NEW YORK (WCBS 880) — An upstate New York woman has been charged for allegedly starving her boyfriend’s seven-year-old son to death, prosecutors announced.
Leticia Bravo, 39, of Newburgh, allegedly kept the boy, Peter Cuacuas, “locked and secreted in a bedroom behind a door that locked from the outside,” according to the Orange County District Attorney’s Office.
Bravo served as the primary caretaker of Peter, who only saw his father, Arturo, on Saturdays, according to prosecutors.
In her care, Peter stopped logging into virtual schooling in January. Soon after, on the morning of Feb. 10, Bravo brought Peter’s lifeless body to St. Luke’s Hospital in Newburgh, where he was pronounced dead.
Peter had weighed 37 pounds at his death and it was determined that he had died due to malnutrition, prosecutors said.
Bravo, who had worked as a child-care provider, faces 25 years to life in prison on charges including Murder in the Second Degree; Manslaughter in the First Degree; and Manslaughter in the Second Degree.
Bravo was arraigned Friday before Orange County Court Judge Craig Stephen Brown.