Children removed from custody of mother charged with using iron to discipline 3-year-old boy for wetting the bed

A mother’s three children have been removed from her home after she was charged with child abuse for allegations that she burned her son’s foot with an iron as punishment for wetting the bed.

Derby Sanon, 28, was arrested Tuesday and charged with one count of aggravated child abuse. She was released Wednesday from the Manatee County jail on a $15,000 bond.

On Thursday afternoon, Sanon appeared before Senior Circuit Judge Lee Haworth in dependency court for an emergency petition to shelter her three children. Based on the allegation stemming from her arrest and a medical evaluation that concluded that the boy suffered first and second-degree burns as a result of the inflicted injury, Haworth found probable cause to remove the children and place them in their father’s custody.

There are prior cases involving the family because of violence in the home, a child protective investigator told Haworth.

Sanon was granted supervised visitation twice a week for one hour.

The Manatee County Sheriff’s Office began its investigation into the allegations Tuesday, after a worker at the boy’s daycare reported the injury. The boy had allegedly told the worker that his mother had burned him and the worker saw the fresh blister on his right foot.

That night deputies and child protective investigators went to the family’s home in the 5600 block of 24th Street West in Bayshore Gardens and interviewed Sanon and her son. Sanon admitted that she took him into the bathroom, laid him over her leg as she sat on the toilet, turned on the iron, waited for it to get hot and touched it to the bottom of his foot as a scare tactic and form of punishment for wetting his bed overnight.

The dependency case will next be heard in court at 2:30 p.m. July 19.

This story was originally published June 29, 2017 at 5:13 PM with the headline "Children removed from custody of mother charged with using iron to discipline 3-year-old boy for wetting the bed."