David Gonzales & Anita Valdez, San Antonio father and stepmother arrested handcuffing their young kids, forcing them to eat hot peppers and other ongoing tortures

A couple from San Antonio, Texas, is accused of handcuffing their children to bed posts, forcing them to eat hot peppers as punishment, and engaging in other forms of continuing torture at their Bexar County home.

David Gonzales, 30, and Anita Valdez were detained last week after two of their children reported to the Bexar County Sheriff's Office (BCSO) that they had been shackled to their beds and repeatedly assaulted.

Officials were summoned to the 1100 block of Tecumseh Drive for a case of unlawful detention and injury to a kid, after one of the children who had come for a weekend visit told her biological mother of what she'd undergone, according to KENS5.

San Antonio parents handcuff and torture their "kids for their own safety."

A 7-year-old child informed her mother that she was tied to her bed overnight while visiting her father, David Gonzales, and stepmother, Anita Valdez. The girl claimed that her father and stepmother had shackled her hands to the bed, and she awoke still restrained until her 9-year-old sister got her out.

The mother immediately contacted Gonzales and confronted him. According to accounts, he accepted it but declined to explain why. The mother, angry and worried, contacted the authorities.

When investigators with BCSO arrived, more details came out. The 7-year-old said the handcuffs hurt her wrists and that this was not the first time—and that the ‘punishment’ happened often. Another child, Valdez’s 6-year-old daughter, also told police she was regularly handcuffed, sometimes with a rope tied to one hand, ‘for her own safety.’

The girl said she was only allowed to eat once a day and was punished with extremely spicy peppers if she disobeyed. She also claimed Gonzales hit her with a belt, with officers later finding bruises on her legs and thighs.

The child mentioned the last time she was handcuffed was when she was caught eating in the bathroom because she was still hungry, KSAT reported.

The children also mentioned being forced to take ‘nasty-tasting gummies’ that made them sleepy, and that Valdez would rub oil on their cuts that burned. They all said they felt unsafe in the home.

Police searched the house and found three sets of handcuffs attached to the children’s beds, along with straps.

Both Gonzales and Valdez were arrested and charged with injury to a child and unlawful restraint under the age of 17. Valdez faces an additional unlawful restraint charge.

Jail records show the father and stepmother making bond and no longer in custody.