Mesa mom gets 17-year sentence for abusing girl rescued from closet

PHOENIX – A Phoenix-area mother was sentenced to 17 years in prison for child abuse Friday, nearly four years after her malnourished 3-year-old daughter was rescued from a closet.

Mayra Solis pleaded guilty in August to one count of child abuse for the malnourishment and two counts of attempted child abuse for leaving her daughter with a friend who allegedly offered the girl online for sex.

Francisco Covarrubias was sentenced to 35 years in prison in October 2018 after pleading guilty on kidnapping and attempted child abuse charges.

“A little girl’s life has been impacted forever by the extreme physical and emotional abuse she endured in her very early years,” Maricopa County Attorney Allister Adel said in a press release.

“Acts like this defy all comprehension, and the heartbreak is amplified in the knowledge that they were perpetrated by her own mother. [Friday’s] sentence was just but can never make this innocent girl whole again.”

Solis admitted shaving her daughter’s head and telling people the severely malnourished girl had cancer as a way to get money, according to the release.

In January 2016, police responded to a Mesa apartment after receiving reports that a man was offering a young girl for sex. They found Covarrubias in the apartment, and he admitted he was keeping the girl in a closet, according to the release.

Police found her inside a trash bag in the closet with tape over her mouth and around her wrists and ankles. She was bruised, covered in filth and too weak to stand.

Solis and Covarrubias were former co-workers, and she left her daughter in his care for days at a time, according to the release.

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