After a homeschooled child was brutally tortured and abused for years before he starved to death, a Kansas prosecutor is arguing for new regulations that better protect children who are not enrolled in school and therefore may not have outside witnesses who might pick up on abuse or neglect.

The horrific abuse and murder of seven-year-old Adrian Jones in Kansas City, Kansas, has invited scrutiny on current homeschooling regulations, which do not require any kind of interaction with education or social services officials once a family is given the authority to homeschool their children.

As Crime Online previously reported, Jones was routinely tortured and abused at the rented home where his father and stepmother purportedly homeschooled the little boy and his six sisters. He was forced to stand outside in the cold in freezing weather, and to stand up to his neck in filty poolwater overnight on at least one occasion.

He was also allegedly beaten and deprived of food over a several-month period before he eventually died of starvation. In order to conceal the death, his father and stepmother fed his corpse to pigs.

According to Fox 4 News, Wyandotte County Prosecutor Mark Dupree is asking that every child who is homeschooled be in contact with public school officials at least once a year to ensure the child is being properly cared for. The news station reports that lawmakers are also considering a mandatory annual test through the public school system to monitor the child’s progress and well-being.

Adrian’s grandmother, who was prevented from seeing her grandchildren after they moved in with the couple who pled guilty to Adrian’s murder, reportedly testified at a House Committee hearing on Tuesday that the abuse and torture was allowed to continue because no one outside the home knew what was going on.

As Crime Online previously reported, Missouri Department of Social Services records released last week showing that Adrian told a child services worker his father was hurting him and his parents weren’t feeding him — two years before he died. Not long after his interview with a caseworker, his parents stopped cooperating with child services and moved the family across state lines to Kansas City, Kansas.

Photo: Family handout/Adrian Jones in 2012