A woman was found guilty of torturing her young son, whom she eventually killed. She did not act alone in that perverse action. Her boyfriend and the child’s stepfather supported her.

The events are set in June 2018 and this week, on March 7, 2023, the court delivered its verdict. The boy Anthony Ávalos died without understanding why his home was the scene of his ordeal.

A judge found Heather Maxine Barrón and her partner, Kareem Ernesto Leiva, guilty “for the torture and death of the little boy,” Telemundo reported.

Anthony was a studious child. He was only 10 years old to become a victim of such atrocities. Photo: social networks

The 20-year-old boy was tortured for two weeks

The trial of Barrón, 33, and Leiva, 37, began Feb. 22 in Los Angeles County Superior Court, they said.

The couple were accused of torturing the little boy for two weeks until he died.

Not only did they face those crimes: “They also had two cases of child abuse of Ávalos’ half-siblings, identified as ‘Destiny O’ and ‘Rafael O’, aged 13 and 12.

The deceased minor’s brothers “stated at trial that they saw Leiva grab Anthony by the ankles and throw him on the ground 20 times on the head the day before police were alerted that he was unconscious,” Noticias Telemundo reported.

In this story there was a past that was not overcome, a cycle that repeated itself.

At the trial, which the minor’s mother and stepfather “accepted without a jury”, Anthony’s mother’s brothers were “the ones who testified and said she used the same torture methods she was subjected to as a child by her mother and stepfather”.

Container of spicy sauce that they placed on the lips of the minor. Photo: Taken from Telemundo Fresno

scandalous practices

“The little boy’s brothers told in court that they were starving because they were not fed, they endured cuts and burns, they were flogged with straps and cables, they forced them to beat each other, they forced them to eat hot sauce or to kneel.” on uncooked rice, nails or cement, until he is horribly injured,” Noticias Telemundo engrossed.

Mother and stepfather continued with Anthony: “they made him hold weights with a rock on his head, and at the same time they whipped up his legs with a vacuum cord.”

Luz Barrón, Heather’s niece, and her brother David, testified in court that they reported the abuse to the Ministry of Children and Family.

This is the child’s father

Víctor Ávalos, the child’s biological father, who lived in Mexico, even said he had information about his son through third parties.

When Ávalos heard the court’s verdict, he told Univisón: “I felt relieved, but that doesn’t take away the pain that one feels (…) “We were waiting for the death penalty.”

Now Barron and Leiva face a life sentence without the possibility of parole. The death penalty was ruled out despite the objection of Deputy Prosecutor Jonathan Hatami, explains Noticias Telemundo.