Madison County woman sentenced to 70 years in child abuse case

A Madison County woman who was found guilty on multiple counts of criminal abuse against her 9-year-old daughter was sentenced to 70 years on Thursday.

In 2014 officials say Linda Richmond and her boyfriend Julio Valladares spent a year torturing the child. Court documents say Richmond and Valladares would withhold food from the child for wetting the bed.

The jury recommended Richmond serve a 90 year sentence, but the judge said that the max sentence for criminal abuse was 70 years. Valladares took a 20 year plea deal.

The indictment states that the couple systematically engaged in mental and physical abuse by starving the child, spraying rubbing alcohol on the wounds they had caused, even forcing her to stand in a cold shower for 20 minutes, a routine they called showers on the hour.

"I've sat through this trial, I've sat through a lot of things and this is one of the most horrific acts I've ever seen that was plagued upon a child for months on end, resulting in the child barely being alive at the hospital,"Judge Logue said. I suppose that was the only merciful act you did, take her to the hospital. "

The couple is also accused of making the girl sit in a chair for several hours a day, and for limiting her food intake because of what police called accidental bed wetting.

Richmond is being held in the Madison County Detention Center.