Texas father sobs as he is rescued from starvation of his four-year-old son, even as videos show child begging for bread

A Texas father has been acquitted in the starvation death of his four-year-old son, despite horrific videos showing the boy begging for food with his bones sticking out.

Brandon Cervera, 31, sobbed as the jury returned a not guilty verdict of felony injury to a child inflicting serious bodily injury in the 2021 death of his son Benjamin, KSAT reported.

Cervera took Benjamin to the emergency room in August 2021. The child was unconscious, covered in bruises, in various stages of healing, and appeared extremely emaciated. He died shortly after arriving at the hospital.

The boy's stepmother, Miranda Casarez, 25, was convicted in April and sentenced to 25 years in prison for inflicting great bodily harm on a child by omission.

Heartbreaking videos shot on cellphones and surveillance footage shared during Cervera's trial showed the little boy begging for food, rummaging through cupboards for leftovers and crying while trapped in his sparsely furnished room.

Horrific videos show four-year-old Benjamin with protruding bones begging for food in the months before his death

A video taken just days before the four-year-old starved to death showed Benjamin asking, “Daddy, Daddy, can I have bread?” with his hands tightly folded across his chest as his clothes hung off him.

Other videos from early 2021 show the little boy rummaging through cupboards and the refrigerator in the middle of the night to get food. Benjamin could be seen grabbing fruit snacks, a Jell-O cup, cookies and milk.

Eventually, prosecutors said Cervera would lock the cabinets, making it harder for Benjamin to steal food.

In a text exchange with his ex-wife, Cervera allegedly told her, “He doesn't need to eat dinner” and told his ex to just give the child bread after she told him he had been begging all day.

Cervera's lawyers said the text message was taken out of context and that he said not to give Benjamin dinner because he had already eaten an entire loaf of bread.

Brandon Cevera (left) is seen in police bodycam footage standing next to his child before he died in 2021

Surveillance footage also shows the child crying while trapped in the sparsely furnished room he shares with his brother. Police discovered that Benjamin was the only family member without a bed and had to sleep on a mattress with a urine-soaked blanket.

Other videos show Benjamin hitting himself in the face in the back seat of a car and Cervera threatening his child as he begs for bread, according to the San Antonio Express-News.

According to Detective Lawrence Saiz of the San Antonio Police Department, police captured the cell phone footage using his stepmother's device, while the surveillance footage was captured from cameras in the apartment.

Bexar County Chief Medical Examiner Dr. Kimberley Molina said Benjamin weighed only 28 pounds at the time of his death and had not grown for 10 months.

She also noted that the boy had no body fat and no food was found in his intestinal tract when he died.

Cervera's lawyers brought in experts who, based on photos of the boy's body changes in the last months of his life, argued that Benjamin was not malnourished.

During a welfare check (pictured), Benjamin was seen with black eyes and was extremely thin

A medical examiner determined the cause of death to be starvation and stated that he weighed 28 pounds at the time

“This child was always small and that doesn’t mean anyone is starving,” said defense attorney Jodi Soyars.

After the verdict, Cervera told reporters outside the courtroom that he could now properly mourn his son, according to WOAI.

“My life is torn apart because of being labeled a monster despite the evidence,” he said.

“I just want justice for my son, and now I just want to have peace. 'I just want to be with my children.'