Nine-year-old boy in France abandoned by his mother for two years

The nine-year-old boy was abandoned and left alone in an apartment without electricity and water.

For two years he survived on cookies and tomatoes he took from the neighbor’s balcony – without anyone noticing.

– He took care of his hygiene, did his homework and pretended that everything was fine, says the mayor Barbara Couturier

In 2020, the mother left her son alone in a Nersac apartment in western France to live with her new boyfriend.

He lived there for two years without electricity or hot water. He slept with three blankets to cope with the cold nights and lived on cookies, preserves and tomatoes, reports say France Blue.

People in the boy’s surroundings knew nothing about existence. He continued to maintain his hygiene and made it to school where he did well.

– There were no signs that he had been abandoned. He is a very good student and has always been clean and polite. I think it was a cover he used to show that “everything is fine”, says Mayor Barbara Couturier La Parisien.

– He has shown incredible strength.

Sentenced to prison

When the neighbors finally discovered the tomato theft from the plants on the balcony, they began to suspect that everything was not right.

The boy was then taken into care by social services and now lives in a foster family.

The 39-year-old mother was sentenced last week to six months in prison for abandoning her son. She denies the accusations, but has been refuted by the neighbors’ testimony, writes France Bleu.

– I am not a mother hen, but he is still my son, she said during the trial.