A 6-year-old boy found Monday inside a locked shed in Dallas had his wrists tied behind his back and was in the shed for at least two weeks, according to an arrest warrant affidavit.
The boy, whose hands were tied behind his back with shoelaces when police located him, told investigators his grandmother locked him in the dark shed without food or water and would give him a plastic bag when he needed to use the restroom, the affidavit says.
According to the document, the boy said there were rats and bugs inside the shed and his grandmother would bathe him outside by spraying water on him.
The boy's grandmother, Esmeralda Lira, and her boyfriend, Jose Balderas, were arrested Monday and face charges abandoning or endangering a child with imminent danger of bodily injury.
The affidavit says Lira put the boy in the shed when she left the house and overnight, and that while Balderas was aware it was happening, he did not do anything to stop it. He told authorities the boy had been in the shed for at least two weeks.
The boy told authorities he was always left in the backyard, put in the shed overnight and not allowed to go inside the house, the document says.
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Texas Child Protective Services told NBC 5 Monday that two other children, a 4-year-old boy and a 7-year-old girl, were also removed from the home and placed in foster care.
