The boy's mother reportedly is a bartender in Donora. She says Van Pool came to the bar asking for eighty dollars for the boy. The mother says she never thought the money would be used for prostitutes. She said,
"I just thought he would call his grandmother and wind up spending it at Wal-Mart or wherever...I didn't know that she would take him to those type of women. I didn't think they existed in this area. I thought you had to go to Pittsburgh for that."Van Pool reportedly took the boy to two separate locations.
Police said the 12-year-old's father had passed away a short time ago and that the child was "acting up", so the sex was thought to be "a way to appease the boy."Van Pool has been placed in the Washington County Correctional Facility on $5,000 bond.