A four-year-old girl found beaten and abused told police she thought her name was “Idiot”.
Her mother and boyfriend have been arrested after the little girl was reportedly discovered zip-tied to furniture, covered in scars and with dried blood on her mouth.
Jennifer Denen, 30, and Clarence Reed, 47, were detained by cops in Hot Springs, Arkansas, US, on charges of first-degree domestic battery, permitting abuse of a minor and first-degree endangering the welfare of a minor.
The police report said she was found with "deep purple bruising on her bottom, lower back and legs; a black eye; swollen right cheek; a bruise on her forehead; healing scars across her back; and dried blood in the corner of her mouth."
When police asked the girl for her name, she apparently replied “Idiot”.
Reed, who admitted tying her to the bed as a punishment, regularly used “Idiot” instead of her real name, police said. He defended himself, saying it was meant as a “joke”.
Denen, who has six children, admitted she had seen her live-in partner hitting her daughter with a plastic bat.
She also revealed she had never taken her to get medical attention.
The couple could face 32 years in prison.
A spokesman for the Hot Springs Police Department said Denen’s 11-month-old baby, her only child with Reed, had been taken into the custody for the Department of Human Services. The other four children are with their biological father.
