“My mom and her boyfriend made Gabriel eat spoiled stuff or expired stuff. One thing I remember is expired spinach. He threw it up, and they made him eat it off the table.”
Gabriel Fernandez‘s 16-year old brother Ezequiel testified in court Wednesday that his mother’s boyfriend made his 8-year old brother eat cat feces, cat litter, and his own vomit. Ezequiel, Gabriel’s brother, was 12 years old at the time. Isauro Aguirre is charged with killing Gabriel after he and Gabriel’s mother allegedly engaged in an eight-month long campaign of torture, and emotional and physical abuse, because they thought Gabriel was gay.
The trial began Monday. Aguirre is a six-foot two, 270-pound man. Gabriel was just 70 pounds when he was died on May 24, 2013, two days after being pronounced brain dead.
“Ezequiel described a daily barrage of beatings Gabriel endured at the hands of both Aguirre and Pearl Fernandez,” Gabriel’s mother, who is also charged with his murder, reports ABC 7. “The courtroom was silent as the prosecution rolled in a small cabinent that Aguirre and Fernandez would allegedly lock the boy in, bound and gagged, sometimes for hours without food, water or access to the bathroom.”
The cabinet, which Ezequiel referred to as “the box,” was locked with a pair of handcuffs.
Ezequiel, testifying in court with the defendant in the room, “said Aguirre would hit Gabriel with his fist, kick him and pick him up by the neck and drop him to the ground once the child lost consciousness. Ezequiel also said Aguirre would pepper-spray Gabriel in the face and strike his naked body with a belt buckle and a metal hanger.”
Aguirre would shoot Gabriel in the face, chest, legs and groin with a BB gun, and also pin him against the wall until the boy passed out, the teen testified. Ezequiel described one instance in which Aguirre struck Gabriel so hard that the child’s head left an indentation on the wall. He said sometimes during the beatings, Aguirre would call Gabriel “gay.”
At one point during the testimony, the teen said, “My mom and her boyfriend made Gabriel eat spoiled stuff or expired stuff. One thing I remember is expired spinach. He threw it up, and they made him eat it off the table.”
The prosecutor then asked, “Did the defendant make Gabriel eat throw up?” Ezequiel answered, “Yes.”
He said his mother and her boyfriend also forced Gabriel to eat cat feces and cat litter.
RELATED STORIES:
Mom, Boyfriend Who Called 8 Year Old ‘Gay,’ Tortured, And Beat Him To Death To Get Plea Deal
Couple On Trial For Murder Of 8 Year Old Called Him Gay, Tortured Him ‘More Severely Than Many POWs’
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