A Knox County stepmother was sentenced today (Friday, May 19, 2017 to 24 years in prison after being convicted of aggravated child abuse and reckless endangerment. Officers say 43-year-old Jessica Ann Cox’s two stepsons escaped from their home at 834 Canton Hollow Road in May 2013 where they had been handcuffed to a kitchen cabinet. The fourteen and sixteen-year-old victims walked to Farragut High School where school custodians called 911 and the boys were taken to East Tennessee Children’s Hospital. The children say Cox handcuffed them, deprived them of food and struck them with items like mallets and rolling pins. Also, they say they were submerged in ice baths and forced to kneel on uncooked rice.