LANCASTER (CNS) – A Palmdale woman has pleaded no contest to torturing her two adopted children, who were beaten with electrical cords and a hammer, and is expected to be sentenced to life in prison.
Ingrid Brewer, 52, entered her plea to a pair of torture counts involving the girl and boy, who were 7 and 8 years old at the time of the abuse.
Under the plea deal, two counts each of child abuse, assault with a deadly weapon and battery with serious bodily injury will be dismissed at Brewer’s March 11 sentencing, when she is set to be handed a life term, plus seven years, according to the District Attorney’s Office.
Brewer reported the two children missing on Jan. 15, 2013. Deputies found them hiding under a blanket near a parked vehicle on a street near their home.
“Neither child had any type of winter clothing on, despite temperatures in the mid-20s,” sheriff’s Deputy Mark Pope said at the time.
The children told deputies that they had run away because “they were tired of being tied up and beaten,” Pope said.
Brewer would tie their hands behind their backs and beat them with electrical cords and a hammer, investigators said. Brewer also deprived them of food and access to the bathroom, forcing them to use wastebaskets in their rooms to relieve themselves, according to law enforcement and prosecutors.
Brewer has been jailed in lieu of $2 million bail since her Jan. 16, 2013, arrest.