The 3-year-old girl went missing Oct. 7 in a suburb of Dallas, Texas, and was later found dead, officials said.
Wesley Mathews told police that his daughter disappeared after he punished her by sending her outside at 3 a.m. for not drinking her milk. Weeks later, her body was found in a culvert.
Mathews told police a different story on Monday and was booked into a local jail in Richardson County. He said that she died after he “physically assisted” her in drinking the milk, local media reports said, and a warrant said that he claimed she choked on the milk.
He was arrested and charged with felony injury to a child.
On Wednesday, as he was taken from the Richardson County jail to a Dallas County jail, while handcuffed, he put his head down and ignored reporters.
After NBC submitted a request to interview Mathews, the Dallas County Sheriff’s Department told the station that he’s under a suicide watch and can’t accept the request.
Mathews and his wife Sini attended a court hearing on whether they could get custody of their biological daughter, who had been placed in protective custody after Sherin went missing.
Sini Mathews has not been charged in the case.
Reports said that when Sherin went missing, Sini was sleeping.
“He was physically assisting her with that milk, apparently to the point to where she began to choke, lost consciousness, and expired,” Sgt. Kevin Perlich of Richardson Police said. “He told us he removed her from the home, and she was deceased the time he removed her from the home,” said Perlich.
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