A Wyoming man pleaded guilty to assault causing serious bodily injury after being accused of torturing and starving his 13-year-old stepson with his wife.
Truman Sitting Eagle, 36, was even accused of forcing the boy to live in a cramped space under his home in the town of Araphoe without access to food.
The federal investigation dates back to December of last year after the boy had been missing from school for a month.
Matt Lee, a school resource officer with the Bureau of Indian Affairs, made multiple attempts to find him but was unsuccessful, according to the FBI.
On December 12, Lee demanded to see him and Sitting Eagle finally relented, revealing that he had been hiding in the crawl space.
Truman Sitting Eagle (pictured left), a Wyoming man, pleaded guilty to assault causing serious bodily injury after being accused of torturing and starving his 13-year-old stepson with his wife Kandace (pictured photo on the right).
The federal investigation dates back to December of last year after the couple’s son was absent from school for a month. Matt Lee, a school resource officer with the Bureau of Indian Affairs, made multiple attempts to find him but was unsuccessful, according to the FBI.
The boy had bruises and his face was swollen. Lee reported that he appeared to have lost ten pounds since she last saw him.
He was taken to a local healthcare facility before being flown to a hospital in Salt Lake City, about 300 miles to the south.
While hospitalized, he was noted to have bruises on his arms, chest and back and had cuts on his fingers, face, ear and scalp, according to Cowboy State Daily.
He could only move slowly and said he was in pain and very hungry, as he had not eaten for several days except for a sandwich and some chips in the last 24 hours.
When interviewed by investigators, he said his stepfather Sitting Eagle and his mother, Kandace Sitting Eagle, 33, told him he was causing a problem with mice and stealing food from them.
The Sitting Eagles locked the door to his room, but the boy was able to escape and get food, the FBI stated in an affidavit.
‘This made them angry. They put a padlock on her door. They also screwed the window shut so he couldn’t get out,” the report said.
He even accused them of punching him in the face and beating them when they caught him stealing food.
The boy was forced to hide in a small space in the couple’s home in Araphoe, Wyoming.
When interviewed by investigators, the boy said his parents told him he was causing a problem with mice and stealing food from them.
The other children in the family, all under the age of nine, were interviewed and confirmed that they had seen their brother abused.
At one point, stepfather Truman strangled the boy until he was unconscious. When he woke up, his stepfather hit him.
The boy’s mother was “taking care of the babies or taking the girls to school” when her husband did this to her son.
“You have to stop hitting that boy or something bad will happen,” Kandace said, according to the FBI, who said that at one point Truman hit the boy so hard that his hands “swelled up like balloons.”
Kandace also hit her son, but said “her hits didn’t hurt him.”
His memory had become “foggy,” at one point misremembering that he had been let out of his room for Thanksgiving.
His mother and stepfather yelled at him and only occasionally gave him leftovers to eat.
The boy’s siblings, all under the age of nine, were interviewed by federal agents and all confirmed that their brother had been beaten.
On Lee’s visit on December 12, the boy allegedly overheard Truman talking to Kandace on the phone, before Truman told him to go to the basement.
Sitting Eagle reached a plea deal with federal prosecutors on April 4 and will be sentenced on July 9. He faces no less than ten years in federal prison and could receive a life sentence.
He remained there until Lee told him to come out.
The couple was charged with federal child abuse charges in mid-December, and a federal arraignment was scheduled for January 18.
Sitting Eagle reached a plea deal with federal prosecutors on April 4 and will be sentenced on July 9.
He faces no less than ten years in federal prison and could receive life in prison.
The prosecution of his wife Kandace is still ongoing and she has not yet entered a plea. He faces multiple crimes related to the abuse and confinement that his son suffered.