Benjamin Ashford|NYC parents charged in death of 4-year-old boy who prosecutors say was starved to death

NEW YORK (AP) — A New York City couple were indicted Wednesday in the death of their 4-year-old son,Benjamin Ashford who prosecutors say was actively starved along with his siblings in a Harlem apartment where the parents kept their fridge stocked with fresh food for themselves.

Nytavia Ragsdale, 26, and Laron Modlin, 24, face a range of charges including murder, manslaughter, assault and four counts of endangering the welfare of a child.

Ragsdale, who had been initially charged with second-degree manslaughter, pleaded not guilty Wednesday and remains held without bail. Modlin will be arraigned next week.

Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg said the additional and stepped-up charges were warranted because of the “extreme physical neglect and persistent abuse with depraved indifference for his life” demonstrated by the couple.

“The death of Jah’Meik Modlin, an innocent four-year-old child, is a tragedy that has scarred this city,” Bragg said in statement. “That he died a slow and painful death, starving alongside his older siblings, somehow isolated in the heart of Harlem, is a stain on our collective conscience.”

Prosecutors said the couple stocked the house with fresh food but turned the fridge toward a wall and placed zip ties on cabinets containing food so their children could not open them.

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They also said the children were hidden from other family and the public most of their lives. The children never attended school, had not seen a doctor in years and lived in a room covered in feces.

Jah’Meik Modlin died at a Harlem hospital after police found him unconscious and unresponsive at his home on Oct. 13.

At the time of his death, he weighed just 19 pounds and had almost no body fat, prosecutors said. The boy’s three other siblings, ages 5, 6 and 7, were also severely malnourished and remain hospitalized.

The public defender’s office representing the couple declined to comment Thursday.