Man Accused of Hiding, Assaulting Family Faces Charge of Violating Restraining Order
Originally published by The Associated Press, February 7, 2002
SALEM, Mass. (AP) — A Salisbury man accused of isolating his six children for six years and beating and raping members of his family has now been charged with violating a restraining order from his jail cell in Middleton.
Prosecutors allege Patrick McMullen, 38, convinced an unidentified third person to send religious materials to his wife, the Daily News of Newburyport reported.
The restraining order McMullen's wife, Christine, obtained last May forbids any contact.
Kathe Tuttman, who is prosecuting the case for the Essex District Attorney's office, said the person asked to contact McMullen's wife stopped after learning of the restraining order.
The alleged violation was cited by Superior Court Judge David Lowy on Wednesday as one of the reasons for denying McMullen's request for a lower bail.
But Lowy also denied prosecutors' request for higher bail, setting it at $100,000, a reduction of $5,000.
McMullen has pleaded innocent to four charges of rape and abuse of a child under 16; seven charges of indecent assault and battery, including five involving a child under 14; assault with attempt to commit rape; assault and battery; dissemination of materials harmful to children and possession of an electric stun gun.
Police said they discovered a shocking case of physical and sexual abuse when McMullen's wife walked into the police station on May 8 and asked for a restraining order against her husband.
McMullen was charged with raping one daughter, now 17, over a period of at least six years. He was later charged with sexually assaulting another daughter, now 12.
McMullen's children three boys and three girls were not allowed to venture past the brown wooden fence surrounding the junkyard compound where they lived. Police said the family was at times kept locked inside the home for months.
A seventh child died in infancy nine years ago in Thorndike, Maine.
