Police: Mother charged after leaving 4 young children home alone alt=Police: Mother charged after leaving 4 young children home alone width=470 height=259]
Evelyn Smith - Police say Smith left her four young children home alone WHAS11.com Posted on September 8, 2011 at 10:30 AM
Updated today at 5:22 PM Louisville, Ky. (WHAS11) - Police say four children under the age of five were left home alone for hours.
Neighbors say it was not an isolated incident and police say, along with the kids, they found crack cocaine in the home.
Police say it's one of the most troubling cases of child abandonment they've seen in quite some time.
They say the mother actually left her 5-year-old child to babysit while she was gone for several hours.
And neighbors tell WHAS11 it wasn't the first time
Inside an apartment on Quest Drive last Thursday, police say they found four children left abandoned in harm's way.
“A 2-year-old that was naked and had feces over the body,” said LMPD Spokesperson Dwight Mitchell. “There was a 1-year-old child in a diaper playing with a fork. And what appeared to be a bone of a pork chop that had a very sharp edge.”
A warrant says a 5-year old was left in charge.
The warrant says the children were eating cereal off the floor and could not tell officers their mother's name or the names or phone numbers of any relatives.
While officers were searching for contact information, they say they found suspected crack cocaine in a shoebox on the refrigerator.
Police took the children to the Home of the Innocents last week, but their mother, 25-year-old Evelyn Smith, never inquired about their whereabouts until she was arrested Wednesday, when she showed up for court on another charge.
The neighbor who called 911 told WHAS11 off camera that the children have no beds, frequently roam the neighborhood unattended in diapers or pajamas and had been abandoned often in the past.
“It's a very serious situation. Fortunately for these children, there was someone who saw this injustice and called us. We were able to get there before any further damage had been done,” said Mitchell.
Other neighbors were stunned by the allegations.
“They can get into all kinds of stuff when you're in the house. Especially that many of them that young, to be left alone for a long time,” said neighbor Channing Banks.
“A 5-year-old, they can barely talk to you, hold a conversation,” said Joshua Johnson.
Nobody was at home at the apartment Thursday.
Police say the children remain in protective custody, while authorities consider additional charges.
Smith was placed on diversion back in July for her participation in an organized check fraud ring last year.
As part of that deal, she was allowed to stay out of jail if she stayed out of trouble for two years.
This latest arrest will likely violate conditions of her diversion.
