Mom left three kids home alone in Ohio to jet off to Florida ‘for friend’s liposuction surgery’
Cops found ‘garbage, bins and bags were strewn all over the floor’
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An Ohio mother has been convicted of endangering her children after leaving them to go on vacation in Miami.
Dominique Knowles was charged with two counts of endangering children earlier this month. She had left her 7-year-old twin daughters with her 10-year-old daughter for three days in February to go to Florida, a judge ruled this week.
A teacher concerned about the children’s wellbeing requested a welfare check. Once officers arrived at Knowles’ apartment of February 22, they found the unit in “disarray.”
“Garbage, bins and bags were strewn all over the floor,” court records state. The children told an officer they did not have a cellphone to contact their mother but she had been communicating with them through Nest cameras located around the unit and FaceTime on a MacBook tablet.
The tablet was not charged or operational once officers arrived at the unit.
Officers arrested Knowles after she returned. During a police interview, she told a detective she was not out of state but declined to say where she had been.
However, police subpoenaed her cell phone records that showed she made or received 50 calls in Florida between February 21 to February 23. Detectives interviewed the woman’s mother and friend. They said she never told them about her plans to travel to Florida.
Westlake Law Director Michael Maloney said Knowles told police she was traveling to Miami to support her friend undergoing liposuction surgery, according to WKYC.
At her sentencing hearing on Wednesday, Knowles said: “I understand what I did was wrong and this absolutely would never happen again. I did believe my kids were able to dress themselves and get themselves to school. I wouldn’t dare let anything happen to my kids. I wish I could go back and change the circumstances.”
She opted against having a jury trial and was found guilty by Judge Joseph T Burke of the Rocky River Municipal Court.
“Something bad could’ve happened to the children, they could have started a fire in the apartment, they could have hurt themselves or suffered a medical emergency or they could have been taken by a stranger,” Burke wrote in a bench verdict.
“But most of all, they needed their mother to be there and parent them and not do so by remote cameras from Florida.”
Knowles was sentenced to five years of probation and ordered to attend a parenting class and mental health counseling. She was given $800 in fines and 360 days of house arrest. She will be allowed to leave for work, according to WJW.
“I don’t want to further victimize your daughters by separating you from them,” Burke told Knowles in court on Wednesday. “It is now time for you to become the mother that your daughters deserve, need and require.”