Mom gets 99 years for mutilating infant son’s genitals

HOUSTON - A Houston-area mother convicted of mutilating her infant by cutting off his genitals two years ago was sentenced to 99 years in prison.

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The jurors chose among possible sentences ranging from probation to life in prison. Nadal, who shook her head as the jury foreman read the sentence, will have to serve at least 30 years before she is eligible for parole.

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Nadal had claimed the family dog, a 6- to 7-pound dachshund named "Shorty" was responsible for mutilating her then-5-week-old son, Holden Gothia, as he slept in his parent's bedroom in March 2007 at their suburban Houston apartment.

But prosecutors said she was high on drugs when she mutilated her son with an unknown sharp instrument. Authorities say Nadal, who had prior drug arrests, tested positive for cocaine, methadone and Xanax after the attack.

Holden survived, but the severed body parts were never found.

'I failed him'
After the sentence was announced, Holden's paternal aunt, Patches DeShazo, who has custody of the now 2-year-old boy, read a victim impact statement in the courtroom.

"I am thankful by the time you are eligible for parole you will be beyond childbearing years. It makes me crazy to this very day to hear you say I did not hurt him," DeShazo said as she read her statement.

That prompted Nadal to yell back from the table where she sat with her defense attorneys: "I failed him. I did not hurt him."

The boy's father, Camden Gothia, then stood up and yelled to Nadal, "You abused him when he was in the womb," a reference to Nadal having taken drugs when she was pregnant with Holden. Gothia then left the courtroom.

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During closing arguments in the punishment phase of the trial, Thomas told jurors that Nadal had sentenced her child to a life of pain and suffering. "She took his identity as a human being and either flushed it or threw it in a trash can," Thomas added.

Doctors testified that he faces years of surgeries and counseling.

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http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/32457057/

She was on a heck of a drug cocktail at the time.

I really feel sorry for the child. :cry:

sorry. that was unnecessary.

It's unbelievable that the victim, a very young son, is practically a modern day eunuch.

Sadly he will have a long hard road ahead of him, at school, at work, and at his daily life.

as time goes on. I don't know what they're doing--I know that in at least one famous incident where a baby boy lost his penis by accident, he was raised as a girl, but that didn't turn out so well. I'm wondering if, should this child continue to be raised as a boy, they can do more to reconstruct the correct genitalia for him as he gets older.

Since female-to-male gender reassignment is possible in the case of transgendered people, I would assume that the surgical and medical techniques must exist, though perhaps they would not be feasible till he's older. But anyway how awful for this poor kid!

There was that story about the baby whose genitals were mutilated following a botched circumcision and everyone thought it would be fine to raise him as a girl instead, reconstructing his parts to reflect that. That boy went through hell until he found out the truth about himself, then went through more painful reconstruction in order to live as a man.

I read that in this case there's a possibility for reconstruction eventually, but seeing as how, unlike the other story, this boy lives in the US rather than Canada, there isn't any money for the surgery. I'm guessing... no health insurance. Perhaps the story will garner attention and some surgeon will offer his/her services free of charge, or they can raise the money through donations.

Terrible, terrible story. From every angle.