But I cannot adopt a child in this state...

... simply because I am a gay man.

Couple Pleads No Contest To Torturing Kids

INVERNESS, Fla. -- A couple pleaded no contest Wednesday to torturing and starving five of their seven adopted children, including yanking out their toenails with pliers, and were sentenced to 15 years each in prison.

John and Linda Dollar's plea to five counts of aggravated child abuse avoids a scheduled Oct. 31 trial and saves the children from an on-camera deposition documenting their misery.

The five abused children were so severely underfed that twin 14-year-old brothers weighed just 36 and 38 pounds each -- about 80 pounds below normal. Police compared their conditions to victims of Nazi concentration camps.

The Inverness couple also tortured the children with an electric cattle prod and bondage equipment. The two children who were not mistreated were favored by the Dollars and had no physical injuries.

The allegations surfaced Jan. 21 when the couple's 16-year-old son was admitted to a hospital with a head wound and red marks on his neck.

He weighed less than 60 pounds. The family lived in a secluded home and the children were home schooled, so no one outside the family knew their conditions.

The Dollars were arrested in Utah in February after leaving the state when the investigation began.

They had moved to Florida about two years earlier from Tennessee.

The children who range in age from 12 to 17 have been placed in foster care under the supervision of the state Department of Children & Families.

15 years? Not enough. I will say that the only correct choice they ever made was to plead no contest, to keep the children from having to testify.