Mom who kept 8-year-old in wooden box and tortured him with Icy Hot will continue rotting in prison after failing to convince judge her guilty plea was 'coerced'
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--Al
A California mother who was convicted of first-degree murder and sentenced to life in prison for "beating, binding, burning and starving" her 8-year-old son with help from her boyfriend has been denied resentencing for a second time after insisting she was "coerced" into pleading guilty.
The resentencing attempt by Pearl Fernandez, 42, of Palmdale, was shot down Monday by Los Angeles County Superior Court Judge George G. Lomeli following an emotionally charged petition hearing.
"We are here again, reliving and reopening wounds," said Emily Carranza, one of several family members who spoke during the court proceeding, according to local NBC affiliate KNBC.
In her latest petition, which was filed in February, Fernandez claimed that the state-appointed defense attorney who represented her in the murder case "provided ineffective assistance of counsel" and "coerced me into signing a plea of guilt for a sentence of life without possibility of parole," according to local ABC affiliate KABC and the Southern California-based City News Service.
Fernandez was sentenced in 2018 after entering a guilty plea in which she confessed to the brutal torture and mistreatment of her son, Gabriel, who died from blunt force trauma and child abuse over a long period of time. Fernandez's boyfriend, Isauro Aguirre, was also found guilty of participating in the abuse and sentenced to death.
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--Al
