The Indian-American foster parents of Sherin Mathews, the three-year-old Indian girl who was found dead in a culvert in Dallas, on Friday relinquished custody and parental rights to their biological child. In a custody hearing, Wesley and Sini Mathews stood in shackles before a judge and agreed to relinquish their parental rights - an irrevocable decision, Dallas News reported. Sherin went missing on October 7 and her body was found on October 22 in a culvert in suburban Dallas by a cadaver dog after an intense search. Sini “made the extremely difficult decision to give up her parental rights because, given the circumstances and the pending criminal cases, this is in the best interests of the child. If convicted, Mathews could face the death penalty, should prosecutors choose to pursue it, or an automatic sentence of life without parole.

Source: Hindustan Times January 27, 2018 04:30 UTC