Adam Morton: Man Who Put Toddler Into Running Clothes Dryer Sentenced, And Many Are Calling It A Joke

Adam Morton, a New Hampshire man who put his girlfriend’s toddler into a running clothes dryer, pleaded guilty to assault in January and has now learned his fate.

Morton will receive only three years, the Daily Mail notes.

The assault occurred in August of 2014, when Morton was taking care of the 2-year-old boy while his girlfriend was at work.

The toddler was rushed to the local emergency room after his mother returned home from work and found her child burned, the Mail adds.

She reportedly told police that she had been dating Adam Morton for only a short time, but hadn’t believed him to be a violent man.

Court docs revealed disturbing details into the child abuse, noting the child suffered second-degree burns on his back and arms as well as burns and blisters on his feet after being put inside the appliance.

Morton told police the boy was in the dryer’s drum for just one revolution of the cycle, but Dr. Lawrence Ricci, who conducted the forensic examination [via WCSH6], said after looking at the injured toddler, it was apparent he’d been left in the dryer for a longer period of time.

“There were lesions on the lower back that looked like they could have been healing burns and incidentally, the two circular lesions correspond to bolts on the inside of the dryer… [and] the distribution of the burns indicates either that the child was moving fairly dramatically and or the dryer was moving.”

Michael Sousa, the father of the abused boy, returned to the child’s town in order to care for him and his three siblings after the abuse incident occurred.

He said his son was feeling back to normal within a month of the incident, but also said that although the toddler may be too young to remember his mother’s boyfriend putting him in the dryer, he will have physical scars that will last a lifetime.

Sousa also told WABI-TV he doesn’t agree with the charges of aggravated assault being brought against the man who did this to his son, saying “it sounds more like attempted murder than aggravated assault.”

When the three-year sentence was handed down on Adam Morton this week, most commenters online were enraged, calling him a “disgusting loser” and stating that he “shouldn’t be allowed around children for the rest of his life.”

What do you think of the sentence, readers? Did Adam Morton get off light?

[Image via Penobscot County Sheriff’s Office in New Hampshire]