Atlantic City’s mayor and his wife are accused of abusing their 16-year-old daughter just days after dragging her out in a humiliating press conference to deny claims he beat her so badly she miscarried

Atlantic City Mayor Marty Small Sr. and his wife have been accused of maliciously beating their teenage daughter in an argument about her dating life – two weeks after hauling her in front of cameras to deny rumors of the crimes.

The Democrat, 50, and his wife La’Quetta Small, superintendent of the Atlantic City Public School System, are accused of abusing their daughter on multiple occasions after she refused to stop seeing a boy she was dating.

According to reported charging documents, they carried out a barrage of abuse from December 2023 to January 2024, including knocking her unconscious with a broom, threatening to ‘earth slam’ her down stairs, hitting her with a belt and punching her in the mouth.

But weeks before the charges were laid, Small held a bizarre, tongue-in-cheek press conference in response to his home being raided by police, insisting that his daughter was not pregnant with twins by a drug dealer, and stressing that he had not something to hide .’

As his daughter stood awkwardly beside him, he listed a series of denials, some of which he has since been charged with by Atlantic City prosecutors.

Among the claims, he denied that his wife ‘was pregnant with twins and I beat her so badly that I killed the babies and I will be charged with double murder.’

At the press conference, Small outright rejected claims that he abused his daughter, saying instead that all allegations were driven by ‘political and racial’ motives.

“We don’t have money from the City of Atlantic City in our house. I have not stolen anything,’ he said at the press conference. ‘No, we don’t have drugs in our house. And we don’t have weapons’.

“First of all, let me confirm an undisputed fact: My daughter is not pregnant,” he continued. ‘My daughter has never been pregnant.’

Addressing rumors that Small said came from an Atlantic City police officer, the mayor doubled down on his denials that his ‘daughter was beaten by a drug dealer in Stanley Home’s village – false.’

“My wife knocked the sound out of her while my son recorded it all and I just stood there – fake,” he said.

Small also addressed what he referred to as ‘the most violent’ of the rumors – that his ‘daughter was pregnant with twins and I beat her so bad I killed the babies and I’m going to be charged with double murder.’

“Now, would you be able to handle this the way I handle it?” he concluded.

Small’s daughter did not speak at the news conference, which was opened by a pastor who quoted Martin Luther King Jr.

Both parents have been charged with second-degree endangering the welfare of a child, and Marty Small is also charged with third-degree terroristic threats, third-degree aggravated assault and disorderly persons simple assault.

La’Quetta is also charged with disorderly persons, and Atlantic City High School Principal Constance Days-Chapman — a reported close friend of the mayor and his wife — is also charged.

Days-Chapman is accused of failing to notify authorities when the teenager told her she was being ’emotionally and physically abused’ by her parents.

After charges were filed, Smalls took to social media to share a close-up of the selfie with several hashtags, including #unbothered and #2sides.

According to a criminal complaint reported by NBC10thThe search of Smalls’ home — and subsequent charges — were sparked by the mayor’s daughter telling a school employee about the alleged abuse.

In January, students at Atlantic City High School received mental health and were asked to circle faces on a ticket indicating whether they were happy, neutral or sad.

Small’s daughter reportedly wrote the word ‘abuse’ on the back of a neutral ticket and asked to speak to a counselor.

She then told a mental health coach she had been knocked out with a broom and described her father as a ‘big guy,’ the complaint said. She added that she had previously told Principal Days-Chapman.

Days-Chapman claimed not to have been told before, but told the counselor she would report the alleged abuse to the Department of Child Protection & Permanency.

The teenager also reportedly told a therapist the same day about the abuse throughout December and January, and police said she told the therapist: ‘I was really stressed, I cried a lot, I wasn’t mentally stable, I wasn’t comfortable around them, I just didn’t feel safe.’

When contacted by the therapist, La’Quetta reportedly said her daughter was struggling with personal issues because of a ‘young man’ her parents did not approve of.

According to the criminal complaint, she endured two months of abuse for refusing to end the relationship, including having her legs repeatedly beaten by her father, causing bruises.

La’Quetta allegedly punched her daughter several times in the chest, also causing bruising, and pulled her by the ear and beat her with a belt.

She is also accused of punching her daughter in the mouth during one incident.

When the alleged abuse was reported to the NJ Department of Children and Families, it was allegedly noted that it should have already been reported and the meeting merely followed up.

This allegedly led the department to claim that no one from the school ever notified them, the criminal complaint said, leading them to notify the Atlantic County Prosecutor’s Office.

An interview with DCP&P, in which Small, his wife, daughter and son were all present, saw the children deny the abuse with their parents present, NBC10 reported.

Smalls’ daughter reportedly said she was angry with her parents over the relationship and claimed to have made up the abuse allegations.

But when investigators met with her boyfriend, he claimed she would repeatedly describe incidents in which her parents abused her and included video footage from his cell phone with evidence, the complaint said.

The boy’s mother also told officers he had raised the issue with her before. Investigators also found several others, including her cousin who worked at the school and a therapist who said she had reported abuse to them in recent months.

On March 28, police raided Small’s home and found a letter which read: ‘Honestly, I’m going for peace, I keep disappointing you all, I’m just leaving. Gotta hate me for not being perfect.

‘Being called stupid, crazy, mental and sick hurts but it’s okay, I think I’m probably the biggest disappointment to defend myself.’

The search sparked the bizarre press conference from the mayor before charges were filed, where he stressed that the search of his home and vehicles was a ‘private family matter’.

The press conference, attended by his daughter, saw a series of denials surrounding rumors circulating about the case, including claims he ‘beat the ass’ out of his daughter, which prosecutors now claim happened.

He also suggested that law enforcement officials were targeting his office for political reasons and that the media should connect the dots.

But Smalls’ attorney said at the end of the conference call that they did not claim the search of the mayor’s home was politically motivated, but that they “didn’t rule anything out,” according to a report.

Following the charges, the mayor’s attorney Ed Jacobs told NBC10: ‘The charges filed by the Atlantic County Prosecutor’s Office today make no allegation of public corruption or misconduct in office or any failure on the part of Mayor Small to discharge his responsibilities as mayor of Atlantic. Town.

‘On the contrary, they only focus on personal, private family matters.’

The mayor’s office did not immediately respond to a request for comment when contacted by DailyMail.com.