A Beaver County couple face a preliminary hearing next month on charges that the woman's daughters were assaulted with a stun gun last month.

Michele Lee Hopkins is charged with child endangerment, possession of a prohibited weapon and disorderly conduct.

Jeffrey Alan Young is charged with the same counts, use of an electronic incapacitation device and reckless endangerment.

Their hearing is scheduled for 9 a.m. Sept. 11 in Beaver County Central Court.

Bridgewater police Chief Douglas Adams said a neighbor in the 200 block of Washington Street called three weeks ago to report that 11-year-old Abigail Hopkins was outside with a stun gun. The neighbor said the girl's baby sitter took the weapon away and escorted the girl to their home on Market Street.

The neighbor reported seeing incidents involving the girls with the stun gun from July 28 to 30.

Chief Douglas went to the home of the sitter, Samantha Stewart, who said the girl's mother kept the device on the refrigerator. Abigail and her sister, Gabrielle, 9, retrieved the stun gun from time to time, she said.

The younger girl told police that her mother's friend, Mr. Young of Beaver, had used the weapon to get her to "calm down and not act up," according to a police affidavit.

Abigail then told the chief that her mother used the stun gun on her and her sister to keep them in line or to make them do their chores.

Police said the weapon has peak power of 25,000 volts, which is relatively low for such weapons. Neither of the girls was seriously injured after having been shocked with it, police said.

The girls' father, Matthew Hopkins, who does not live with them, last month took the girls to the police station, where the chief took statements from all three.

Gabrielle told police that Mr. Young had last used the stun gun on her on July 29. She said her mother knew about the incident but did nothing about it.

Both girls said at that meeting that their mother had never used the weapon to stun them. But, they said, she frequently threatened to do so.

Mr. Hopkins told police that Mr. Young telephoned him to admit having shocked Gabrielle, and he apologized, the affidavit said.

Mrs. Hopkins later told police that she eventually learned that Mr. Young had used the stun gun, but that she had been asleep at the time of the incident.

The girls said their mother had used handcuffs to bind them together because they misbehaved.