After a multi-year investigation, an Amish man who owned and led a Missouri counseling retreat for the disabled is facing 10 felony charges for allegedly abusing campers and contributing to the death of a 6-month-old baby.
Sam Shetler, 42, took over the retreat center called Mercy and Truth, located about 100 miles east of Kansas City, in 2022. In the four years of Shetler’s ownership, Cooper County Sheriff’s Office received numerous phone calls reporting suspicious cult-like behavior, including alleged sexual, abusive and neglectful behavior.
Because of cultural differences, several of these reports were ruled as unfounded and were unable to be fully investigated, according to court documents.
Earlier this year, Cooper County Sheriff’s Department received a report from a victim in which he detailed abuse he witnessed and endured at the retreat. The victim began attending Mercy and Truth in 2023 when he was 15 and said Shetler allegedly forced him and the other residents to take around 100 pills – some homemade and others vitamins and minerals – every day.
Shetler allegedly force-fed, beat and verbally abused victims, forcing those who refused the pills to sleep in freezing conditions. He also forced residents to pay for the pills, and if they couldn’t afford the fee, they had to send the “pill bills” to family members.
Anyone who refused to submit to Shetler was accused of being demon possessed and was “treated” accordingly, according to the report.
One witness claims Shetler tied up and violently abused a disabled man as punishment.
A female victim tried to escape the retreat and was forced to sleep in a cold attic in winter for three weeks as punishment.
“I felt like I was going to die if I stayed there,” she said, according to court documents. “I felt like I was in prison.”
Shetler allegedly forced the boys and men at the retreat to work without pay. They trained horses, worked in the fields and were hired out to do jobs for “English” people. The full payment for outsourced work went to Shetler, not the workers.
Court documents also say a 13-year-old girl visited her sister at the retreat for three weeks in 2024, and during her stay, Shetler told her she was possessed by evil spirits. He wanted to have “counseling sessions” with her in the middle of the night, despite not having her parents’ consent to give her therapy.
Shetler touched her inappropriately to “heal her” and gave her something to make her drowsy one night, according to court documents. She awoke to someone holding her down, and Shetler later told her it was one of the evil spirits he warned her about.
Before the larger retreat building was constructed, three sisters went to Shetler in 2014 to learn how to be more Amish, according to court documents. The girls were forced to take 80 pills a day, punished for not submitting to Shetler and witnessed a dozen men hold down a 6-year-old boy to torture him as a form of punishment.
After over two years of abuse and multiple getaway attempts, all three sisters managed to escape.
For the alleged crimes committed, Shetler is facing the following charges:
- Three counts of trafficking for the purpose of slavery, involuntary servitude, peonage or forced labor
- First-degree sodomy or attempted sodomy
- Four counts of first-degree kidnapping
- First-degree sexual abuse
Shetler is also facing a charge of 1st degree involuntary manslaughter for the death of a 6-month-old baby boy, who was brought to Shetler for holistic medical treatment after the baby started having trouble breathing.
However, a retreat employee told investigators Shetler was “too busy with the girls and horses” and didn’t perform any of the checkups he promised the parents.
On the fourth day of the baby’s sickness, Shetler gave him a breathing treatment using a diffuser and lavender oil before laying him down for a nap, but the child died in his sleep. A woman found the baby unresponsive after about an hour and ran to a neighbor’s house.
The neighbor called 911 and the baby was pronounced dead at the scene after emergency medical staff tried to resuscitate him. An autopsy revealed the baby died from pneumonia complicating polyviral respiratory infection, which happens when multiple viruses infect someone and cause severe lung inflammation.
Detective Sergeant Jordan Shikles wrote in a probable cause statement that the baby might have survived his illness had he received proper medical care.
“The negligence of Sam Shetler who identifies himself as a ‘practitioner’ and carries himself as one with medical knowledge was aware of this substantial and unjustifiable risk which constitutes a gross deviation from the standard of care which a reasonable person would exercise in this situation involving any unwell or ill child,” Shikles wrote.
Shetler was arrested March 23 after a warrant was issued and a search was conducted at the retreat. He originally faced three charges, which increased to 10 charges last month.
“Sam Shetler took advantage of his position in the Amish Community to control, manipulate, coerce, and force vulnerable people for his own profit, monetarily, sexually, and mentally,” Shikles writes.
The Cooper County Sheriff’s Office has reason to believe there are more victims and witnesses to Shetler’s crimes and encourages anyone with information to contact the office by calling 660-882-2771.
Shetler has pleaded not guilty to the charges and is being held at Cooper County Jail without bond.
(Photo credit: Cooper County Sheriff’s Department)
