4-year-old boy found wandering alone in pond after dad fell asleep on recliner and mom ignored 'filthy' conditions in bug-infested home: Cops

Deputies in Florida found a 4-year-old boy wandering alone in a pond and then discovered he was living in a home infested with bugs and filled with animal feces, authorities said.

The child’s parents, 24-year-old Jeneixa Rodriguez-Crespo and 25-year-old Fermin Medrano-Perez, are now facing child neglect and animal cruelty charges, records show.

Neighbors called the Volusia County Sheriff’s Office around 8 a.m. Saturday after spotting the toddler wading in a DeLand pond. Deputies quickly rescued the boy when they arrived on scene. He was wearing only a diaper and splashing in the water, police body camera video showed.

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Deputies learned the boy lived nearby and went to the house. The door was “slightly ajar,” according to an arrest affidavit obtained by Law&Crime. Medrano-Perez became “frantic” when deputies told him his son was in the pond, cops wrote.

Once deputies went inside, they allegedly found “filthy conditions” which included a roach infestation, “copious” amounts of dog urine and feces and mold. Deputies also found a caged, neglected dog, they said.

Rodriguez-Crespo, who was at work, returned home.

Both parents told police they bought the home about a year ago and noticed a cockroach infestation, claiming they called an exterminator to address it. They said their dog urinates and defecates in the home, but they only clean it up “once a week,” cops wrote.

Medrano-Perez said he was watching the boy around 7:15 a.m. The boy was playing on the floor when Medrano-Perez fell asleep on the recliner. The father said he believed his wife left the door unlocked when she left for work at 6 a.m. and his son must have opened the door himself and walked outside to play.

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He had “no other explanation for the homes condition other than a full-time work schedule and the inability to keep the bug infestation at bay with the financial resources available to his family currently.”

Both parents were arrested while a grandparent came to pick up the boy. The suspects have since posted bond. Their next court dates are not listed.

The post 4-year-old boy found wandering alone in pond after dad fell asleep on recliner and mom ignored ‘filthy’ conditions in bug-infested home: Cops first appeared on Law & Crime.