HOUSTON – A man was charged with child abuse after investigators said he hit a 7-year-old boy 62 times within five minutes in Acres Homes.
The incident was reported at 5 p.m. Thursday at an illegal dumping site near the man's apartment in northwest Houston.
"He saw a vehicle pull up at one of our illegal dumping sites and saw a man get out of a car and take a young child out of the car and proceed to just beat him senselessly,” said Constable Alan Rosen with Harris County Precinct 1 Constable's Office.
Investigators said Kordarell Williams, 27, pulled over at James Franklin Street and Esther on Thursday evening and used his hands and a belt to hit a 7-year-old boy all over his body.
"He struck this child 62 times, put him in a headlock and knocked him over on numerous occasions with the blows,” said Rosen.
Detectives said Williams is the boyfriend of the boy's mother.
They used the license plate in the video to track Williams down and in three hours, deputies arrested him.
Wearing jeans and a black shirt, Williams made his first court appearance Friday afternoon.
“They observed the complainant to have bruising on both eyes and a swollen right eye, welts on his buttocks, legs and welts on his chest and bruising on his neck,” said the prosecutor.
Williams admitted to investigators he hit the boy, but only 16 times, for stealing a phone charger.
“This is just hard for me to describe. The brutalness of how he beat this child,” said Rosen.
The boy allegedly told deputies Williams had beat him in the past.
On Friday, the boy was in CPS custody.
Williams was behind bars on a $30,000 bond.