Daniel Schergen (LaPorte County Sheriff’s Office).
An Indiana man allegedly pinned the head of a 7-year-old relative against a car seat and tried to push a bar of soap into the child’s mouth after he used profanity, police said. The child was left with a bleeding injury to his forehead.
Daniel Schergen, 34, faces a felony charge of domestic battery involving a child under 14 in connection with the alleged late-August incident in LaPorte County, court records show.
According to court documents, Schergen was traveling in an SUV with his girlfriend, the boy and three other children when the alleged assault occurred. After one child was dropped off at football practice, the 7-year-old reportedly said a curse word that a witness described as “really bad,” according to documents obtained by local CBS affiliate WSBT.
Schergen allegedly told his girlfriend to stop at a convenience store in Kingsbury for a bar of soap. After she returned to the vehicle, he took the soap and attempted to force it into the boy’s mouth while pressing the child’s head against the seat, police said.
The boy kept his mouth closed during the struggle. Schergen allegedly struck him in the forehead, prompting the child to fight back by hitting and kicking him several times, according to investigators.
Police said the child was crying and screaming afterward and had a bloody, oval-shaped mark on his forehead. Schergen’s girlfriend allegedly returned to the store to purchase alcohol wipes and bandages for the injury, court documents state.
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Investigators also allege that Schergen had used soap as punishment against the boy at least once before. The case began in September, when police received a suspected physical-abuse report from the Indiana Department of Child Services.
During an interview with investigators, Schergen said the boy struggled to control his temper and had been suspended from school for hitting other students. He told police he had been moving away from spanking and toward timeouts and conversations, although he acknowledged those approaches were not always successful.
Photographs taken by the boy’s mother allegedly showed forehead redness and a facial bruise following the August incident. Schergen reportedly acknowledged that the redness resulted from holding the child’s head against the car seat.
LaPorte County Prosecutor Sean Fagan told WSBT that parents are legally permitted to discipline their children, but that authority has boundaries.
“When you’re dealing with these kind of cases, you’re always having to ask yourself how much is too much when it comes to the discipline of a child or a minor,” Fagan said.
Schergen was taken into custody on a warrant Oct. 23 and released from the LaPorte County Jail five days later after posting $750 bond, court records show.
A conviction could result in a prison sentence ranging from six to 30 months.