The jailed father of three missing Michigan boys told a Detroit television station that he has not harmed his young sons and does not know where they are located.
John Skelton has told authorities that he gave 9-year-old Andrew, 7-year-old Alexander and 5-year-old Tanner to a group called United Foster Outreach and another called Underground Sanctuaries. Police have said they cannot locate those groups.
Skelton told WXYZ from the Lenawee County Jail in Adrian that he wanted to keep the boys away from their mother and his estranged wife, Tanya Skelton. The couple were going through a divorce and the boys were visiting their father Thanksgiving Day at his Morenci home, about 70 miles southwest of Detroit, when they last were seen.
"I did not hurt the babies. I did not hurt her babies," he told WXYZ in the interview recorded Tuesday and aired Wednesday evening.
"I miss them terribly. I played with them almost every single day that . . . well . . . every single day that I was home. I talked with them every single day. I miss making them pancakes."
When asked if he knew where the boys are, Skelton replied: "No, unfortunately, that has escaped me as well."
Police, who say Skelton has fed them other misinformation about the boys, announced Tuesday that the case was now a homicide investigation. Skelton is charged with parental kidnapping and was being held on a $30 million bond. The charges against him were not changed Tuesday.
Police, firefighters and dozens of volunteers spent days searching for the boys in barns, fields, woods and creeks in southeast Michigan and across the state line into Ohio.