Court raises question about beaten boy’s custody

Associated Press

June 25, 2009 02:10 pm

— BOSTON (AP) — Massachusetts court officials say they have no record of a custody order sending 7-year-old boy from Alabama back to his father, who is now charged with beating him into a coma.
Nathaniel Turner was declared clinically dead Tuesday after a Father’s Day beating, allegedly by his father, Leslie Schuler.
Relatives of the boy have said they were given a court order about a month ago to send the boy home to Massachusetts to live with the father for the summer. He had lived most of his life with his maternal grandmother in Eufaula, Ala.
But court officials say there is no evidence the father was ever granted custody.
A Worcester probate judge has allowed the family of the boy’s mother to decide whether he should be taken off life support.