Pennsylvania dad shocked his kids with dog collars and stuck needles under their nails in horrific child abuse case

A Pennsylvania man has plead guilty to horrific abuse of his family.

Joseph K. Myhre will spend 20 to 40 years in jail for crimes that the prosecutor called "the worst domestic-violence case" in the recent history of Montgomery County, which is north of Philadelphia.

The abuse of his son and daughter, now 14 and 12, went on for seven years. During that time, he shocked them with an electric dog collar, stuck needles under their nails, sat on them, strangled them and beat them with both PVC pipe and sticks. They suffered serious brain injuries as a result.

"We're talking about a man who tortured the people he was supposed to protect," prosector Alexandria MacMaster said in a video interview. "Today, he was finally held accountable."

Myhre was investigated after his wife went to a hospital with a fractured skull in the middle of the night. She'd waited until he went to sleep to make her escape and seek treatment. His wife even had "cauliflower ear," a condition normally found on veterans of combat sports.

Myhre's wife, who is filing for divorce, said that they allowed him to appear like “a loving husband and father" even though they were “often praying for their own deaths in hopes of an escape."

Myhre will now go to state prison. He was ordered not to have any contact with his wife or children until at least 2023.