TX - Alfredo & Leticia Ines kept daughter, 12, in closet, Brownsville, 2010

BROWNSVILLE - Police say the parents of a 12 year-old girl forced her to live locked in a closet with no light and minimal contact with the outside world. Police say no one had a clue about the abuse, not neighbors or school officials, until the girl's brother spoke up. When police went to the family's home on the 400 block of Jo Ann Lane, they found the girl locked inside the closet.

CHANNEL 5 NEWS has video and pictures of the space were the girl was confined. She was allegedly only let out so she could go to school, eat, or use the bathroom during the day. The bucket in the space was her bathroom at night. Police say she was forced to clean it every morning.
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Police say this was torture endured by the child for more than a year. The landlord tells us she didn't suspect any problems. She let us inside. Police say the room the girl was living in had no electricity and she would use the light coming through the cracks to do her homework."

The girl's mother told police she kept the girl locked up because she didn't want her stealing food from the refrigerator. But police say the girl needed to eat. They say she was malnourished and looked like an 8 or 9 year-old instead of 12.
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CHANNEL 5 NEWS wanted to know why no at the girl's school noticed problems. A District spokesperson says they're now looking into the situation.

A hearing is set for next week to determine if the girl will stay in foster care.



more here

http://www.krgv.com/news/local/stor...t-For-Over-A-Year/HHkE7qaFC0eZoiKg0529LA.cspx

Yes --please -- tell us why the school didn't notice this poor starving child!! :furious:

Bless her heart -- doing her homework by the light coming thru the cracks.

Texas Mist said:

BROWNSVILLE - Police say the parents of a 12 year-old girl forced her to live locked in a closet with no light and minimal contact with the outside world. Police say no one had a clue about the abuse, not neighbors or school officials, until the girl's brother spoke up. When police went to the family's home on the 400 block of Jo Ann Lane, they found the girl locked inside the closet.

CHANNEL 5 NEWS has video and pictures of the space were the girl was confined. She was allegedly only let out so she could go to school, eat, or use the bathroom during the day. The bucket in the space was her bathroom at night. Police say she was forced to clean it every morning.
........

Police say this was torture endured by the child for more than a year. The landlord tells us she didn't suspect any problems. She let us inside. Police say the room the girl was living in had no electricity and she would use the light coming through the cracks to do her homework."

The girl's mother told police she kept the girl locked up because she didn't want her stealing food from the refrigerator. But police say the girl needed to eat. They say she was malnourished and looked like an 8 or 9 year-old instead of 12.
........

CHANNEL 5 NEWS wanted to know why no at the girl's school noticed problems. A District spokesperson says they're now looking into the situation.

A hearing is set for next week to determine if the girl will stay in foster care.



more here

http://www.krgv.com/news/local/stor...t-For-Over-A-Year/HHkE7qaFC0eZoiKg0529LA.cspx

Yes --please -- tell us why the school didn't notice this poor starving child!! :furious:

Bless her heart -- doing her homework by the light coming thru the cracks.

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there arent enough sick/frustrated/horified/disgusted emoticons here to tell what i think about this............

Yes - why didn't the school report? WTH???????

I don't get it. Why can't people find their voices? That's gonna become my new motto. It is horrifying to hear about these children that have come into contact with so many adults and no one does a dam thing!

SPEAK UP!!!!

I hope someone sues on behalf of the child and the school ends up paying a nice hefty sum that will provide this child with a decent college education.

Salem

Ah H3ll...I knew I didn't want to read this thread!:beyond pissed:

Sweet, sweet baby girl, my prayer is that you are in the most wonderful foster home, where you are surrounded by love, have plenty of good food to eat, a cozy bed to sleep in and plenty of good food to eat. May you never have to do your homework by the light seeping in under the door and my life offer you only good things for the rest of your life. I pray you are never returned to the monsters who conceived you and held you like an animal. God bless you sweet girl and heal you in every way.

What a couple of sickos. :furious:

SOMEONE should pay dearly for not reporting this.
Teachers/school employees are MANDATORY REPORTERS (IMHO, everyone should be, but I digress).
Bless this precious child, and bless her brother for having the nerve to step up when there were grown-ups turning the other cheek.
Hopefully these kids can grow up and have some semblance of normalcy...

So often it comes down to food. Food is love. Children need it and crave it and will do anything to get it. Parents (horrid and wonderful) use it as a control trip and dangle it as a reward and a punishment. Withholding food is known to cause some of the deepest scars as the abuse can begin pre-verbally while the child is still bottle fed (yes, I just realized I didn't include breast there, but I have to admit that I've never read a study of withholding the breast as I have about the bottle, hmmmm).

It becomes a vicious cycle as the child acts out to get the food so the parent withholds more. Then comes the locking and the closeting. We know the rest of the story.

Living with a houseful of children with eating disorders and "issues" based on early abuse and abandonment issues, I have to say that I've never encountered anything more challenging (other than our rape trial and aftermath) than dealing with food. It was a constant battle to get it right.

If I wasn't mentally in a good place, in a great marriage, and with a vital support network; I could see me going crazy over what our kids tried to do concerning food. We had a locked pantry as some kids would get up at night and eat until they vomited. We have one son who would spirit away whole bags of bagels and bury them in the yard. We caught him eating them after he'd dug them up, even though they were dirty and moldy. We had to notify any parents of friends about these issues as our kids would clean out fridges--literally. We had one boy break into a neighbor's house to steal food. I will spare you all the more graphic stories. Children who have gone without love or who've been abused or neglected in any way can be pathological about obtaining food in any way possible. And sad to say, the answer is not unlimited food. That's far too simplistic.

When people ask me what my first chapter will be titled in that magical book I'm supposed to write some day, I always answer simply, "Food". I'm not defending this Mom in any way but I do grasp how this cycle begins. Very sad and very sick.

its ureal that she was that emaciated and no one at school noticed. huh? gotta be kidding me.

I have a sneaking suspicion the monsters locked this girl up because they're azzholes & this was just part of the abuse this little girl suffered....heck yeah she wanted in the fridge when they weren't looking....no telling how long they'd been starving her!!

It wouldn't surprise me if the school was told some lame-azz lies about her eating behavior....her dad worked for Brownsville ISD....too convenient.

IMO, there'll be more to this sad case & what the little girl has endured -- even before being locked in the closet.

Isn't there always?

kbl--I agree, the school should have known. But what did we learn with Jeanette Maples' death here in Oregon? A number of teachers called in a report and nothing was done.

I should add that our family had to work closely with teachers and administrators so everyone knew what we were dealing with and our kids were never emaciated or even skinny. FWIW, I just read my husband the post I wrote and we both sat silently for a while. It was rough. Harder than I can describe. There was no way to "fill" our children. It hurt to be in that space and it still hurts as we've watched a few transfer those food issues to other unhealthy habits. Not all of the kids, but a few.

Yes, why didn't the school notice? Children are not raised in a vacuum. It takes a team approach. Sorry to sound like a broken record, but it does indeed take a "whole village".

Here are the monsters, looks like mom did not miss any meals :furious: :

Snipped>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

"She would be locked in this closet for a whole week in a row, " Sgt. Jimmy Manrrique told Action 4 News.

Living in the home, on the 400 block of Jo Ann Lane, were the parents Alfredo and Leticia Ines, as well as three other boys ages 11-17, and the 12-year-old.

"Everyone in the house knew what was happening but you have children that are, based on fear, always hold this type of secrets," he said.

It wasn't until one of the boys broke the silence that Child Protective Services and police finally became aware of the abuse


http://www.valleycentral.com/news/story.aspx?id=410213

mysticrose said:

Here are the monsters, looks like mom did not miss any meals :furious: :

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lol yeah it was the little girl stealing out of the fridge.......
gotta think the brother was being abused too.

All I ever want to know in cases like these.. when does it become more enjoyable to torture and starve your child instead of filling their hearts and bellies with the joy of love and good food? My goodness, this is just pure evil.

Police charge parents with locking 12-year-old girl in closet for about a year
Comments 4 | Recommend 1
February 01, 2010 9:36 PM

snipped**********************************************************

When investigators arrived at the home, they found the girl so malnourished she appeared to be only 8 years old, Manrrique said. She was old enough to be in seventh grade but instead was in fifth.

Investigator’s photographs show she slept on plush, fleece quilts on the cement floor. By the blankets, there were pictures of the Virgin of Guadalupe, a ratty, yellow notebook and a white bucket, which Manrrique said the girl used to go to the restroom at night. In the morning, she was said to have to clean it out.

At the home, some sundresses still hang on a rack in the small room. Child’s scribbles and a few little stars, bright blue and lime green, appear to have been drawn across the walls in magic markers, sporadic flares of color on grimy ivory. But inside, investigators said the place was usually dark.

The girl’s parents, Leticia, 40, and Alfredo Ines, 43, were charged Saturday with second-degree injury to a child and unlawful restraint. They were each assessed $275,000 bonds and have been transferred to Cameron County Jail

http://www.brownsvilleherald.com/news/police-108104-year-girl.html

mysticrose said:

Here are the monsters, looks like mom did not miss any meals :furious: :

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It's sad that most starvation cases we see one or both caretakers looking a little more than well nourished.

You'd think the school would have noticed a really small skinny child since she probably wolfed down her breakfasts and lunches at school. If the girl didn't act up at school and even did her homework, they were probably told some big lie about the girl's size if a teacher ever even brought it up. Thank God the boy finally told someone and I hope the girl never has to set eyes on her so called parents again. I don't think very well of the older brothers either, because they were old enough to know better and to do something especially the 17 year old.

txsvicki said:

You'd think the school would have noticed a really small skinny child since she probably wolfed down her breakfasts and lunches at school. If the girl didn't act up at school and even did her homework, they were probably told some big lie about the girl's size if a teacher ever even brought it up. Thank God the boy finally told someone and I hope the girl never has to set eyes on her so called parents again. I don't think very well of the older brothers either, because they were old enough to know better and to do something especially the 17 year old.

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well i somehow doubt there abuse was just contained to the 12 year old. who knows what else was going on with the other kids.

mysticrose said:

Snipped>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

"She would be locked in this closet for a whole week in a row, " Sgt. Jimmy Manrrique told Action 4 News.

Living in the home, on the 400 block of Jo Ann Lane, were the parents Alfredo and Leticia Ines, as well as three other boys ages 11-17, and the 12-year-old.

"Everyone in the house knew what was happening but you have children that are, based on fear, always hold this type of secrets," he said.

It wasn't until one of the boys broke the silence that Child Protective Services and police finally became aware of the abuse


http://www.valleycentral.com/news/story.aspx?id=410213

Click to expand...

BBM --

Alrighty then...so is the school district going to claim they called CPS, and CPS is gonna say they never got a call?

Ideas, anyone, beside the usual we hear all the time?

I'd like to know how long the step-father has been in the picture? It says she's been locked up like this for the last year, so did she have a normal childhood before then?
Was nothing being looked at by the school because the step-father worked for the school district? Did he work at her school so she'd feel she couldn't dare say anything?
I'm so glad her brother made the call for help!!!
Are there other family members out there who should have picked up on the signs? Where's her father, what about grandparents, aunts uncles etc?
I hope she'll get the help she will need so badly and that these 2 monsters will never be free again to torture an innocent child, her brothers also will need a lot of help.

VB

Disguised--You asked a good question about as to when a parent crosses that line. I think it's when the parent is so empty that they have nothing left to give, except hate. It becomes "me against them". That's when evil twirls its tendrils through the hearts of the parent. The child becomes the scapegoat and is sacrificed. It breaks my heart to say it but that's what I've seen.