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Richard, Amber Dowen found with a 12-pound 4-year-old.
By SAMIHA KHANNA, Staff WriterDURHAM -- A Texas couple were charged with attempted first-degree murder after a sheriff's deputy found their dehydrated, malnourished 4-year-old son, who police say weighed 12 pounds, in their tractor-trailer Wednesday.
Investigators say they think Richard and Amber Dowen of Riverside, Texas, had starved their son, Randolph Thomas, since April, according to arrest warrants. The boy was in critical condition late Wednesday at Duke Hospital, police said.
"I have never seen anything like that. It reminded me of photographs of the Holocaust, the starvation," said Durham County Magistrate Eric Van Vleet, who saw photographs of the boy while setting bail for the couple.
The average weight of a 4-year-old boy is 35 to 45 pounds, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says.
A Durham County deputy discovered the boy about 8:20 a.m. when the officer saw a man inside an 18-wheeler on South Miami Boulevard near Interstate 40 waving an arm out the window, said Lt. C.R. Vaughan of the Durham County Sheriff's Office.
The man, identified by police as Richard Dowen, 32, told the officer that his stepson appeared to be unconscious and needed a doctor, a Durham police news release said.
The boy had bruises on his head and marks on his chest, the release said. Another child inside the truck, a 15-month-old girl, appeared to be healthy, the release said.
A Durham County social worker took the girl while Durham police investigated.
Police charged the mother, Amber Dowen, 20, and Richard Dowen, the boy's stepfather, with attempted first-degree murder and felony child abuse.
They also charged Richard Dowen as an accessory after the fact because they suspect he allowed his wife to starve the boy, according to arrest warrants. Amber Dowen was charged with malicious conduct by a prisoner after she allegedly spit at a police officer who was taking her to jail, warrants stated.
It was unclear Wednesday to where the Dowens were traveling when they stopped in Durham. Attempts to reach their relatives were unsuccessful.
The 18-wheeler belongs to New Prime Inc., a trucking company based in Springfield, Mo. The company owns about 2,500 trucks, mostly used for delivering dry goods and refrigerated foods, a manager with New Prime said by phone. He confirmed that Dowen had leased a truck from the company, working as an independent contractor.
The Dowens were booked into the Durham County jail about 5 p.m., appearing before a magistrate who set bail for each of them at $1 million.
Both Richard and Amber Dowen, who gave their address as a post office box in Riverside, are scheduled to make a first court appearance today at the jail. (News researcher Brooke Cain contributed to this report.)
http://www.newsobserver.com/news/sto...-9212991c.html
Wonder how that makes people who can't have children but want children feel? 
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