to be “off” in the least. However, the neighbors and everyone else across the country have found out that he was sexually terrorizing a child behind closed doors.
“We kept seeing them walk up and down the road to go to school and that was about it. Both his kids have toys outside and everything else in the backyard. They’ve got bikes and all kinds of toys out there, but we’ve never seen them come outside at any time or any day of the week,” one woman who lives near the family said.
Unfortunately though, police are now saying that Mr. Nealy was holding a young child captive for sexual purposes.
“This was our neighbor? I can’t believe it. I know all of the neighbors here, and I can’t believe one of them would be doing something like that to a child.”
What’s more, the arrest warrants are showing that this grotesque abuse began in January 2015 and lasted until this last September. That’s a full five years of pure terror that he put his kids through, folks. One of the family’s closest neighbors said that they began investigating claims of abuse when one of the children divulged it to a school counselor.
“What gets me is that he just seemed so friendly, you know what I’m saying? He would help my fiance mow his grass, and he would even help him weed eat around the yard and things like that.”
This person told FOX 46 that Mr. Nealy was forced to move in with a family member who lived nearby during the course of the investigation because of harassment.
“It’s just so crazy. I mean, can you even trust anybody nowadays, not nobody? It doesn’t seem like it. You just don’t even know who your neighbors are anymore.”
Either way, they arrested Nealy on Friday and he is currently in the Cleveland County Jail on a $500,000 bond.