A deputy with the Johnson County Sheriff’s Department was sent to a home off of Ky 172 after receiving a call about children being abused.

The deputy and Social Services spoke with the children there.

There were four kids there between the ages of four and eight-years-old.

According to the deputy, the kids told them, that a man would put them in the basement without the lights on, for punishment.

The man they said put them there was Joseph Hovious, the father of the youngest kid there.

The kids said they were scared of the dark and the rats in the basement, and that they cried wanting out.

The kids were also told by Hovious that “Freddy Cougar” would get them.

The children claimed that the door was closed and that they couldn’t use the bathroom when in the basement.

Hovious claimed he never closed the door, and he just used the basement as a scare tactic.

The children’s mother said she would not come and get them out of the basement because she wasn’t the one who put them in there, and Hovious never left them in the basement for too long.

Hovious was arrested for 3rd-degree criminal abuse.