Prosecutors said the 25-year-old mother, Alize, and the 27-year-old stepfather, Tre, were indicted on multiple charges, including: first-degree murder, aggravated child abuse, aggravate manslaughter of a child, two felony child abuse offenses, and causing a minor to become delinquent or dependent. Alize was also charged with tampering with a witness in a capital felony case.
Alize’s 6-year-old son, Anthony, was reportedly drowned in a bathtub. Prosecutors said that the boy was also tortured and locked in a dog cage. The boy’s stepdad, Tre, routinely put him in a chokehold to put him to sleep. The little boy was pronounced dead in a hospital, two days after his mom found him face down in a water-filled bathtub in their home, NYP reported. The boy’s mom allegedly expressed a desire to put her son up for adoption the day before the bathtub drowning.
During an interview with investigators, the mother reportedly said she ordered the boy to take a bath in a darkened, powerless room in anger at him peeing himself. The autopsy later found multiple open superficial wounds and scars that were deemed signs of abuse. According to reports, the victim’s 10-year-old brother claimed he saw his brother being drowned by their stepdad. The sibling, who was not identified, told investigators that Tre reportedly took the victim to the bathroom to go swimming, describing him holding his head under underwater. The boy watched his stepfather drown his brother. The boy told investigators he initially lied about the circumstances of Anthony’s drowning because his mom threatened him.
The 10-year-old boy also said that his stepdad also performed a chokehold on all the boys to get them to go to sleep. He also said that he and the other children would get rewarded for beating up their brother, usually with food or candy. The responding officers also found the cage in the garage, along with multiple images and at least one video stored on the boy’s mom’s phone of him looking terrified and traumatized in the cage. The dead boy’s biological dad, Andre, told prosecutors that he had been fighting to regain sole custody of his son leading up to his death. He’d had custody for three years, but lost it a year ago after a brief stint in jail for domestic violence.