Officers with the Houston Police Department have arrested a couple in connection with the death of 8-year-old Melanie Mendoza and the injury and neglect of her twin sister.
The Houston Chronicle reports that the victim’s mother, Soledad Mendoza, and her boyfriend, Ruben Moreno, both 29, face charges of capital murder and injury to a child.
Doctors first became concerned in 2014 when they noticed that Mendoza and her sister were not at a healthy weight for their age. At the time, the family lived in San Antonio.
Before the family moved to Houston, CPS referred Melanie and her twin sister to the Center for Miracles, according to the Chronicle.
This outpatient clinic assesses children suspected to be victims of child abuse or neglect. The twins started gaining weight at the facility, which prompted officials to urge Soledad to be “more involved” in the twins’ lives.
CPS did not begin seriously looking into the family until 2018. The twins’ school denied both girls breakfast and lunch during that time. According to CPS officials, the school was apparently withholding said meals at the behest of Soledad Mendoza, who allegedly told the school that the girls were eating breakfast at home.
When CPS officials interviewed the surviving twin, the discourse was also unsettling. Reportedly, Melanie’s twin said that both girls were beaten daily, forced into a trash bag, and made to scavenge for food out of the apartment’s garbage can.
Allegedly, following an incident during which the girls found and ate some bread, Moreno responded by beating them both with a belt and a shoe.
The actual investigation began in December 2020 when paramedics transported Melanie to the hospital because of several bruises and injuries. Unfortunately, the child succumbed to her condition shortly after her arrival. She weighed 29 pounds, according to KSAT.
The average weight for an 8-year-old girl in the United States, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), is between about 40 and 80 pounds.
Prosecutors were alarmed by something else in this case; the twins’ three other siblings — an infant, a 10-year-old, and a 12-year-old — did not show signs of abuse or neglect. One of the prosecutors in the case, Gilbert Sawtelle, said that the twins “appear to be the scapegoats of the family.”
Mendoza and Moreno are being held on a $1 million bail. If convicted, they face life in prison with the possibility of the death penalty.