Texas mother Kaylene Bowen-Wright, 36, was sentenced Friday to six years behind bars for causing her son to undergo medical treatments and surgeries he did not need, NBC News reported.
In the Dallas court, Bowen-Wright pleaded guilty to injury to a child causing serious bodily injury after confessing to subjecting her son Christopher Bowen to multiple unnecessary surgeries throughout his life, The Dallas Morning News said.
Christopher's father, Ryan Crawford, complained to the judges for several years that his son was healthy and did not need the medical treatments, the Morning News added.
According to NBC Dallas-Fort Worth, investigators said Christopher Bowen spent the first eight years of his life in and out of the hospital due to various health problems his mother claimed he suffered from, including muscular dystrophy, heart issues, seizures, and cancer.
As a result of the unnecessary treatments, Christopher, now 10, contracted sepsis multiple times, suffered blood clots from the treatments, and was exposed to radiation, the NBC station said. The station added that his mother had doctors insert a feeding tube, and confined him to a wheelchair.
In total, Christopher logged over 320 hospital visits and underwent 13 surgeries.
In 2017, he and two siblings were removed from Bowen-Wright's care after a Dallas hospital told Child Protective Services that Christopher was not actually sick. The same year, authorities arrested Bowen-Wright.
The reason for the medical abuse has been named as Munchausen syndrome by proxy.
The mother initially faced up to 20 years in prison.
Crawford on Friday testified that he lost years with his son due to Bowen-Wright's insistence on hospitalizing him so many times.
"It was too much manipulation, too many lies. I didn't know what to do," the NBC Dallas-Fort Worth quoted Crawford as saying.
."I’m glad there was a judge that was able to stand up for Christopher," The Dallas Morning News quoted him as saying.
Christopher is now living with his father, and is happy and thriving.