LAS VEGAS, NV — Police have charged 36-year-old Laketha Moore with 31 counts of child abuse after her 4-year-old daughter was discovered tied to a bed, beaten and starved.
Had it not been for a Loma Vista Apartments maintenance worker, there’s no telling how long this little girl would have continued to suffer. He was performing a routine maintenance check inside Moore’s apartment on Monday and found a belt connecting the bathroom and bedroom doors.
When the worker went inside a bedroom, he found Moore’s starving 4-year-old daughter tied to a bed and surrounded by filth. She had multiple injuries, including a black eye, cuts on her nose, cheek, a bruised rib cage, back, ankles and matted hair. The girl said she was hungry because “Mommy ties me up all the time.”
When police located Moore she confessed to police that she abandoned her daughter regularly to go to work or church.
“Laketha Moore was allegedly leaving her daughter tied to a bed in her bedroom, and locked in there for hours, 10 to 12 hours a day, five to seven days a week,” North Las Vegas spokeswoman Chrissie Coon said.
She said she would tie the girl up because she would often ransack their home. But hey, it’s not like she is a heartless monster. She would leave her with a little food and water and placed a plastic bin beside the bed so the girl could go to the bathroom.
As for the starving thing, Moore explained that her daughter was a picky eater and “probably wouldn’t eat the food anyway.” The food she is referencing is probably the variety of food police say was stocked in the kitchen.
As for the girl’s physical injuries, that was easy to explain as well. Moore told police she routinely beat her daughter with a belt, striking her anywhere the belt landed, until the girl blacked out.
Police arrested Laketha Moore and charged her with 31 felony counts of child abuse – one charge for each day she left her daughter alone. The girl has been placed in child protective custody until she can be placed with a relative or foster home.
