Man purposefully hurts stepchild with blazing hot water while bathing because he had to pause the video game he was playing, and a third of child’s body suffered serious injuries he will never completely recover from, sentenced

A man was given decades-in-prison sentence for what he did to his stepchild in an incident that happened last year while he was supposed to take care of him. The 27-year-old man, identified in the court documents as Joshua, will spend 40 years in prison after pleading guilty to seriously injuring his wife’s son. The stepdad got frustrated because he was supposed to pause the video game he was playing to briefly take care of the child.

The investigation into the case started in late May of last year, when the child was brought to a hospital with very serious injuries all over the body. Prior to calling medical help, the child’s mother got back from work and found her son, 4 years old, wrapped in a towel that hid his injuries. When she removed his towel and revealed the victim’s injuries, she immediately told Joshua to call 911, and the child was transported to the hospital. Doctors told investigators that the child had suffered bu-ns over 33% to 36% of his body, which included the entirety of both of his legs and feet, as well as a portion of his right arm.

The whole time, the child was at the family’s Tx. home with the stepfather and a babysitter. The story started to unfold when investigators questioned the babysitter. According to the babysitter, the child went alone to the bathroom, and the sitter asked the father to take care of the child while he was playing video games. Obviously frustrated that he had to pause the video game, he furiously took the little boy, undressed the victim, ran a very hot bath, and went into the bathroom with the child. Then he left the boy there and got back to his room to continue playing video games while the boy was left alone in the bath.

When the victim started screaming in the bath due to the very hot water just shortly after he was left, Joshua returned and started yelling while the child was consistently crying over the pain he suffered. When the couple arrived in the hospital, Joshua initially said that the boy bumped into the stove, accidentally spilling a pot of hot water on himself. However, the doctors’ report indicates that the story wasn’t in correlation with the type of injuries since most of the bu*ns were third-degree and that the victim’s injuries were likely the result of him being held down in the dangerously hot water by force.

Recently, Joshua formally pleaded guilty to one count of injury to a child with intent to cause serious bodily injury in connection to the incident. He was sentenced to four decades in state prison.