Trivial Pursuits: Bewildered by child abuse case

Not quite 10 months after Artis Kattenberg was arrested for child abuse, she was sentenced last week to five years of probation. 

Seven years of jail time was suspended.

Kattenberg isn’t out of the woods yet; she was arrested by Lyon County police Friday and transported across the border, where she’s being held for two drive-by shootings she and her 16-year-old son allegedly committed last December.

But unless the state attorney’s office appeals, from the standpoint of the Minnehaha County court system, the Artis Kattenberg case is closed. 

I’ll be honest. I’m more than a little confounded. 

A lot of people have gone on record that Kattenberg and her son believed they were microchipped, heard voices from satellites and were being “handled” by the government. 

Area gun stores knew them, and they had a massive stockpile in their home – not just of high-caliber guns and ammo, but also bulletproof vests, night vision and sniper gear.

Court documents said the Kattenbergs shared a delusional disorder in which they believed they were part of a video game, and the prosecution argued that Artis was training her son to be an assassin. Police believe the teen was holding the weapon in the drive-by shootings, which occurred at the homes of an elder and a deacon of an Iowa church from which the Kattenbergs had been banned after the son was spotted with a weapon.

In the court documents, reports of their behavior at that church go back to 2016.

Kattenberg is a widower who homeschooled her son in Brandon up until they were both taken into custody in December.

It’s likely their odd beliefs and behavior existed well before 2016.

What kind of mother says, “Let’s go shoot at some houses,” to her teenaged son and takes him shopping for guns?

It’s not illegal to own firearms, not even the type and amount found in Kattenberg’s home. And while her son was complicit, he was – and is – just a child. 

The word “brainwashing” comes to mind. 

If messing with your child’s mental state to that degree isn’t child abuse, I don’t know what is.

I don’t disagree with the judge’s decision not to sentence Artis Kattenberg to more jail time. I’m not sure jail is the appropriate place for her. 

I was relieved to see that mental health therapy is a requirement of Kattenberg’s probationary terms on the child abuse charge, but how effective can weekly or biweekly counseling be for a woman who believed, not 10 months ago, that she and her son were microchipped and acting on orders from a government “handler”? 

Kattenberg spent more than two weeks in treatment at the mental health facility in Yankton after she was arrested. 

In the more than 200 pages of court documents that were filed since July alone, Kattenberg’s attorney said her client no longer suffered from the delusional disorder she was diagnosed with.

I hope she’s right.

More than that, I hope Kattenberg hasn’t done irreversible damage to her son.