He then noticed bruises on his arms and face.
The waitress, Flavaine Carvalho, invented a plan. She wrote “Do you need help?” on a piece of paper and kept it up to the boy, from where his parents could not see from his stand in the restaurant Mrs. Potato.
She told police it took three attempts before the boy said “yes.”
Carvalho called the police. He is now credited with helping save the boy from what police described as “dangerous abuse.”
“This could have been a homicide situation if he had not intervened,” said Orlando Rolon, Orlando police chief. ABC WFTV subsidiary.
The owner of the restaurant, Rafaela Cabede, said she attributes what happened to a higher power.
He said Carvalho was not to work the night he saw the boy. She was only there because she called another employee. And the family was sitting at the only table in the restaurant where Carvalho could have kept the sign to the boy without the rest of his family seeing it.
They were also the last table of the night, which allowed Carvalho to pay more attention to the family.
“We understand that this should encourage other people to say something when you see something,” Cabede said. “We know that when we see a wrong situation, we know what needs to be done. We know that talking is the right thing to do. But it takes more than acknowledging it. It takes courage.”
“The lesson here for all of us is to recognize when we see something that is not right to act on … That saved a child’s life,” Rolon said.
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The boy’s stepfather, Timothy Wilson II, 34, was arrested for a third-degree child abuse offense.
In interviews with detectives, they said the boy told them his stepfather hit him with his fists, a wooden broom and a back scraper. The boy told detectives he was hanging upside down from a door frame by his ankles and in another case tied to a furniture cart.
Police said the boy also said he was not allowed to eat regularly as punishment. It weighed less than 20 pounds.
“To be honest what had happened to this child was torture,” Detective Erin Lawler said. “There was no justification for this in any kingdom in the world. I am a mother and to see what that eleven-year-old had to go through, it amazes your soul.”
After police learned of the additional details of the abuse, they said they re-arrested Wilson on several charges of child abuse and child neglect.
Police said when they interviewed the boy’s mother, Kristen Swann, she admitted she had known about the abuse and had not sought medical attention for the boy. She was arrested and charged with two counts of child neglect.
Investigators said both the boy and a 4-year-old girl were removed from custody of the couple by the Department of Children and Families. They said there was no evidence of physical abuse of the girl.
Police said the family had recently moved to the area and was staying in a hotel for an extended stay.
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