A California mother has been charged over the death of her three-year-old daughter who last year died from asphyxiation after having an exorcism performed on her by her pastor grandfather at the family’s tiny Pentecostal church in San Jose.
Arely Naomi Proctor died in September last year after her mother Claudia Hernandez, who goes by a different name on social media, and her pastor grandfather performed an exorcism, according to police.
Claudia is accused of holding the girl’s neck, squeezing it and depriving her of food, while Pastor Rene Huezo, the girl’s grandfather, and her uncle held her down.
They told police they were trying to rid the girl’s body of ‘evil spirits’, according to The Mercury News.
Claudia also allegedly told police that she thought the child was possessed because she ‘would wake up and scream or cry periodically,’ local station KTVU reported, citing court documents.
‘If you weren’t there, then you don’t know.’
The church operates out of the basement of a home in San Jose. It is unassuming from the outside.
The man who owns that house told the Mercury News that he was unware they were performing an exorcism when the child died last September.
It was on September 23 and lasted some two hours.
‘The grandpa told me they were praying, and they think that by praying, the Holy Ghost will come and save her.
‘The mom said she was trying to squeeze her body to bring her demons out. I can’t believe she said that. It’s very awful. Very, very awful,’ Santiago Garcia said.
ormed an exorcism.