NOT mother of the year
Mom arrested after toddler abandoned in Orlando woods
Associated Press
Posted March 11 2005, 10:49 AM EST
ORLANDO -- A 3-year-old girl survived frigid temperatures after being abandoned in the woods when her mother's car ran out of gas in south Orange County, authorities said.
The child, whose body temperature had dropped to 84 degrees, and her 5-month-old sister were treated early Thursday at St. Cloud Hospital and turned over to the state Department of Children & Families, said Cpl. Carlos Torres of the Orange County Sheriff's Office.
The child's mother, Krissy Deshay Glover, 21, of Apopka, was arrested on a charge of child neglect and was being held without bond in the Orange County Jail, Torres said Friday. She had not yet made her first court appearance and there was no information immediately available on whether she had an attorney.
``There is a lot of inconsistencies in her story, but she knew right from wrong,'' Torres said.
Glover told police she was headed to Tampa about 3 a.m. Tuesday with her two daughters when she ran out of gas in some woods near Orlando International Airport.
At the time, it was raining, temperatures had dropped into the 40s and the wind was blowing about 20 mph, according to weather reports.
Glover left the car with her two children, leaving their jackets in the car, and forced the 3-year-old to walk barefoot beside her as she carried the infant, Torres said. She left the 3-year-old behind when she became too weak to walk farther.
At about 4 a.m., she knocked on the door of Bryan and Christa Carter, about three miles from her car. While his wife, Christa bathed the infant in warm water, Bryan Carter and Glover rushed out and found the 3-year-old about a quarter-mile from Carter's house.
``She was very weak, very cold, in a hypothermic state. She was just kind of grunting and laying there face down on the ground,'' said Carter, a physician's assistant who specializes in emergency medicine and vascular surgery.
According to the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta, a body temperature below 86 degrees is severe hypothermia and life-threatening.
Authorities don't know why she passed several houses and trailer parks to get to the Carter's home.