6-Year-Old Boy Dead After Parents Beat Him For Drinking Water From Toilet Bowl

A 6-year-old boy who was on life support after his parents allegedly beat him for drinking water from a toilet bowl last month has been reported dead in Osceola County, Florida on Wednesday, Aug. 9.

Deputies responded to the Knights Inn on West Irlo Bronson Memorial Highway on July 5 after the child's mother, Bianca Blaise, 25, called 911 to report a drowning incident, claiming that her 6-year-old son was found with his head in the toilet and unconscious.

When deputies arrived at the motel room, they found the child in the arms of his 22-year-old father, Larry Rhodes Jr. Blaise and five other children, ages ranging from 5 years old to 10 months old, were also in the motel room, FOX 35 Orlando reported.

The officers who responded to the scene administered CPR on the child before he was rushed to a hospital with a life-threatening brain bleed and a lacerated liver. At the health facility, he was put on life support. However, on Wednesday morning, the child died from complications brought on by blunt force trauma.

According to Blaise, after initially finding the child with his head in the toilet, she reprimanded the toddler and told him to stand in the corner near their hotel room's front door as punishment. However, a short time later, she claims she heard Rhodes yell followed by three "claps." After she rushed to the room, she allegedly found the child lying on the floor with Rhodes standing nearby.

However, according to Osceola County Sheriff Marcos Lopez, the parents may have become angry with the boy because he was drinking from the toilet and began to beat him, WESH 2 News reported.

"She was lying from the beginning saying this child drowned in a toilet. I mean it's just physically impossible," Lopez said.

After the incident, Blaise and Rhodes were arrested on child neglect charges. However, after the child's death, Lopez said that the couple's charges have been upgraded to murder. The couple was also charged with aggravated manslaughter of a child, aggravated child abuse, and five counts of child neglect.

"The little boy was our primary focus when we first arrived on the scene, however it was immediately clear that the other children in the hotel room were also the victims of child abuse," Lopez said.

"You could tell they were abused simply by looking at them. They appeared to be malnourished and had bruises that were consistent with being hit with a shoe," he added.

The children have since been placed in foster care.