DARLINGTON — A Belmont man charged with neglecting his two young daughters pleaded guilty Tuesday, Nov. 19.

Dalton Allen Hopper, 25, is scheduled to be sentenced Feb. 4 in Lafayette County Circuit Court. He faces up to 52.5 years in prison.

He entered pleas of guilty to a Class C felony charge of child abuse, intentionally causing great bodily harm and as a party to a crime, and a Class F felony charge of chronic neglect of a child, also as a party to a crime and in which the consequence was bodily harm. Other similar charges were dismissed as part of a plea agreement.

Hopper’s attorney Timothy Angel requested an independent pre-sentence investigation (PSI), to go before the judge alongside the court-ordered PSI.

Under routine questioning from the judge, Hopper said at his plea hearing that he was undergoing counseling for a mental disorder but he was not on any medications.

Hopper’s co-defendant and the mother of the victims, 27-year-old Jamie Lee Weigel, pleaded guilty to similar charges in October and is scheduled to be sentenced Dec. 10.

According to the criminal complaint, Hopper and Weigel neglected their children to the point that one, a 5-month-old girl, nearly starved to death. A doctor told police it was next to the worst child neglect case she had ever seen. Hopper reportedly said he knew he was not taking care of the children like he should have, was choosing his relationship with Weigel over them and he didn’t know how long they were going to live.