Scott Schollenberger Wiki

                                        Scott Schollenberger Biography

Who is Scott Schollenberger ?

Scott Schollenberger will spend the rest of his life in prison as punishment for the abuse he heaped upon his son.

A Pennsylvania father on trial for torturing and starving his 12-year-old son before he died has pleaded guilty to multiple charges and was sentenced to life in prison without parole.

Scott Schollenberger Jr., 43, of Annville, pleaded guilty Thursday to charges that included felonious homicide, child endangerment and conspiracy on both counts. His trial was scheduled to begin on March 14.

Arrested and Charged

Schollenberger and his fiancée Kimberly Maurer, 36, were charged in September 2020 with imprisoning his son in a dark room for years, starving and beating him while treating his other children well. Maurer remains in jail and is due to stand trial next month.

The charges against the couple stemmed from the death of Maxwell Schollenberger, whose body was found on May 26, 2020. Authorities said the boy was naked and his feces-covered body was lying on a dirty bed in a room that it was also covered with that.

Several other children who lived in the home, both from Maurer’s previous relationship and Schollenberger and Maurer’s biological children, appeared to be well-adjusted and healthy, the district attorney’s office reported in 2020.

When interviewed, the other children in the home said the defendants refused to let the victim out of her room. One child specifically recalled the couple walking into the child’s room and the child screaming and crying.

Maurer pleaded not guilty Thursday, according to court documents. His trial is still scheduled for March 14 before Judge Charles.

Both Maurer and Scott Schollenberger remain in custody at the Lebanon County Jail.

The boy never received medical attention, was not enrolled in school and was rarely seen even by his brothers, who lived in the same house as the couple, authorities said. There were no lights in the boy’s room and the curtains on the windows were taped shut. Metal hooks kept the room closed from the outside.

Investigation

“The investigation also revealed that defendant Schollenberger expressed intense frustration toward the child victim and that he had indicated to others that he was afraid of hurting her,” the documents state.

Schollenberger and Maurer have other children together “who appeared to be healthy, well-adjusted and cared for,” investigators wrote in a report on the case. Those children received regular medical care and attended school, authorities said.

On May 26, 2020, Maxwell’s body was found in his second-floor bedroom by Annville Township Police and members of the Lebanon County Detective Bureau.

“Both the bed and the victim’s body were completely covered in fecal matter,” the documents state. “The door and its frame contained three metal hooks … to lock the boy in his bedroom.”

For years, Max was hidden from the outside world, locked inside the dark, fecal-filled room with little food or water. Officers found the boy naked on the bed, in a room with no toys or furniture.

Maxwell Schollenberger Death

Maxwell Schollenberger was about 4 years old in this photograph. In 2020, at the age of 12, he died in his bedroom, closed from the outside, with the windows covered and with little food. His father and his father’s fiancee have been charged in his death.
Police filed murder charges against Scott Schollenberger and his fiancée, Kimberly Marie Maurer, in September 2020. They lived with Max and the other children in a house on the first block of South White Oak Street in Annville Township.

Victims

“Claw marks appeared on the child victim’s sheets,” according to a news release from the Lebanon County District Attorney’s office. “Max Schollenberger’s room was completely devoid of light and furniture, apart from the bed in which he died. The windows in the room had shutters and doors. The shutters were glued to the window frames and the doors were screwed shut; window coverings prevented the child from seeing in or out”.

An autopsy in June found that the boy had suffered from starvation, malnutrition and multiple blunt force trauma to the head and body. He weighed 47.5 pounds when he died.

In court documents, detectives testified that Scott Schollenberger and Maurer had not taken the boy for medical visits for more than a decade and had never enrolled him in school.