An 8-year-old boy leaped to his death from a ninth-floor apartment in Ukraine to avoid the latest beating from his parents, according to reports.
The youngster’s parents put him through years of abuse, and a neighbor said she heard them again yelling and beating him for damaging some clothes last month, according to The Sun, citing local reports.
The boy — identified only as Anton — finally snapped and leaped to his death from the building in Enerhodar, the reports said.
“There was that horrific thud when a body hits the ground,” a downstairs neighbor, Zhanna, told reporters, according to The Sun.
“I looked out of my kitchen window and saw the boy lying below.”
Another neighbor, Andrey, said she saw the parents go upstairs to the apartment just before the child’s death.
“Ten minutes later the boy was lying on the ground as his parents were racing downstairs in the street,” Andrey said, according to the report.
Paramedics raced to the apartment block but the boy was pronounced dead at the scene.
His parents confessed to beating their son and said that “he jumped out of his room window right after the abuse,” the reports claimed. The couple each faces up to five years in prison if found guilty.
Anton’s school principal, Oksana Zelenska, reportedly claimed that the tragic youngster was neglected, saying, “His parents were not interested in him at all.”
However, psychologist Zoya Pershyna, who saw Anton several times, insisted, “I did not see it coming.”