A Texas mother who abandoned her children in filthy, neglected conditions with her son’s decomposing remains has been sentenced to 50 years in prison.
Gloria Williams, 38, had been accused of leaving her kids in a squalid, pest-infested Houston-area apartment for more than a year with the body of their 8-year-old brother Kendrick Lee, who was beaten to death by her boyfriend, Brian Coulter.
The boy’s body was discovered in October 2021 in a scene Harris County Sheriff Ed Gonzalez described as seeming “too horrific to be real.”
Investigators determined Coulter had beaten Kendrick to death around Thanksgiving 2020. Several months later, Williams and Coulter moved to an apartment about 25 miles away and left the remaining kids to fend for themselves.
When authorities found Lee’s surviving brothers, they were thin, malnourished and starving. The apartment was crawling with roaches and other bugs, swarming with flies and the carpets were soiled. They had been living in fear that Coulter, who had abused them for years, would return.
The oldest son, 15 at the time, overcame his fear and called police. The two other siblings were 7 and 10 years old when they were found. The eldest brother is currently in foster car while the younger two have since been adopted, according to the Houston Chronicle.
Williams and Coulter were arrested days after the brothers were found. They were located in a library while reading online articles about the discovery.
Williams pleaded guilty in October to two counts of injury to a child. She had previously waived her parental rights after her arrest.
Coulter was sentenced in April to life in prison without parole for Lee’s death.
