A Roseville man who allegedly whipped his two children after they switched the TV from a Christian station has been charged with malicious punishment of a child.

Stanley Chukwudi Ogbonna, 33, told police on Dec. 14 that he was angry because the children had lied about how the channel was changed. According to the criminal complaint in the case, filed Friday in Ramsey County District Court, he admitted he grabbed a cord and struck his 10-year-old daughter across the head or neck.

He denied striking her or his 8-year-old son previously.

But examinations by staff of the Midwest Children’s Resource Center at Children’s Hospital in St. Paul revealed “various marks of different ages on both children’s bodies,” and that both children described being whipped by a belt or cord by their father, the complaint said.

The boy told a Roseville police officer that his father beat him “on a nearly daily basis,” the complaint said.

The case was brought to the attention of police on Dec. 13 by a school social worker who discovered large welts on the girl’s arm, according to the complaint.

—Emily Gurnon