ATLANTA -- A jury in Atlanta found the parents of a baby fed only a vegan diet, guilty of malice murder.

Their infant son weighed just 3 ½ pounds when he died. The boy’s parents are vegans, meaning they do not consume any animal products.

Prosecutors claimed the baby suffered a prolonged and painful death, not because of what he was fed, but because he was fed too little and that his nutritional needs were deliberately ignored by his parents.

Late Wednesday afternoon, the father of the baby told the judge that wasn’t true.

“We’re vegetarians, we are against animal cruelty, so why would I be cruel to my son? Why would I do something with his body? We are against animals being murdered, why would we be cruel to him and try to do something to his body,” asked Lamont Thomas.

27-year-old Thomas criticized the prosecution and jury after he and his wife, Jade Sanders, were found guilty of malice murder in the death of their 6-week-old son, Crown.

Prosecutors said the couple slowly starved the baby on a diet of soy milk and juice in such small quantities that he died of complications from malnourishment. The kitchen cupboards in the parents’ apartment were empty at the time.

But the father denied he caused his baby’s death.

“The fact that we named him Crown, we were proud of him. We weren’t trying to kill my son,” Thomas said in court Wednesday.

The jury convicted the couple after 5 hours of deliberations. They were also found guilty of felony murder which calls for a mandatory life prison sentence.

The grandmother spoke in court and asked the judge to show mercy to the couple.