A mother in France was sentenced to 18 months in prison last week for abandoning her 9-year-old child, according to CNN affiliate BFMTV.

BFMTV reported that the boy had been left to live alone in the family’s apartment in the town of Nersac in the Charente region for two years, from 2020 to 2022, and appeared to survive on cake, canned goods, and stolen tomatoes.

According to BFMTV, the child’s mother lived with her partner in another apartment five kilometers (3.1 miles) away and would only visit the child from “time to time.”

The Mayor of Nersac, Barbara Couturier, as reported by BFMTV, said the child often did not have hot water or heating. Nevertheless, he continued attending school during this time and was a good student, Couturier also stated.

Couturier said she alerted the local and national police about the situation after the mother asked social services to help buy food.

“I met his mom on May 2022. She came to tell us that she had financial problems, and we gave her four vouchers for food, but she took some processed food products instead so that got me suspicious. Some residents told me that there was a child living alone, so I connected the two things and I called the local police and the national police,” Couturier explained.

Couturier stated that the child had been under the care of social services since September 19, 2022.

This is a developing story.

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