A Sarasota couple were arrested on Wednesday after deputies said they admitted to keeping their 12-year-old daughter zip-tied in a playhouse.
Eugenio Erquiaga, 51, and Victoria Erquiaga, 53, told deputies they used zip-ties on the girl's ankles and wrists before locking her in a 5-by-7 foot playhouse with the door barred by a piece of wood and the windows screwed shot, WINK reports.
The girl told deputies her parents used the zip-ties because she would get angry, with WTSP adding that the couple did this to "protect her and her six siblings from (the girl's) violent outbursts."
Deputies said the playhouse smelled like urine and that the girl said she would “often (have) to soil herself when she (couldn’t) get out.” WTSP reports a detective referred to the playhouse as a “glorified cage.” WINK added that the couple allowed the girl to eat dinner with the family, but she was “sometimes forced to sit on the floor to eat.”
The girl was able to break loose from the playhouse and ran to her neighbor’s house on Dec. 27 for help. The neighbor, Scott Mackindoe, said he thought the call from his teenage son “was a joke.”
"I saw bruising here, here and two zip tie on the right, zip tie on the left and a zip tie connecting the two," his son, Sean Mackindoe, told WTSP.
The couple’s attorney, Derek Byrd, asked the public not to jump to any conclusions.
“I’m certain any people in the public would say that’s not the way they would handle it and they’re entitled to their opinion. The question is, is it criminal to handle a problematic child that way?” he told WTSP. Both parents were arrested and face aggravated child abuse charges.
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