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Mayor Marty Small Sr., 50, and Dr. La'Quetta Small, 47, were slapped with several charges via summonses on Monday, Apr. 15, the Atlantic County Prosecutor's Office said in a news release. The couple was charged with second-degree endangering the welfare of a child.
Mayor Small was also charged with third-degree terroristic threats, third-degree aggravated assault, and disorderly persons simple assault. Dr. Small was also charged with three separate counts of disorderly persons simple assault.
Prosecutors said the couple physically and emotionally abused their 16-year-old daughter several times in December 2023 and January 2024. In one incident, Mayor Small was accused of hitting her several times in the head with a broom, knocking her unconscious.
The mayor was also accused of threatening to hurt his daughter by "earth slamming" her down the stairs, grabbing her head, throwing her to the ground, and "smacking the weave out of her head." Investigators also said in another incident, the mayor bruised his daughter by repeatedly punching her legs.
Dr. Small was accused of punching her daughter multiple times in the chest, which also caused bruises. In another incident, prosecutors said Dr. Small dragged her by her hair and hit her with a belt on her shoulders, leaving marks.
In another argument, Dr. Small was also accused of punching her daughter in the mouth. The special victims unit for the county prosecutor's office investigated the accusations.
The couple's charges came exactly two weeks after Mayor Small publicly addressed search warrants executed on their Presbyterian Avenue home on Thursday, Mar. 28. He criticized the tactics used in the raid and called it politically motivated.
At his Monday, Apr. 1 news conference, the mayor admitted to some parenting challenges that he and his wife have had raising their children but he didn't specifically say what the issues were.
"There's no book and no course that we took in college to show you how to be a parent and more importantly, how to deal with the struggles of raising teens," said Mayor Small.
On the same day of the raid on the mayor's house, Atlantic City High School principal Constance Days-Chapman was charged for failing to properly report a student's claim of abuse by their parents. Mayor Small did not say if Days-Chapman's charges were related to his children who attend ACHS.
Mayor Small supported Days-Chapman, who was his 2021 campaign manager and someone his children call "Aunt Mandy."
"We confide in her about personal details in our household and she does the same with us, so if you think that you're going to drive a wedge between us, it's not going to work," the mayor said at the news conference. "We support you, Mandy. You did absolutely nothing wrong."
Anyone with information about this case should call the Atlantic County Prosecutor’s Office at 609-909-7800 or fill out an anonymous report online at ACPO.tips. You can also report any instance of child abuse or neglect to the state's hotline at 877-NJ-ABUSE (652-2873).
You can also report crimes to the Crime Stoppers of Atlantic County at 609-652-1234 or 1-800-658-8477.
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