An Arkansas woman was cited on an endangerment charge after a 2-year-old girl was found walking alone, unclothed, in the middle of an intersection, police say.
Officer David Stout was flagged down around 8 a.m. Tuesday by a man who said his sister had taken a naked child to his house, according to a Jonesboro Police Department report.
The 45-year-old woman told Stout that she was awakened by a vehicle’s horn. She went outside and spoke with a driver who said she found the child walking in the middle of Center Street, the report states.
The 45-year-old reportedly told the driver that she knew where the child lived and went to the residence, but she did not get an answer when she knocked on the door. This is an ongoing problem with the child’s mother, the 45-year-old told authorities.
Stout went to the child’s home, noting that he had previously been at the French Street residence to tell the woman to get her older children out of the road.
When he knocked on the door, he heard Malarie Cheyenne McGinnis respond to him in a “muffled voice” from the back of the home.
The officer wrote that the 24-year-old walked out with “disheveled clothing" and was "rubbing her eyes,” adding that it appeared she may have been asleep. McGinnis said that she had been in the bathroom, according to the report.
She was cited on a charge of third-degree endangering the welfare of a minor and is scheduled to appear in court May 16. Police said she was released to take care of the child, but the State Police Child Abuse hotline was also called.
