A 33-year-old woman has been arrested on suspicion of starving her son and handcuffing him to a table for hours at a time.
According to a number of reports, the Arkansas woman said that the reason for this treatment was because she thought her mother, the child's grandmother, loved him more than her.
Local Arkansas new outlet,
Fox 16, reports that the eight-year-old was handcuffed to a school desk in the sitting room between 8 pm and 4 am because he took junk food from the kitchen during the night.
When police interviewed staff at the boy's school, they said his appearance had changed drastically between November 2017 and January 2018.
His eyes and cheeks were sunken with visibly thin arms while he became very emotional when eating.
The mother of five children aged between 17 and 5, who is expecting her sixth child, initially denied the allegations of abuse but later said that she was sorry and needed help.
She is facing charges including domestic battery, aggravated assault on a family member, endangering the welfare of a minor, tampering with physical evidence and kidnapping and terroristic threatening.
Her boyfriend, who also resides at the family home, is facing the same charges as an accused accomplice in addition to a charge of permitting child abuse.
Her children are now in foster care while the accused are held in remand at the Washington County Detention Center since their arrest on January 26th.
