An El Salvadorian citizen who is illegally residing in the United States is the alleged MS-13 gang member who will go on trial next week for the horrific 2018 murder of his California girlfriend’s 10-year-old child.
In court documents, Kareem Ernesto Leiva, 37, and Heather Maxine Barron, 33, his girlfriend from the United States, are both charged with torturing and killing Anthony Avalos as well as harming two other children who resided in the home.
The prosecution claims that the child suffered “extreme physical misery and suffering” at home, including beatings, malnutrition, being forced to kneel on rice, being force-fed, being lashed, and other things.
Leiva was accused of shackling another prisoner and was charged with domestic abuse against women in both 2010 and 2013.
His brother, Mauricio Leiva, is another alleged MS-13 member who was indicted in a federal racketeering case against a violent drug gang in 2016.
The murder trial for Leiva and Barron is scheduled to start the following week in Los Angeles. The case has been entrusted to Saeed Teymouri and Jonathan Hatami, who gained renown as the prosecutor in charge of the Gabriel Fernandez trial.
An inquiry for comment was not immediately answered by Dan Chambers, Leiva’s defence attorney.
The prosecution had earlier charged Barron and Leiva with flogging the child, dousing him in hot sauce, and hanging him upside down. Anthony had been tormented “for over two weeks, up until paramedics went to [the] flat and found Anthony’s lifeless body,” according to court documents.
Anthony and his siblings also endured other forms of abuse, such as curling iron burns and extended confinement to their rooms.
Records show that on June 20, 2018, just a few weeks after Anthony’s fourth-grade academic year finished, Barron called 911 to report that her son was not breathing.
The child was lifeless and covered in scratches and bruises when the cops came, they found. He also has circular burn scars on his stomach. When he was brought to the hospital, the staff there noted that he was “severely malnourished and dehydrated.”
His demise was verified the following morning.
The Los Angeles County Medical Examiner-Coroner determined that Anthony’s death was a homicide and listed a number of other causes of death, including subdural, subarachnoid, and intraparenchymal cerebral haemorrhages brought on by blunt-force head trauma.
He was regularly thrown into furniture, hit in the face with a ping-pong paddle, slammed to the floor, and given rug burn. He was also frequently dumped on his head while being supported by his feet, forced to perform wrestling manoeuvres as punishment, and forced to fight other children in the house.
The day before the 911 call, Anthony was apparently unable to eat or walk. Leiva and Barron allegedly left him unconscious for hours.
The prosecution claims that Leiva repeatedly banged Anthony’s head against a wall that evening, striking the final fatal blows. Barron didn’t get in touch with the police until the next morning. Prior to the arrival of the police, Leiva purposely took his children out of the house.
Authorities were informed of accusations of possible child abuse for a long time, according to court documents. Even before Barron started dating Leiva, a different adult male associate of hers was accused of sexually molesting her son when he was only 5 years old.
Despite many meetings with county child services, authorities found that investigations into numerous past child abuse complaints were “inconclusive.”
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