HOUSTON – A woman was sentenced to serve 40 years in prison after beating her 5-year-old daughter to death with a belt and lying about it, according to Harris County District Attorney Kim Ogg.
Andrea Webb, 24, was found guilty in September for the first-degree felony of injury to a child.
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In 2019, Webb called police and told them her daughter, Samantha Bell, fell from the family’s second-story apartment balcony in southwest Houston, according to prosecutors.
During the investigation, police found that Samantha suffered from bruises all over her body. When Webb was asked about the bruises, she admitted she lied and made up the story because she was scared that she would be charged with murder, prosecutors said.
Webb also admitted that she repeatedly beat her daughter with belts and made her sit against the wall without support of a chair for hours at a time and would beat her if she could not do the wall sits, according to prosecutors.
It was revealed that Samantha had died from a constellation of old and new blunt-force injuries, including patterned and looped scars, contusions and lacerations that resulted in pulmonary fat embolism, acute kidney injury and evidence of systematic stress response, according to Assistant District Attorney Gilbert Sawtelle, who prosecuted the case, and is a chief in the DA’s Child Fatality Section.
“The little girl’s body just couldn’t take it anymore,” Sawtelle said.
Webb and her boyfriend, Deven Gibson, were both arrested. The boyfriend’s case is still pending, according to the DA’s Office.
“Children are the most vulnerable and most innocent victims that we see in the criminal justice system, and a parent’s duty is to protect them, not violently beat them,” Ogg said.