Lakechia Schonta Stanley St Louis - A mother found guilty of child abuse, including waterboarding and severely beating her children, been sentenced to 78 years in prison.
On Friday, 34 years old Lakechia Schonta Stanley admitted to abusing her three children at different times. She confessed to beating the children with whips, baseball bats and even waterboarding them.
"What the defendant did to three of her own children far exceeds the definition of child abuse and amounts to systematic torture," assistant circuit attorney Tanja Engelhardt wrote in a sentencing memorandum for the judge.
"[Lakechia Schonta Stanley] was supposed to be their mother, the one person they could trust. Instead she became a symbol of betrayal and fear, using every tool at her disposal to beat and torture her own innocent children," he revealed.
According to the St .Louis Post Dispatch, Lakechia Schonta Stanley's inhumane behavior towards her children may have started as far back as 2011. Her 10-year-old daughter is reported to have confessed to a school librarian that Lakechia Schonta Stanley, her mother, beat her and her younger sister of 8, with a baseball bat. The girl said she was beaten with the baseball bat for not cleaning the kitchen as fast as her mother desired. Her sister was reportedly struck with the bat for staying too long in the shower.
After further interviews with the children, prosecutors learned a list of sickening acts that Lakechia Schonta Stanley perpetuated against her own children. Reports indicate that besides being waterboarded and beaten with a baseball bat, Lakechia Schonta Stanley whipped them with several blunt objects including electrical cords. She also forced them into scalding and freezing showers.
Officials found significant scarring on the bodies of all the children. Doctors say one of the girls had been stuck so hard that the blood supply to her arm was strained.
"The scarring on these two girls is the worst scarring I have ever seen on children from repeated whippings from objects," Detective Robert Jauer wrote in a probable cause statement.
Lakechia Schonta Stanley, a St-Louis native, has been charged with assault and endangering the welfare of her children. She pleaded guilty to 34 felonies before being sentenced.
Reports indicate that Lakechia Schonta Stanley's husband, Andrew Rui Stanley, was arrested on similar charges. He pleaded guilty to 42 charges and is serving a 160-year sentence in jail.
