Quote: Family members in the court in Dallas, Texas, sobbed as the judge announced 23-year-old Elizabeth Escalona's punishment. She faced from probation to life in prison, and prosecutors had sought 45 years. Escalona pleaded guilty in July to felony injury to a child, but her mother and sister had pleaded for leniency on her behalf. State District Judge Larry Mitchell said she "savagely beat" her child and deserved to be punished. Escalona's other children told authorities that their mother attacked Jocelyn Cedillo in September 2011 due to potty training problems. Police say she kicked her daughter in the stomach, beat her with a milk jug, then stuck her hands to an apartment wall with super glue. Jocelyn suffered bleeding in her brain, a fractured rib, multiple bruises and bite marks, and was in a coma for a couple of days, a doctor testified at the sentencing hearing. Some skin had been torn off her hands, where doctors also found glue residue and white paint chips from the apartment wall. |