[silintli]

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/1...?ncid=webmail1

A Colorado Springs couple found in 2009 to have starved their teenage son until he weighed 37 pounds was sentenced Monday afternoon. Bryan and Tonya Ricks were each sentenced to 25 years in prison for child abuse resulting in serious bodily injury and failure to provide medical attention.

The Ricks were found to have left their son untreated with a seizure disorder for five years leading up to 2009. The boy suffered from as many as 12 seizures a day which doctors say, compounded by malnutrition, left him bedridden, unable to support his own body weight, and incapable of speech.

According to KKTV the boy was found by a family friend in his own urine and feces.

The Gazette reports the boy and his five sisters were removed from the home in late 2009. The Ricks had home-schooled their children but the children were unable to grip a pencil and did not know how to use a toothbrush.

Court documents state the Ricks's home had "limited furniture [and] little to no bedding for the children ... neither bathroom contained... toilet paper, hand towels... or anything else which would be used to clean up after showering/toileting."

Defense attorneys had requested both Bryan and Tonya receive 10 year sentences. The maximum sentence would have been 32 years, reports Fox 21.

The children are in a foster home and will likely be adopted by the foster family. Reginald Short of the District Attorney's office told KRDO, "I think ultimately what we can say is the children are in a better place at this point."

37 lbs! Really!? The article does not say that he died, but I'm sure his development is FUBAR at that point :(

[kellyhound]

is wrong with these morons ?

Defense attorneys said the couple loved their children – but were poor, uneducated and too proud to ask for help.

Public defender Amanda Philipps raised questions about Tonya Ricks’ psychiatric health and her ability to understand the criminal proceedings against her.

Bryan Ricks was also slow, and learned to live without during a rough upbringing in rural Georgia, according to his defense attorney, Terry Rector.

Tonya Ricks served in the Air Force until 2004 or 2005. Bryan Ricks worked odd jobs.

Prosecutor Donna Billek said the couple ignored offers of help – from their church, their son’s school and the Colorado Department of Human Services.

“This isn’t about the system failing them,” Billek said. “They turned the system away.”

Educators at Pine Valley Elementary School set up the boy with a home tutor in 2005 because they believed his health was too fragile to stay in school.

Within a month, however, the Tonya and Bryan Ricks said they were moving to Denver, ending the school’s involvement with the Ricks family.

The Ricks family never left. Instead, they withdrew the rest of their children from public schools, in what Billek attributed to an effort to escape scrutiny.

A school social worker testified that he alerted DHS to the boy’s worsening condition in 2005, but it’s unclear what, if anything, was done to follow up on his complaint.

Billek said the couple were hostile and uncooperative with the agency’s workers, and had rebuffed offers of help from DHS in the early 2000s.

The children remained with their parents until 2009, when authorities received back-to-back reports of possible neglect.

Colorado Springs police officers inspected the family’s apartment after receiving a 911 call from an electrician, but found no grounds for a follow-up investigation.

The second call — from a church worker who alerted DHS after seeing conditions in the home while delivering food — triggered the children’s removal.

Philipps said Tonya Ricks voluntarily gave up custody of the boy because she knew a different family could give him a better life.

Described by friends as reserved and soft-spoken, the woman sobbed violently while professing her love for the children.

“If I could go back and change it, I would,” Tonya Ricks said, as Bryan Ricks buried his face into his arms at the defense table. Both said they never meant to harm the children.

Now 16, the boy is struggling to reclaim skills he learned as a child, beginning efforts to crawl rather than rely on a wheelchair.

Despite his progress – and rapid weight gain – it is unlikely he will be able to live independently, his foster mother testified.

The other girls received dental care and other medical help under the supervision of their foster family.

Their foster mother is planning to adopt them, and is looking into adopting the boy as well, to make sure the children stay together.

[Faline]

[MrCorpse]

37lbs may not be much for a human... but that's pretty big for a chicken... Why not fry the fucker and eat those wings... destroy the evidence, rid yourself of a basket case, and then I guarantee the future would of been bright... Unfortunately these monkeys couldn't see the reward at the end of the frying pan so they're gonna have a different life now. Sucks to be you Tyrone.

[Jere]

there is no excuse for abuse

[silintli]

Thanking you for more info, kellyhound! Okay. they are proud and didn't want help. Whatever. Couldn't they at least rise the poo off the kid? WTF.

and MrCorpse... very funny, har har, but I cannot picture any fat or muscle being on him. Maybe a nice bone broth with a side of fried crispy skin? Or course that skin had been marinating in uric acid.

but that's in bad taste. No pun intended.

[DiamondSmiles]

They should have gotten life or the max of the 21 years! Assholes!

[collaredgirl65]

Good they are going to jail, but still doesn't begin to make up for what they did.

[juliemd]

why can people like this reproduce? they say they loved the children, but they did not provide anything for them and let them waste away. fuckers should be dragged down the road naked.

[Nanina]

Originally Posted by collaredgirl65 ↗

Good they are going to jail, but still doesn't begin to make up for what they did.

For not just one child, but 4 others as well.