A Houston mother was sentenced Tuesday to 50 years in prison for her role in the death of her 8-year-old son in 2020, Harris County District Attorney Kim Ogg announced.

“We expect parents to protect their children, not hurt them, because children really are our most vulnerable victims,” Ogg said. “This case shocks the conscience not just because a child lost his life, but because of his parents’ complete and total disregard for human life.”

Gloria Yvette Williams, 38, pleaded guilty earlier to injury to a child causing serious bodily injury, a first-degree felony, in the death of son Kendrick Lee at the family’s west Houston apartment.

She also pleaded guilty to a second count for the harm inflicted on a child who survived.

Williams’s husband, Brian Coulter, 34, was sentenced in April to life in prison without parole after being convicted of capital murder for killing his stepson.

The case garnered widespread media coverage since the couple were arrested in 2021 because they moved to a different apartment but left the body to decompose in their former apartment, where Williams’s other young children continued to live.

Kendrick’s body, covered with a blue blanket, lay in the apartment for over a year while his siblings were forced to stay there with the remains.

Two siblings testified during Coulter’s trial that they saw Coulter repeatedly beat Kendrick when he was alive. The boy died in late 2020 after Coulter beat him severely. Coulter then covered the body, and he and Williams moved to a different apartment while the boy’s siblings were forced to stay behind.

A year later, one of the siblings called Houston police about the situation. Only the boy’s skeletal remains were found when officers arrived at the home in October 2021.

Assistant District Attorneys Celeste Byrom, who is also the division chief of Victim Services of the DA’s Office, and Edward A. Appelbaum, who is a chief assigned to the DA’s Child Fatality Section, prosecuted both Coulter and Williams.

“We’re grateful the judge listened to all of the evidence, evaluated it in a fair manner and that justice was served,” Byrom said. “It was an honor to speak up for the children who for so long did not have a voice.”

Appelbaum agreed and said the facts of the case shock the conscience. Both prosecutors said that the facts in the case were horrific.

Appelbaum noted that as part of Williams’s plea agreement, she requested that the children not have to testify again about the death.

“By pleading guilty and waiving the right to a jury trial, the defendant finally acted like a protective mother,” Appelbaum said. “For one day of her children’s lives, she was a good mother.”

Williams was facing life in prison for her role in the death. As part of the plea agreement, her punishment was capped at 55 years. After hearing the facts in the case, a judge sentenced her to 50 years in prison.

She will have to serve at least half of that sentence before she will be eligible for parole.

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