An Iowa teen testified before the court Wednesday, saying his adoptive mother refused to feed his 16-year-old sister even as she starved to death Oct. 26, 2016.

Natalie Finn had become too weak from hunger and yet Nicole Finn, the adoptive mother, refused to feed her until the girl got up from the bed.

"She said, 'Since you're not going to get up, I'm not going to feed you,'" Natalie’s brother, Jaden Finn, testified before the Polk County jury at his mother’s trial, Chicago Tribune reported.

Nicole’s son also added they used to live like prisoners inside their own home, and were required to ask for their mother's permission to go to the bathroom, eat food, or leave their room. However, most of the time when they would try and seek her approval, she would be “unavailable” or not be “willing” to give permission.

Since Nicole did not feed her children on time or even provide them with proper meals, Natalie, Jaden and their younger sister, Mikayla, would often go hungry for days. Natalie’s brother revealed before the court, once, when he and his sister had gone hungry for two weeks, they were forced to sneak out of the home to beg for food.

However, Nicole and her ex-husband put an end to their hunts for food when they discovered pizza boxes and other waste outside the window. Their bedroom window was boarded up and an alarm was installed inside their room to ensure they would not leave their room.

Mikayla also said Nicole would force them to sleep on the bedroom floor. Since they were often not allowed out of their bedroom by their mother to visit the bathroom, there were times when she was forced to relieve herself on the bedroom floor. Hence, they were essentially forced to live in their own waste.

Around the time of Natalie’s death, her siblings had written the words “need food and money” on a piece of paper and put it on the bedroom window. Her brother recalled feeding Natalie water through a plastic syringe on the night before her death. In the morning Natalie’s siblings found her with no pulse, lying in her own vomit.

Although the emergency services were alerted and Nicole tried to give her daughter CPR, they were unable to resuscitate Natalie.

Nicole was charged with murder, kidnapping and child endangerment. She was also accused of child abuse by her two surviving children, who were found by the police in their West Des Moines home in Iowa in a severely malnourished state.

She pleaded not guilty to all the charges and accusations against her. According to Des Moines Register, a conviction on any of the charges could earn her life in prison.

In addition, Joe Finn, Nicole Finn's ex-husband, was charged with kidnap, neglect or abandonment and child endangerment. He too pleaded not guilty to all the charges and will face the jury Jan. 8.

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