An Ector County grand jury has indicted the mother of an 8-year-old boy who died in November on a capital murder charge. The boy’s stepfather is also facing prison in connection with the death.
According to the indictment, Megan Marie Lange is accused of applying pressure to Arturo Coca’s throat or neck or blocking his nose or mouth which resulted in his death Nov. 5. In addition to capital murder of a child under 10, she’s also facing two injury to a child counts for allegedly hitting him and failing to provide him adequate nutrition or medical care, the indictment states.
Rodolfo Reyes is also accused of failing to provide the child adequate medical care or nutrition. The grand jury indicted him on a single charge of injury to a child by omission.
The injury to a child charges are first-degree felonies punishable by five years to life.
Ector County District Attorney Dusty Gallivan has not yet decided if he will seek the death penalty for Lange. The capital murder charge is also punishable by a life without the possibility of parole.
According to an Ector County Sheriff’s Office report, Lange called 911 from her home in the 2000 block of North Huntington Avenue on Nov. 5 to report Arturo was unresponsive. Life saving measures taken by firefighters and Medical Center Hospital personnel were unsuccessful.
Lange told authorities Arturo had woken up after defecating and urinating on himself and after she cleaned him up, he stopped breathing, the report stated.
Ector County Sheriff Mike Griffis said Lange and Reyes, the boy’s stepfather, attributed the boy’s death to diabetes, but a forensic pathologist ruled the cause of Arturo’s death was “asphyxiation by manual strangulation with underlying causes of neglect.” He also determined the boy was malnourished.
Griffis also told the Odessa American the boy weighed 35 pounds.
Lange and Reyes remain in the Ector County jail.
