GOSHEN – Leticia Bravo, 39, of Newburgh, is expected to be sentenced to 15 years in state prison and five years of post-relate supervision when she is back in court in June for the starvation death of seven-year-old Peter Cuacuas he a City of Newburgh apartment.
Bravo, who previously dated the child’s father, was the boy’s primary caregiver.
She pled guilty to a charge of manslaughter in Orange County Court on Wednesday.
On February 2, Arturo Cuacuas, 54, of Newburgh, Peter’s father, pled guilty to criminally negligent homicide. He admitted that in the months before the child’s death, he would see his son with Bravo once a week, noted his deteriorating condition and that she failed to take appropriate steps to help him. He will be sentenced to 1 1/3 to four years in prison, the maximum permissible for the crime.
At the time Bravo pled guilty, she admitted being Peter’s primary caregiver, knowingly under-feeding him and failing to provide him with medical attention that she knew he required. She had kept him hidden in a room in her apartment.
On February 10, 2021, shortly after 8 a.m., Bravo brought the child’s lifeless body to the hospital. He was pronounced dead shortly thereafter.
“We may never know why this defendant subjected an innocent child in her care to what must have been such an agonizing and wholly preventable death,” said District Attorney David Hoovler. “It is unthinkable that someone would accept the responsibility of being a young child’s primary caregiver and then deny that child the barest necessities of life.”
