A disability-rights investigation says child welfare officials missed repeated chances to directly assess Thomas Strong before he died.
LAKEVIEW, Ore. — Months before Thomas Strong was found dead at his Lakeview home, educators and others were reporting that the teenager had disappeared from school, lost substantial weight and become increasingly isolated, according to an independent review that now shadows the life sentences imposed in his death.
Strong’s case has become two stories that meet at the same front door. One is a murder prosecution that ended in July 2026 with life sentences for his mother, Amanda Edwards, and her longtime partner, Nathan Cullins. The other is a child welfare chronology reconstructed by Disability Rights Oregon, which says the state repeatedly had information pointing to possible danger but failed to maintain meaningful direct contact with Strong before obtaining a protective custody order. When officials finally served that order on Feb. 18, 2025, they found his body in a cardboard box in the family’s garage.
The child welfare timeline began with a sudden break from Strong’s normal routine. Disability Rights Oregon said Edwards removed him from Lakeview High School on Nov. 15, 2024, and he never returned. School had been an important part of his life. Teachers knew him, classmates watched out for him, and his obituary says he enjoyed art, drawing and cooking classes. His continued absence therefore did more than interrupt his education. It also removed one of the regular settings where adults outside the home could see him and notice changes in his condition.
By Dec. 11, a caller to Oregon’s child abuse hotline reported that Strong had lost a large amount of weight and was no longer in school, the advocacy group said. Disability Rights Oregon reported that child welfare staff screened out the complaint after concluding it did not contain an allegation of abuse that required investigation. The next day, a school principal and a school resource officer visited Strong’s home, generating another report with additional concerns. The independent review said that complaint was also screened out, even though it described his continued absence, weight loss and troubling household conditions.
A third report on Dec. 17 finally prompted the Oregon Department of Human Services to open an investigation into possible neglect, lack of supervision and failure to meet Strong’s needs, according to Disability Rights Oregon. The department arranged an interview with Strong and Edwards in December and gathered releases for records. But the advocacy organization said the investigation then became too dependent on Edwards responding to calls, following referrals and voluntarily engaging with services. Strong himself was not regularly seen by child welfare staff during the weeks when his case remained open, the report found.
That gap is central to Disability Rights Oregon’s criticism. The organization said records showed no child welfare worker saw or spoke directly with Strong for nearly two months after the December contact. During that period, school staff remained concerned about his absence and a mental health provider reported unsuccessful attempts to connect with the family. Strong’s primary care provider had not seen him since August 2024. The advocacy organization said the state offered referrals and left messages but did not establish the kind of active safety plan that, in its view, the accumulating reports required.
The situation remained unresolved into February. Edwards joined a Feb. 6 school meeting by telephone as educators discussed tutoring and possible services for Strong, the review said. Four days later, child welfare staff spoke with Cullins. On Feb. 12, Strong’s maternal grandfather contacted officials with what Disability Rights Oregon described as urgent concerns. He said he had not seen his grandson since October and raised concerns about Edwards’ substance use and prolonged absence from work. Workers went to the home that day, the report said, but no one answered.
On Feb. 18, the Department of Human Services obtained a child protective custody order from Lake County Circuit Court. State officials went to the property to remove Strong from the home. Instead, they found him dead. The Oregon Department of Justice later said his body was inside a cardboard box in the garage. An autopsy found extensive injuries from long-term abuse and concluded that he died of blunt-force trauma. Investigators also discovered video footage of abuse recorded by the defendants, according to the Justice Department. Authorities have not publicly released those recordings.
Disability Rights Oregon estimated that Strong had died on or about Feb. 1 and had been dead for two to three weeks by the time officials entered the residence. His obituary lists his birthday as Feb. 17, 2008, meaning that estimate would place his death shortly before he turned 17. Because his body was discovered the day after his 17th birthday, official and news accounts have often described him as a 17-year-old. The distinction reflects the uncertainty surrounding his precise date of death rather than a dispute about his identity.
The criminal investigation unfolded separately from the later review of the child welfare response. Early court reporting said Edwards and Cullins initially faced criminally negligent homicide, first-degree criminal mistreatment and second-degree abuse of a corpse after Strong was found. Cullins also faced an unlawful-use-of-a-weapon allegation at that stage. The final case was much more serious. The Oregon Department of Justice said Cullins was convicted of first-degree murder, second-degree abuse of a corpse and first-degree criminal mistreatment, while Edwards was convicted of murder by abuse and the same corpse-abuse and mistreatment offenses.
Cullins, 33, was sentenced July 21, 2026, to life in prison with no possibility of parole for at least 35 years. Edwards, 40, received a life sentence July 27 with no possibility of parole for at least 25 years. Oregon State Police led the investigation with help from the Lake County Sheriff’s Office. At the request of the Lake County district attorney, state Justice Department attorneys took the lead in the prosecution. The agency said Senior Assistant Attorneys General Dan Wendel and Jayme Kimberly and Assistant Attorney General Elise Josephson handled the case with local prosecutors.
The convictions resolved the question of criminal punishment for Edwards and Cullins, but they did not resolve the institutional questions raised by the months before Strong’s body was found. Disability Rights Oregon said the first two reports contained information similar to the third report that eventually triggered an investigation. The organization also criticized what happened after the case was opened, arguing that a referral for services was not a substitute for directly assessing whether Strong was safe. Its report described a pattern in which outside adults kept expressing concern while direct contact with the teenager diminished.
The organization has proposed changes that reach beyond Strong’s case. It recommended clearer rules for screening allegations into child protective investigations and urged workers to follow up when reports are ambiguous rather than waiting for particular wording. It called for child-centered investigations with regular physical observation of children in open cases and said workers should actively engage relatives, schools and other supports when parents do not respond. For children with intellectual or developmental disabilities, it also urged stronger coordination between child welfare and the state’s developmental disability services.
Disability Rights Oregon additionally challenged the state’s Critical Incident Review Team process, which examines certain deaths involving children who recently had child welfare contact. The group said records showed local employees with prior involvement in Strong’s case participated in meetings, despite a state law restricting participation by people from the district where the critical incident occurred or those with prior knowledge of the child or family. It also disputed conclusions in the internal review that characterized the agency as diligent in engaging the family. Those assertions are findings and interpretations of Disability Rights Oregon, not separate criminal findings against state workers.
Oregon Public Broadcasting reported that the advocacy group has unusual access to records through its federally designated role protecting people with disabilities. That access allowed it to reconstruct contacts among school staff, child welfare workers and the family that were not available in ordinary public reporting. Teacher DeNae Bauer told OPB that people who taught Strong still thought about him frequently. The account underscored what the documentary timeline can obscure: before his case became a sequence of reports, phone calls and court orders, he was a student whose daily presence was familiar to people in Lakeview.
His obituary describes that presence in specific ways. Strong liked to draw, cook, camp and fish. He built Lego projects, admired Iron Man and frequently pulled a red wagon around town. He was especially known for making and wearing paper ties. At the 2026 sentencing proceedings, according to the Justice Department, family and community members remembered him making green paper ties for other people and forming friendships throughout Lakeview. He had been expected to graduate with Lakeview High School’s class of 2026.
The sentences mean Edwards must serve at least 25 years and Cullins at least 35 years before either can seek parole consideration. The longer-lasting public question concerns the period when Strong was still the subject of an open child welfare case. Disability Rights Oregon has called his death preventable and urged state leaders to use it as a reason to change how workers respond when a vulnerable child becomes isolated. The criminal court has imposed punishment for the conduct that killed him; scrutiny of the systems that knew he might be in danger remains unfinished.
Author note: Last updated September 8, 2026.