Crime Fix with Angenette Levy - Ohio 'House of Horrors': More Charges for Mom!

Episode Date: August 18, 2026

Elizabeth Siders, 33, currently faces 16 counts of child endangering related to alleged mistreatment of her children. Her husband, Gary Siders, Jr., and her in-laws, Gary Siders Sr. and Christina Siders, face the same charges. Elizabeth's lawyer has asked that she be released from jail and reunited with her children. But now the prosecutor has weighed in and said Elizabeth should remain behind bars because she will likely face more charges. Law&Crime's Angenette Levy goes through the prosecutor's response in this episode of Crime Fix — a daily show covering the biggest stories in crime.Host:Angenette Levy  https://twitter.com/Angenette5Guest:Ron O'Brien https://www.facebook.com/RonOBrienFranklinCountyProsecutorCRIME FIX PRODUCTION:Head of Social Media, YouTube - Bobby SzokeSocial Media Management - Vanessa BeinVideo Editing - Van DinhGuest Booking - Alyssa Fisher & Diane KayeSTAY UP-TO-DATE WITH THE LAW&CRIME NETWORK:Watch Law&Crime Network on YouTubeTV: https://bit.ly/3td2e3yWhere To Watch Law&Crime Network: https://bit.ly/3akxLK5Sign Up For Law&Crime's Daily Newsletter: https://bit.ly/LawandCrimeNewsletterRead Fascinating Articles From Law&Crime Network: https://bit.ly/3td2IqoLAW&CRIME NETWORK SOCIAL MEDIA:Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/lawandcrime/Twitter: https://twitter.com/LawCrimeNetworkFacebook: https://www.facebook.com/lawandcrimeTwitch: https://www.twitch.tv/lawandcrimenetworkTikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@lawandcrimeSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Elizabeth Siders, the mother of 16 children, accused of hiding her children and causing them serious harm, once out of jail. But the prosecutor says Elizabeth should stay put. I'll tell you all of the reasons why. I'm Ann Jeanette Levy, and this is Crime Fix. Elizabeth Siders has been in jail since June 30th, going on two months now. And she wants out. Who wouldn't? Elizabeth's attorney has asked the judge to modify her bail.

But the prosecutor has now responded in writing, and William Archer is essentially saying, Not so fast, Judge. Keep her in. And his reasons for that are interesting to say the very least. I'm going to go through all of this for you. Elizabeth's husband, Gary Siders, Jr., and her mother-in-law, Christina Siders, are still in jail, too. Christina Sider's lawyer has also asked that she be released on bail. Gary Sider, Sr. is out of jail on a signature bond, the 73-year-old grandfather was released from jail because he has a serious medical condition. And since he was in jail, the county would have been responsible for his medical bills. And the prosecutor said those medical bills could have caused the county to go bankrupt. That's how poor Vinton County is. One inmate's medical bills could have sent the county into a financial tailspin. But right now, the county is

responsible for the care of Elizabeth Siders, the mother of the 16 children, her husband, Gary Jr., and her mother-in-law, Christina Siders. In the booking video of Elizabeth from June 30th, she was noticeably the only Siders family member who wasn't handcuffed, just looking at her. Her body language appeared to be much different from her husbands and her in-laws. She cowered. Her shoulders were rounded, and she was practically hunched over. She seemed scared. This, coupled with how Elizabeth appeared in court and in her booking photo, and the fact that she had 18 children over about 18 years made people wonder and questioned whether Elizabeth was the victim of something nefarious. When asked by a local TV station whether Elizabeth Ciders

was a victim, her lawyer Tommy Stolley said Elizabeth didn't consider herself a victim, but he was still looking into that possibility. Here's what prosecutor William Archer said when asked whether Elizabeth was a victim at a press conference back on July 8th. According to her attorney, she's not a victim. So we'll let him decide how he wants to address his representation of her. So it doesn't appear at this point that William Archer's opinion has changed because he has formally objected to any modification of Elizabeth's bond as it stands right now. Archer wrote in a memorandum opposing the request for bail modification. This court should deny the bond modification for several reasons. First, the defendant is facing multiple serious pending charges, multiple F-2s involving serious physical harm to her children,

and thus is a flight risk and a potential risk to the victims in this case. Second, the defendant has filed a competency motion. Consequently, she is at personal risk until her competency is known. Third, the defendant has new serious felony charges that will be considered by the grand jury. Did you catch that last part? William Archer wrote that Elizabeth Sour said, Siders has new serious felony charges that will be considered by the grand jury. That sounds like those charges are in addition to the 16 child endangering charges she already faces. Judge Rogers has

already ordered a competency evaluation for Elizabeth Siders at the request of her lawyer. The evaluation will also include an evaluation to determine whether Elizabeth Siders has a mental illness that would make her not guilty by reason of insanity. Tommy Stolley had said previously that Elizabeth Siders wants to be released from jail so she can be reunited with her children, but that seems highly unlikely to happen anytime soon. Vinton County is actually seeking permanent custody of the children. Let me tell you, running a business is really tough, but why make it harder doing things manually or relying on dozens of apps that don't talk to each other?

That's where our sponsor, Odu, comes in. Odu is an all-in-one business management platform with a full suite of integrated apps that seamlessly connect all of your operations from sales and accounting to manufacturing and even shipping. Odu can automatically generate professional, sleek-looking sales orders, invoices, and vendor bills. And it can automatically assign sales teams, send email updates through each sales stage, and even uses AI to pull reports that help with your decision making. For manufacturing, their apps can sync inventory with real-time production and purchase updates so you never run out of stock. And when it

comes time for accounting, that's also fully automated. Odu can create invoices, track expenses, and even summarize data with AI to save you hundreds of hours. The best part, you can choose your apps and even build custom workflows so it's all fully tailored to you. your businesses needs. Take your business to the next level by consulting with an Odu expert today for free at Odu.com slash crime fix. And there's also news about Christina Siders and her request for a bail modification. We'll get to that in just a moment. But first, I want to bring in Ron O'Brien. He is the former prosecutor of Franklin County, Ohio. That's in Columbus, Ohio, to the north of Vinton County. Ron, thanks so much for coming back on.

Oh, very glad to see you again. Yeah, good to see you. I'm really interested in your thoughts on this prosecutor, William Archer, coming out after all of these weeks, weeks and weeks after these requests for bail modifications were filed and saying, we oppose any bail modification for these three reasons. And the first reason being, you know, one of the three reasons he gave for Elizabeth Siders, at least, was the fact that that the issue of her competency has been raised. What do you make of that? Well, I think first, in order to do a competency exam, the psychologists like to control the location and have it in a controlled setting. And if she was released on bond, too, there's no assurance that she would meet the examiner at the time and place identified. So examiners like to interview the suspect and give them any tests psychological or otherwise while they're in the county jail, if they're going to be released on bond later, that's up to the court. But I think they prefer that controlled atmosphere. As things stand right now, you know, we know what we know. We know that the 16 children

were taken from the house on June 30th. We know that they, you know, that three of the adults remain in jail. The children are in therapeutic foster care. This prosecutor knows a whole heck of a lot more than we do. He knows the inner workings of the investigation. What brought them there in the first place? He is calling Elizabeth a flight risk. Her attorney, on the other hand, has said that she doesn't have any money. She can't post bail. So you should just let her out and put a GPS bracelet on her. So is there maybe something this prosecutor is hearing on jail calls that she might be saying to family members that's really raising his concern that she could potentially flee? Well, I'm quite sure he's listening to any jail calls by her as well as the others. They're permitted to do that and have a big sign next to the jail telephone that the calls are monitored.

typically they don't listen to phone calls between the defendant and their own lawyer. But he's on there talking to family or friends. They are picking that up. Interesting that he also identified her as a flight risk. And I don't know what they would know, that we don't know. They obviously are aware of some investigative information. but she doesn't have any money. She doesn't have, I don't think, a bunch of outside support. I'm not sure where she would go either. The crime scene itself, there's a whole lot of reasons where

she doesn't have stability should she be released. But on top of that, you know, she's looking at multiple up to 16 second-degree felonies that have maximum penalties of eight, years. So she's looking at decades in prison, and that's enough motive to flee, or at least for the state to argue, that she has a reason to flee. William Archer also said that Elizabeth is a potential risk to the victims in this case. Now, these potential victims, the 16 children ranging in age from age 18 to one and a half, they're all in therapeutic foster care. So, you know, you would hope that, you know, she's not going to be able to learn their location since she is accused of endangering the children. But this is interesting to me that the, the, the, um,

a prosecutor thinks she's a potential risk to their safety after her lawyer, Tommy Stolley has said publicly, like, she wants to be reunited with her children. You know, she loves her children. She's getting care packages at the jail and she's asking, can I give this stuff to my kids? So it sounds to me like there's a lot here under the surface that we don't know about. When you read between the lines of this, what does it say to you? Well, I think just by virtue of the fact that she is suggesting she wants reunited with the children, that should she be released, that she might make a effort to have contact with them, obviously the placements for the children would not be known. But given the whole very bizarre circumstances surrounding this case, they probably have a concern that she might try and find out where the children are. Obviously, a proposed ankle monitor, we all know ankle monitors fairly regularly get, at least I have had defendants, cut them off their ankle.

and I'm no longer subject to monitoring, which would fit into their argument regarding flight, as well as attempt to contact the children. There's also another little tidbit of information here, very interesting and very important bit of information regarding Elizabeth Siders. The prosecutor says that she's already facing these 16 charges of a child endangering, and these are F-2s, and that includes causing you know, basically serious harm to a child. You know, it's neglect, not providing a safe environment, causing serious physical harm, things of that nature. But he's saying, when this goes to grand jury, he's going to ask the grand jurors to indict her on new charges. So that makes me think this is in

addition to those 16 child endangering charges. What does that say to you? Because I don't know what other charges. My mind is spinning. What other charges could Elizabeth Ciders face aside from child endangering? Well, that was the most striking thing in the memo that the state filed opposing reduction in bond. And I think it's showing some cards to the public as well as to defense counsel that, look, you're looking at child endangering cases, but there's more coming and it's more serious. and that is also why she might try and flee, and that's also why she might try and reach her children to talk to them, to influence them one way or another in what their statements may be relating to the endangering children, but any other offenses that may have occurred while they're

locked in this small room for many years. The key to this, I think, is, among other things, is it's long-going. It wasn't just one discrete child-endangering where a mother burned a child on the arm, and that's the basis for the single child-endangering. This went on for years, where they weren't sent to school, where they were locked up, that they weren't allowed out, that their life was very much restricted. All those things add up to an equation of a longstanding neglect and abuse that below the radar should add up to something more than what we know. I don't know what other charges she could be facing. You know, I don't want to speculate here.

But I think that, you know, it goes without saying the prosecutors already publicly said, you know, these children were hidden. I mean, he said that to the county commissioners in a meeting. they were the hidden children of Omer Street. He likes that's, you know, he likes that a TV station calls them that. And the county is seeking permanent custody. There's not going to be any reunification. If the county is saying to the courts, we're seeking permanent custody of these children,

I think that is signaling that this is incredibly serious. And reunification is unlikely. I think you're exactly correct. This case, ordinarily this kind of case, even though this is a case of its own exclusive kind, a case like this starts with a request for temporary custody to children's species either on an emergency basis or otherwise. And then you do an investigation, you see what you have, and then you look at the family unit and look at relatives or others that the child might be placed at. But here, they're starting off right from the get-go seeking permanent custody, which again, as you say, says to everyone concerned that we don't think reunification with the parents of these children, the way they've been treated, is ever going to be in the best interest of those children. And that's the legal standard in the state of Ohio is the best interest of the child. It is in most states, I believe. What is in the best interest

of the child? And there must be some evidence that we are not privy to that is goes beyond these are just poor people living in extreme poverty because that's what a couple of the defense attorneys have said thus far. They're just poor. You know, they're living in extreme poverty. You know, Ron, they're not in school. They're not going to school. You know, they're moving around to avoid children's services. Does this not signal to you that this goes beyond just being impoverished? Certainly. Certainly. I think there's very much information below the radar that we don't know yet, but we will find out when the case goes to court that would indicate that the state believes that no time in the future should mom or dad or that grandparents have access to these children

that have been so neglected for so many years. If you love digging into the details of crime cases as much as I do, you must download the Law and Crime Plus app. If you haven't checked it out yet, here are three reasons to jump on board today. Number one, you get complete access. Watch the best shows from both Law and Crime and Court TV completely ad-free. Number two, you get the case files. deep dive access to raw trial evidence, including body camera video, 911 calls, crime scene photos, and more.

And finally, it is free, absolutely free for 30 days. We are giving all of our viewers a full month to test it out completely risk-free. So head on over to law and crimeplus.com, enter the promo code crime fix, and start exploring today. Now let's move on to Christina Siders. She is grandma, and grandma is in jail under the same bail conditions, and her lawyer has also asked that she receive a bail modification and be released on bail, GPS monitor, etc. You know, as it stands right now, all of them have to pay post like $300,000 or at least a portion of that with a surety or something to that effect, and then wear a GPS monitor. As you stated earlier, those can routinely be manipulated, cut off. And honestly, you can cut off a GPS monitor and it might send an alert.

And somebody might not even see it for a day or two, correct? Yes, that frequently will happen, at least here in Franklin County, the systems that they use as soon as it is cut off. It sends an alert to the pretrial release program that then will contact victims and counsel and say that the GPS has been disrupted, but I don't know what kind of system they may have down there. But more than that, the GPS is not monitored in real time. It is kind of like a look back if it gets cut off

or if she would attempt to contact the children or go somewhere she shouldn't go if there's restrictions on her movement, they aren't seeing that until they look for it. And that's one of the difficulties that typically occurs. You can put them in a certain restrictive zone, but unless they're going to give her house arrest, so to speak, where they could put it within, you know, 100 yards of the location where she's going to be staying, and then it would be programmed to alert the probation department or pretrial release, but absent that kind of restriction, then yet can't monitor it in real time. And often somebody with an ankle monitor will be out commit new crimes. And it's good

evidence to prosecute them for the new crimes, but you don't have real-time monitoring to observe or prevent the crimes. So grandma, Christina, William Archer says we have not three reasons with like we do with Elizabeth to oppose a bail modification for her, but we have two reasons. And the first is a similar reason. It says she's facing multiple serious pending charges, the F-2s for child endangering involving serious physical harm to the grandchildren. And thus is a flight risk. So he's saying grandma, is also a potential flight risk and a potential risk to the victims in this case. And at least it seems to me that the same rules apply to all of them, except perhaps maybe the grandfather who seems to have sufficient mental health issues that he may not share the same kind of either flight risk or threat of harm to the victims or witnesses, but it seems to me that all of them are facing decades as a potential prison sentence.

And they're also on notice that the state is going to seek permanent custody of the children. So when you ask yourself, what reason do they have to stick around looking at decades in prison? There's very few reasons that they have to stick around. He does not say in here that grandma is going to face serious new charges as he did with Elizabeth. So is it possible that she only faces those 16 child endangering charges? He obviously left that out of the opposition to her bail modification. What does that say to you? Well, it says that mom and likely dad are the primary offenders here.

and grandma and grandpa were in the house and maybe didn't take control, maybe didn't prevent them from causing the atmosphere that existed. But it sounds to me like they're more passive participants than active participants. And then we also have the competency issue that William Archer writes about that basically she's at personal risk until her competency is known because that's been raised by her counsel. Right. And at least in terms of competency, they want to be assured that she's not a risk of harm to herself or to others. And that is something that would be looked into during the competency exam. And so at this point, I can see why they are saying, look, let's look at this.

There's competency issues. There's flight risk. There's a potential harm to the victims. All this together. let's just keep her in jail until we see where we are. I'm interested to see how soon they may take it to the grand jury because they typically have 60 days from the time it's bound over to the grand jury, and they've already consumed, what, probably a month maybe. In any event, they need to start getting the case together to present to the grand jury. And at that point, we will see what additional charges that have been waived around

are included in the indictment. Ron, you read my mind because that was going to be my next question to you. When do you see this case going to grand jury? Because it's been quite a bit of time now. Is this a case where maybe they only want to go once? They don't want to have to go back to the grand jury, you know, on a continuing basis? I think that's exactly right. I think they want to have what they are going to proceed on, included in the single indictment against all defendants and include all counts.

against each individual defendant, and they have a clock, at least under the rules of superintendents of 60 days from the time a case is bound over from municipal court to common pleas court. And in this case, that is, they're probably close to 40 anyhow, or more. And so at this point in time,

I would think that it should go to the grand jury probably before Labor Day. Well, we shall see because we're all watching that calendar and we'll see what happens. Ron O'Brien, thank you so much for your time and your expertise as always. Thank you and very good to talk to it with you. Elizabeth Bale is currently set at $300,000 if she's able to post it, which her attorney has already said she cannot. She will have to wear a GPS monitor. And remember, you can look at all of the documents, perused through all of them on our Law and Crime Plus.

app. Check it out. We're going to keep an eye on all of this for you. So stay with us. I'm Ann Chenette Levy, and that's it for this episode of Crime Fix. I'll see you back here next time.