PHOENIX – A man and a woman have been sentenced to prison for the extreme abuse and neglect of a child, which included beatings, withholding food, and evidence of one defendant lighting the 10-year-old girl on fire.
Chloe Sergent, the biological mother of the child, and Keola Wimbish were sentenced to 20 years in prison to be followed by 10 years of supervised probation after pleading guilty to one count of child abuse and attempt to commit child abuse, according to the Maricopa County Attorney’s Office, reported FOX 10 Phoenix.
Sergent and Wimbish were initially arrested April 5, 2022, after a family member reported the ongoing crime to authorities. The abuse of the child was “significant,” Maricopa County Attorney Rachel Mitchell said, and included physical attacks with a machete and a crowbar, withholding of food, failing to seek medical care for injuries and evidence that one of the defendants lit the child on fire.
Doctors told police the child was extremely malnourished and had 12 broken bones, among other severe injuries such as infected cuts that required surgical intervention to stabilize the wounds and facilitate proper healing, FOX reported.
Moreover, a family member told investigators they never saw the two feed the girl.
Sergent and Wimbish were in a dating relationship at the time of the abuse, and the two lived together with the victim and two other children.
Each defendant pleaded guilty to single counts of child abuse and attempt to commit child abuse. Wimbish also pleaded guilty to an additional charge of attempt to commit child abuse.
After sentencing, Mitchell said, “The abuse this child suffered at the hands of the people who were supposed to love and care for her is horrific. I’m particularly grateful to this young victim who was willing to bravely tell her story. Thanks to the intervention of a caring relative, thorough investigation by police, and hard work by MCAO prosecutors, justice was done.”
