Resident saves 6-year-old US boy who was 'locked in shed by his grandmother'

Juan Vaquero reveals the harrowing moment he discovers a six-year-old boy locked inside a shed near his camper. Photo / CBS 11

A US man who lives on a property with his landlord has revealed the harrowing moment he discovered a starving 6-year-old boy locked in a shed near his camper.

Juan Vaquero told CBS 11 he heard a familiar voice coming from the shed when returning to his camper, which he rents in the backyard of his landlord's Dallas home at 10pm, Sunday.

Juan Vaquero reveals the harrowing moment he discovers a six-year-old boy locked inside a shed near his camper. Photo / CBS 11

Because it was dark, he shone a flashlight from his phone and traced the voice coming from a padlocked shed behind his camper.

He soon discovered it was his landlord's 6-year-old grandson locked inside, he claims.

Vaquero, who called Child Protective Services that night, also recorded a conversation he had with the boy while he was still locked in the shed for evidence.

In the recording, the boy can be heard telling Vaquero that he had been locked in the shed for four hours with his hands tied up with rope.

The shed where the child was originally locked inside. Photo / KTVT, CNN

"I can walk, but I can't move my hands and touch," the child told Vaquero.

Vaquero questioned: "You said she tied up your hands?"

"Yes," the child responded.

He then asked the boy why his hands were tied.

"Because she didn't want me grabbing things anymore," the 6-year-old said.

The boy said he had no blankets or pillow and hadn't eaten since that morning.

Vaquero offered to get him some food, but the boy said he couldn't eat.

"I can't open jello. She tied my hands behind my back like the police do," the child said.

"But with a rope. And she tightened them," he added.

The child then added: "She lets me out in the morning. I'll take a bath. and then we'll see each other outside."

Vaquero told the child he would go get help. The kid started crying as he left.

Dallas police officers arrived shortly after 11pm Sunday to find landlord Esmeralda Lira, her boyfriend Jose Balderas, and two children, ages 4 and 7, in the house.

The three children are all siblings, Child Protective Services told WFAA.

Esmeralda Lira and Jose Balderas. Photo / Dallas County Jail

Vaquero then told officers that the 6-year-old boy was in the shed, before Lira eventually provided them with a key.

The boy was found "standing alone in the pitch-black shed in a blue storage bin with his hands tied behind his back with shoelaces", a warrant said.

It describes "ligature marks on both his wrists from being tied up" and "rats and insects… in the shed".

Vaquero told CBS 11 that it extremely cluttered in the shed and believed the boy only had two square feet of space to stand.

Police arrested Lira and Balderas for endangering a child. The couple are held on a bond of US$100,000 each.

Balderas confessed to police that the boy been locked in the shed every night for at least two weeks, an investigator said.

An overview of the property where the child was reportedly found. Photo / KTVT, CNN

The couple said they him locked up because he was "stealing food", police said.

But Vaquero told CBS 11 that the boy would come to him several times a week asking for food.

He said the way his landlord was treating the child "broke his up".

While living there, he said that he heard the boy being yelled at, spotted him outside alone, and witnessed him being yanked by his ear.

Vaquero said he will no longer be living on the property.