JOSHUA TREE, Calif. _ A judge on Tuesday released Daniel Panico and Mona Kirk on their own recognizance, five days after they were arrested when a deputy found their three children living in a plywood shack in Joshua Tree.
Dozens of supporters were at the Joshua Tree courthouse Tuesday morning to show their support for the parents.
They wore red paper hearts on their clothing to show their love for the family. Before the hearing, supporters rallied outside the courthouse, carrying signs that read "Reunite this family" and "Being homeless is not a crime."
In a jailhouse interview Monday night, Panico said his family has been torn apart even though he and his wife did nothing wrong.
"We are just minding our own business, trying to raise our three kids on little money," Panico said.
Panico, 73, and Kirk, 51, were charged with felony child abuse last week after a San Bernardino County sheriff's deputy discovered the children, ages 11, 13 and 14, sleeping in a makeshift home about 4 feet tall with plywood walls and a tin roof in a remote part of the desert in Joshua Tree. The Department of Children and Family Services took custody of the children.
Sheriffs' officials say the children were living in a dangerous situation with little food. Friends have defended the family, saying the parents did their best to care for their children despite their poverty.
In an interview at the Morongo Basin Station, where he was being held in lieu of $300,000 bail, Panico said he is worried about his children, doesn't know where they are and misses them.
Sheriff's deputies say the family had been living in the shack for four years. But Panico said the makeshift home was built by his son about two months ago.
"It started out like a kids' fort, and it just got bigger and bigger," Panico said.
His wife and kids did sleep in the hut sometimes, Panico said. Other nights, they slept outside. And sometimes, they slept in a home where he served as a caretaker in Joshua Tree.
"It's like, where do you live? We live here and there," he said.
Panico owns the land that his family was found living on and said he planned on building a home there.
He said he is an inventor and was working on an invention that he hoped would generate money for his family.
Online records show a Daniel Panico was granted a patent in 1976 for a whirling children's toy and has an application, submitted in 2016, for a "device for production of a net impulse by precession."
Kirk used to run a day care facility but stopped working when they had their family, Panico said. She now home-schools their children and works to give them a good education.
His daughter is in ballet, Panico said. His sons have played soccer. His oldest has a photographic memory and can remember everything he reads, he said.
Panico said he wasn't aware of many resources available to families like his, though he said maybe he should have known more. But, he said, he doesn't believe in government assistance.
"I don't believe in going for public resources," he said. "I believe in doing things independently."
