Dayana Medina-Flores will have to serve the 65-year jail sentence she received for the murder of her 12-year-old stepson.
On Thursday, the Indiana Court of Appeals denied her request for a lighter punishment.
Medina-Flores had appealed her sentence on grounds that the Monroe Circuit Court abused its discretion in giving her a maximum sentence.
A 2019 police investigation found Medina-Flores and her husband Luis Posso abused her stepson to the point the child’s body began to shut down. The 12-year-old was kept locked in a bathroom where he was chained to the wall, denied food and routinely beaten.
Medina-Flores pleaded guilty to murder last July as part of a sentencing agreement. Under the agreement, other charges against her would be dropped, including a life without parole modifier.
Monroe County Circuit Court Judge Christine Talley Haseman sentenced her to 65 years in prison.
Medina-Flores then appealed the sentence this March, saying Talley Haseman failed to take mitigating factors into account in her sentencing.
Medina-Flores’ attorney argued that she was only following orders, and that her undocumented status created a power imbalance with Posso, the child’s biological father.
READ MORE: Posso changes plea to guilty in child neglect, murder case
They said her participation in the boy’s abuse was analogous to someone experiencing battered spouse syndrome and noted that she had a lack of criminal history and admitted to the crime.
The Indiana Court of Appeals upheld the maximum sentence.
It acknowledged Medina-Flores’ lack of criminal history and acceptance of guilt but denied she was not a willing participant in the boy’s abuse.
“Our review of the nature of the offense reveals that Medina-Flores knowingly or intentionally killed her stepson,” the decision reads. “We agree with the trial court that Medina-Flores’ total disregard for [the boy’s] life was astonishing.”
