Man Poured Hot Sauce Into 4-Year-Old Son's Mouth As Punishment

A Texas man hit his four-year-old son with a belt and forced hot sauce down his throat for swearing, an arrest affidavit released Wednesday said.

The incident came to light Easter Sunday evening when a cousin of the accused, 24-year-old Demitro Revillas, notified police about the incident at their apartment. Police arrived at the scene and saw the boy in a room, facing the wall as punishment.

During interrogation, the cousin told police that she had told Revillas that the boy had said a curse word while he was away. An angry Revillas hit the child in the face, knocked him down and asked if it was true. However, when the boy did not admit to it, Revillas walked the child to the kitchen and forced hot sauce into his mouth for up to four minutes while the boy screamed for help. When the boy continued to deny cursing, Revillas took him to the bathroom and locked the door. The cousin told police she could hear the accused hitting the boy in the bathroom, the Statesmen reported.

According to the affidavit, there were two others who witnessed the incident, one of whom saw Revillas forcing hot sauce into the victim’s mouth.

The boy told police that his father hit him in the face with a belt. The responding officers could see bruises on the child’s face. One of them also noticed dark red/purple spots beneath the boy’s right eye, NBC-affiliated television station KXAN reported.

When asked, Revillas admitted to hitting the child and told police that the boy “was being bad all day, which is why he received several different punishments.”

He, however, denied hitting the boy on the face with the belt and said he only hit him two times on his back. Revillas also said he only poured a few drops of hot sauce into the boy’s mouth.

Revillas was taken into custody and charged with injury to a child. He was held in the Williamson County Jail at $40,000 bail and could face up to 10 years in prison if found guilty.