Mother 'waterboarded 13-year-old son' as punishment

The couple are also accused of abusing the boy by tying a rope around his genitals

Christi Howell has been arrested along with her partner Casey Shackleford (Police handout)

A woman and her partner have been arrested on suspicion of waterboarding her 13-year-old son, it has been reported.

Christi Howell and her boyfriend Casey Shackleford allegedly committed the offence at her home in Texas, The New York Post reports. According to an affidavit by Kaufman County police, the boy alleges that the pair pinned him down and held a towel over his face. He says that they were angry with him because he had told his mother than he had inappropriately touched the family dog.

Waterboarding is a controversial torture methods which involves simulated drowning and was technique used by US officials to question terror subjects, before being banned.

The affidavit says: “The victim said that he was able to breathe slightly if he moved his head to the side and that kept him from feeling like he was drowning.”

The child also alleges that Shackleford would slap him in the face and that a rope was tied to his genitals for “5 to 10 minutes”; resulting in cuts and rope burns.

Howell and Shackleford are being held at Kaufman County Jail and face charges of “felony injury to a child”.

The alleged victim has reportedly been placed in local foster care.