Nine cats were killed in a Volusia County house fire, which was caused by a colony of ants Tuesday morning, fire officials said.

Tabby swears revenge for fallen brothers, will destroy all ants when free.

Rhonda Spivey, the homeowner, said she had about 80 cats in her home on Vine Street in Daytona Beach.

Daytona Beach fire said it recovered 36 cats from the home, nine of which were dead.

Spivey said she and her husband live in the home with the animals. She said people gave them cats and promised to come back to get them but never did.

Lt. Fred Godawa of the fire department said a colony of ants formed a nest around an electrical outlet on the living room wall, which sparked the fire. The investigator said it was first time he had seen a fire caused in this manner, according to Godawa.

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You can’t just make this stuff up. At least I can’t because I’m not very creative.

From Kansas.com:

Ron and Diane Taliaferro say they locked their kids in a moldy, ant-infested room to protect them from a fugitive.

What happened in the following moments, they told The Eagle on Tuesday, was a gross misunderstanding with law enforcement officers who chased the man to their Oaklawn home June 11.

This story is either really confusing or my reading comprehension skills have shot craps. Please help me decipher what the article is trying to say. I understand that it is the father of the children who was chased to his Oaklawn home by police on June 11th?

It was also the last time they saw their kids.

Officers took all three — 5-year-old Savannah, who goes by Nicki; 4-year-old Anna, who likes to be called “Anna-conda”; and 2-year-old Bubba Jo — into protective custody.

The officers said the room smelled like urine and feces and was infested with ants. The youngest child’s diaper was soiled, and the oldest girl told a detective they hadn’t yet been fed that day.

The Taliaferros spent four nights in jail and were released Friday without being charged.

Does this mean no charges will be filed?

The family moved to Kansas from Alabama about a year ago as they looked for “a fresh start,” which included a new job.

About three months after they got here, they gave up their newborn son, Joshua, for adoption.

What a blessing for this child to be placed in a better home. I hope these worthless parents decide to give all their children up for adoption and then get sterilized.

“We didn’t have the money,” Ron Taliaferro said. “We already had three, and we had a hard enough time keeping clothes on their backs…. We thought it was best for him and us.”

They moved to Oaklawn after a disagreement with a landlord led to their eviction from a home near Hydraulic and Pawnee about a month ago.

Here’s what the Taliaferros said happened June 11:

Ron and Diane Taliaferro and the kids were outside playing in the spray of a garden hose with two abandoned pit bulls they rescued from a home down the street.

This just keeps getting better and better. No offense toward pit-bull owners, but letting your children play with pit-bulls that have been abandoned and you don’t know their history? Crazy.

They went inside so Ron Taliaferro could change Bubba’s diaper, which had absorbed water from the hose.

Moments later, Justin W. Kraai, who had just escaped from Derby police, kicked in the front door.

Could this be the guy the police were chasing? Or, is it really the father of the children?

He had a handcuff dangling on one of his wrists and was acting strange, Ron Taliaferro said.

He recognized Kraai as a man who had tried to sell him a car when the Taliaferro family lived in a duplex near Hydraulic and Pawnee.

So, the father knows this guy — if the story is even true, but I don’t know.

Kraai asked to use a phone, but the family doesn’t have one, so Ron Taliaferro asked his wife to run to a store and buy a prepaid cell phone.

As Diane Taliaferro left, Ron Taliaferro shuffled the kids into a room and locked the door from the outside, using a lock that had been there when they moved in.

Since when does a lock on the outside of the door keep intruders out?

He locked them in so they wouldn’t get hurt, he said.

“I wasn’t afraid afraid of him, but I didn’t know what he was going to do,” Ron Taliaferro said at his home Tuesday as his wife cleaned.

Let the weirdness begin. What convinced the wife to go buy a pre-paid cell phone? A dangling handcuff? Taliaferro apparently was not afraid of the intruder — but he locks his children in a room?

He suspects Kraai swallowed drugs when he was caught earlier that day. Kraai escaped as police were taking him to the hospital.

Normally, Ron Taliaferro said, the kids aren’t allowed to stay in the room because it has mold problems.

“We were thinking of their safety when we put them in there,” he said.

Soon after that, he said, police entered, pistols drawn, and arrested Ron Taliaferro and Kraai. Diane Taliaferro was arrested when she came back from the store.

Ron Taliaferro said police never gave him a chance to explain that he locked his kids in the room to keep them safe or that his kids had been fed that day, and even had ice cream as a treat.

The parents were booked on suspicion of child endangerment with a bond of $75,000 each.

During their jail stay, their van was stolen, their home was broken into and tools Ron Taliaferro used to work as a handyman were stolen.

And they still haven’t been able to see their kids.

“It’s unbelievable,” he said. “Father’s Day was really bad. It’s like you can’t believe it was happening.”

Um, yeah … I’m sure this freak didn’t get anything for Father’s Day.

The Taliaferros said they planned to fill out paperwork today that would determine whether the couple can see their children.

“I can’t imagine what’s going through their minds,” he said of the kids.

Let me try. Maybe something like, “It sure is nice to be out of that moldy stinking room and get some food in our stomachs.”

Sheriff Lt. Jay McLaurian declined to comment on the case but said the SRS is still doing its own investigation of the family.

Ron and Diane Taliaferro said they plan to move after they regain custody of their children.

Ya think? Why bother with the kids — just move your sorry butts and start fresh without children. Am I the only one that finds this entire story strange and somewhat hard to understand? ]]> http://neverthat.com/parents-kids-were-locked-up-for-safety/feed/ 0