A pastor from Dallas County, Texas has been sentenced to 99 years in prison for starving a baby boy to death in an attempt to rid him of the "demon of manipulation."
A Dallas County jury found Pastor Aracely Meza guilty of felony injury to a child causing bodily injury for the starvation death of Benjamin Aparicio, Trib Live reported. She received a sentence of 99 years' imprisonment as well as a fine of $10,000.
Meza, a self-proclaimed prophet, had claimed that God wanted the 2-year-old boy starved so that the demons inhabiting his body would depart.
Aparicio died on March 22, 2015, a month away from his third birthday, after Meza ordered that food be withheld from the child for 21 days because she believed that she was possessed by the "demon of manipulation."
A series of videos had reportedly shown how the once chubby-faced child was reduced to skin and bones, unable to lift up his own head during his last days.
In a footage shot on the day he died, Aparicio was seen being propped up by Meza after he fell on the kitchen floor. The pastor then puts him over her knee, pulls down his pants and spanks him over and over, making the boy cry.
In a video of a ceremony to resurrect the child, Meza was seen holding the boy's limp body in her arms as worshippers looked on. She stroked the child's hair and rubbed something on his forehead as she chanted words in Spanish into the microphone.
Meza, who led the Iglesia Internacional Jesus es el Rey church, has been known to exert powerful control over her congregants.
Her home in Balch Springs had served as a commune where parents were separated from children, including Aparicio while he was still being breastfed. The parents were not allowed to see the child even though they lived in the same home.
A church member who identified as Nazareth Zurita said she felt like she was in a "trance" when she lived in Meza's house. When anyone tried to question Meza, the pastor would say, "The devil is speaking through you. You're the devil," Zurita said. She admitted that she did not intervene while the boy was being starved.
The boy's parents, Zenon and Liliana Aparicio, have also been charged for his death, according to an online court docket.
Zurita had testified that the parents were afraid to report what was happening to the child or that their son had died because they were undocumented immigrants from Mexico.
Prosecutors had also charged Zurita with felony injury to a child, but she has reached an agreement for a reduced charge.
"The state of Texas made a deal with a demon to get a bigger one," Prosecutor Rachel Burris told jurors, noting that Meza had allowed the boy to "suffer, to waste away and die."
