Photo: Monroe County Sheriff’s Office
Luis Fosso, 32, and his wife Dayan Media Flores, 25, are facing three counts each of neglect and one count of confinement. Fosso faces an additional count of domestic battery.
More charges, including murder, could be filed after the results of forensic testing that has yet to formally determine cause and manner of death, said the sheriff.
“The initial thoughts are that he starved to death,” he said.
When Eduardo died, the child was “severely emaciated, weighing approximately 50 to 55 pounds,” with no broken bones or internal injuries but bruises “all over,” said Monroe County coroner Joani Shields.
“It’s not been overnight,” she said of the signs of starvation. “It’s been a long time that he’s been without food.”
Luis Posso, at left, and Dayan Median Flores.Monroe County Sheriff’s Department.
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“There’s really no words for this type of abuse, and how it affects all of us,” said sheriff’s detective Lt. Jennifer Allen, adding that she and her colleagues investigating the case reacted with “disbelief, horror, shock.”
Three other children with the couple — a 9-year-old girl, 5-year-old boy and 2-year-old boy — appear healthy and were placed with a child protection agency, said the sheriff.
Fosso and Flores were staying with the four children at an Economy Inn in Bloomington, Indiana, while passing through the area as contract employees hired to post ads promoting a traveling circus, according to authorities.
Investigators obtained a search warrant and returned to the family’s motel room, where they found chains, ankle and wrist restraints, and the dog shock-collar. Video and photographic evidence recovered from the parents’ cell phones and a web-based security system in their possession showed the alleged mistreatment of the boy — but also that “he appeared to be somewhat of a normal, happy little boy approximately a year ago,” said Allen.
“Both the father and the stepmother denied withholding food from the child,” she said. “The father did admit to some sorts of physical abuse on the child, and the stepmother is the one that actually told us that the father physically abuses the child, as well as uses the restraints on him. The father never did admit to using the restraints on the child.”
“I was given the explanation that (Eduardo) was the child that acted up the most,” she said. “He was the one that they always had issues with.”
The sheriff said his agency is trying to document the couple’s recent travels — they most recently were working in the towns of Bedford, Nashville and Kokomo, and had been in Bloomington since Monday — for possible evidence or charges in other jurisdictions.
“She did think that was somewhat odd,” said Allen.
In the early hours of Friday, “they realized he wasn’t breathing, and then rushed him to the hospital,” she said.
Said the sheriff, citing the 20 years he spent as a child abuse investigator: “I’ve worked some pretty horrendous ones, but this is … beyond anything I’ve worked.”
He portrayed the alleged abuse as “an intentional, deliberate act on Eduardo for reasons that we’ll still try to determine, while the other children seemed to be in fairly good shape. … I’m sure this will be with these children for the rest of their lives.”
An attorney was not immediately named to represent the couple, who are being held on a $500,000 bond each in the Monroe County Correctional Center.
They are scheduled to be back in court on Friday.
source: people.com
