Arraignments postponed for pair accused in torture and slaying of 10-year-old Anthony Avalos

The arraignment of a Lancaster mother and her boyfriend facing felony charges in connection with the death of 10-year-old Anthony Avalos was delayed Friday after a judge approved new attorneys for the two.

Superior Court Judge Richard E. Naranjo granted a continuance after permitting new counsel to defend Heather Barron and Kareem Leiva, accused of torturing and murdering the boy, whose small body was bruised and wounded from head to toe.

Barron, 28, who faces an additional count of child abuse and Leiva, 32, who also faces a count of assault on a child causing death, stared at the floor during the Friday hearing in a Lancaster courtroom.

Prosecutors say Anthony was whipped, beaten and body-slammed into a dresser in the days before he died. His case bears haunting similarities to the 2013 torture killing of 8-year-old Gabriel Fernandez and, as in that case, sparked fierce criticism of Los Angeles County’s child welfare system.

In both cases, L.A. County Department of Children and Family Services received tips about abuse, but left each boy in his home. In Anthony’s case, county documents show that since 2013, the agency investigated 88 claims of abuse at the home, according to an attorney representing Anthony’s relatives. The lawyer said 15 of the claims were substantiated, including two involving sexual abuse.

On the afternoon of June 20, sheriff’s deputies responding to a medical rescue call found Anthony unresponsive inside his family’s Lancaster apartment. Family members told officials that the boy had “suffered injuries from a fall,” the Sheriff’s Department said in a statement. He died at the hospital a day later.

But prosecutors say there’s evidence the defendants brutalized Anthony for at least five days before his hospitalization.

They poured hot sauce on Anthony’s face, forced him to kneel on rice for long periods of time, whipped him with a belt, slammed him into a dresser, gave him rug burns and dangled him by his feet and repeatedly dropped him on his head, according to a motion filed last month by Deputy Dist. Atty. Jon Hatami.

Hatami also prosecuted the mother of Gabriel Fernandez and her boyfriend. Both were convicted and sentenced, respectively, to life in prison and death.

At times, the prosecutor wrote, Anthony was locked in his bedroom for hours and not allowed to leave even to use the bathroom.

“At one point,” the prosecutor wrote, “Anthony could not walk, was unconscious lying on his bedroom floor for hours, was not provided medical attention.”

The defendants often abused Anthony in front of his siblings, Hatami said, adding that “all of them obviously suffered enormously from witnessing their brother being abused, tortured, and eventually murdered.”

Prosecutors say that records from the Sheriff’s Department and the DCFS indicate that the abuse stretched back to early 2013. In addition to Anthony, at least three of his siblings were abused, Hatami wrote, adding that Leiva once struck one of Anthony’s brothers with enough force that the boy had to be hospitalized and have his head injury stapled.

Leiva’s attorney Dan Chambers said his client will plead not guilty to all charges.

Outside the courtroom Friday, Anthony’s aunt, Maria Barron, wiped tears from her eyes as she stared down at her T-shirt emblazoned with a picture of her nephew.

“I feel miserable knowing everything he went through,” she said. “I’m dying on the inside.”

Barron faces 22 years to life in prison and Leiva faces 32 years to life in convicted. They were scheduled for arraignment on Oct. 3.

marisa.gerber@latimes.com

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