Lakeland man sentenced to 20 years for using Taser to punish children

SENTENCING UPDATE: Lakeland man sentenced to 20 years for using Taser to punish children

Eduardo Vazquez had been disciplining children by holding a stun gun to their bare skin and zapping them with it.

Eduardo Vazquez, 22, of Lakeland.

He pled guilty to nine counts of contributing to the delinquency of a child, seven counts of aggravated child abuse two counts of false information to a law enforcement officer and tampering with physical evidence on April 25 and received 20 years in prison, followed by 10 years of probation.

As a punishment for disobeying, Vazquez was shocking the children with a Taser. Of the nine children 22-year-old Vazquez was around, two were removed from his custody because they had “patterned bruises” and “two-prong burns” on their backsides.

One of the children had 10 two-prong burns on his skin. The second child had at least 15 burns.

William Torres-Morales was also arrested for using a Taser on the children. Elizabeth Tarvin and Veronica Sanchez did not use the Taser but were aware of the abuse — they were also arrested.

From left to right: William Torres-Morales, Elizabeth Tarvin and Veronica Sanchez.

Tarvin, who failed to report Vazquez’s abuse to law enforcement, pled to six counts of child neglect and one count of neglect of a child with great bodily harm on March 1 and was sentenced to 10 years of prison, followed by 10 years of probation.

Sanchez is still incarcerated and has not yet been sentenced.

Torres-Morales was found incompetent by a judge on July 31 and was ordered to complete competency training, with reviews every six months. If he regains competency, the courts will move forward with his trial.