Mom charged with endangerment
A mother whose child was reported missing last Friday is now in custody for neglecting her young children on what has been discovered to be numerous occasions, authorities said.
Patricia Reeves, 24, 100 Town and Country Trailer Court, Lot E-12, was arrested Thursday evening for endangering the welfare of a child, Franklin County Sheriff Shannon Oliver said.
According to Oliver, Reeves reported for four-year-old son, Isahia, missing at 5:32 p.m. on Friday, Jan. 10, after she could not find him playing outside their home where he had been earlier in the afternoon.
Oliver said in addition to many officers from the Franklin County Sheriff’s Department, officers from the Russellville Police Department, the Alabama Bureau of Investigation, the North Alabama Search Dog team and the Northwest Alabama State Trooper’s rescue helicopter were all called in to assist with the search because temperatures were below freezing and time was a crucial factor.
Hours of search efforts by all the agencies involved finally yielded a positive outcome when ABI Corp. Brian Faulkner found Isahia under a pile of brush in the woods east of the trailer park.
After registering a temperature of 92 degrees, Isahia was transported to the Russellville Hospital where he was treated for mild hypothermia and released later the next day.
According to authorities, the young boy had been wet from the snow that was still on the ground, so he was covered in ice: on his face, in his hair, and his clothes were frozen.
Officials said if the boy had not been found, he would not have survived outside all night in the sub-freezing temperatures.
Once Isahia had been found, investigators said Reeves admitted this isn’t the first time she has left her small children (ages three, four and seven) outside to play unsupervised for long periods of time.
Investigators said she also admitted to finding her children inside the trailers of people she didn’t even know.
“We didn’t arrest this lady based on one experience of losing her child,” Oliver said. “We understand that accidents happen and children can wander off.
“However, evidence has shown this has been an on-going problem and it needed to be addressed before these children were seriously injured or worse.
“The children’s safety has to come first in these kinds of situations.”
Reeves was released from jail Friday on a $1,500 bond. Her children remain in the custody of the Department of Human Resources.
Endangering the welfare of a child is a Class A misdemeanor punishable by up to a year in jail if convicted.
