The child’s body found in the culvert near Wesley Mathews’ home in Richardson city has been identified as that of the missing three-year-old girl, Sherin Mathews.
The Dallas County Medical Examiner used dental records to identify the body, according to the Richardson Police. The cause of death remains unknown. Her father Wesley Mathews was arrested on Oct. 23 after changing his story of how the incident happened. His initial story was that he sent her outside as punishment for not drinking milk at 3 am. In the second version of the story, he said that she choked on milk and he disposed her body after she died.
Mathews’ wife Sini claims that she was asleep when the incident took place. The police do not contest this claim. Wesley Mathews is charged with first degree felony of causing injury to a child and is being held on $1 million bond.
He was arrested for abandoning and endangering the child, according to his earlier story for sending her out as punishment. He had then told the police that once he saw that Sherin was not at the spot he left her, he went inside and did some laundry while waiting for her to come home. He called the police well after day break, at 8 am.
Sherin was developmentally disabled because of which Wesley and Sini had put her on a special diet that required them to feed her whenever she was awake to help her gain weight, since she was malnourished.
Sherin’s four-year-old sister has been put under foster care by Texas Child Protection Services after the case came to light. Wesley and Sini attended a court hearing on Oct. 23 to regain custody of their biological child. The next hearing has been postponed to Nov. 13.