An Alabama mother was sentenced to 40 years in prison as a punishment for placing two of her children in scalding bath water.
WAFF reports, investigators say Amanda Reyer, 26, intentionally placed her 5-year-old son and 2-year-old daughter into water set at 150 degrees.
Reyer said she purposely burned her children as punishment for misbehaving. She claimed she did it to appease her former boyfriend, Derrick Lynn Defoe, 33, who is still locked up and awaiting trial.
He said the woman punished her kids for misbehaving all day and breaking a bed by placing them in the hot water.
Limestone County Judge Robert Baker tearfully delivered Reyer’s 40-year prison sentence after the mom explained what occurred on June 14, 2015, the day her daughter had over 80 percent of her body burned.
Reyer told the Judge she put the little girl into boiling bath water and she tried to crawl out twice.
Baker responded:
“Your baby was cooking. What were you thinking.”
Before he gave Reyer her sentence on Tuesday, she said:
“I’m a hard fellow to shock. But you did it.”
The woman said:
“I have no valid excuse. I have no valid answer because there is none. There’s no excuse. All I can say is that I wasn’t thinking.”
She added:
“Your honor, I take full responsibly for what happened. I regret it. I’m sorry and I wish I could tell my kids that. All I’m asking you today is to not judge me for the worst day of our lives but for my character, who I am.”
According to AP, her daughter’s skin was so badly burned it peeled off. Foster care caseworker, Ann Chandler, testified during the hearing and said of the girl’s injuries:
“From the neck down, her skin looked like a patchwork quilt.”
Reyer expressed remorse and said she was suicidal after the incident.
Amanda Reyer sentenced to 40 years in prison for scalding her kids in hot bathtub. Limestone Co judge cried as he delivered her punishment. “I’m a hard fellow to shock. But you did it,” he told her. She receives credit for time served, 3 years in jail, since the 2015 incident. pic.twitter.com/xXgtzqFkUP
— Lindsey Connell WAFF (@Lindseyreporter) November 13, 2018
Although both children survived the child abuse Reyer was given the maximum sentence. In a statement, she told investigators she was trying to potty train the child by placing them both in the hot bath as a form of discipline.
Reyer testified:
“I am very sorry. If could do over, I would put myself headfirst in that bathtub before I let my babies get hurt.”
Supposedly she didn’t know the water would burn them.
Defoe’s trial is set for February.
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