Inset: Maribel Plaza (Lake County Sheriff’s Office). Background: Lake County Detention Center in Tavares, Florida. (Google Maps).
In a troubling case from Florida, a woman is facing legal trouble after allegedly leaving a child she was babysitting unattended. During her absence, the child reportedly consumed drugs.
Maribel Plaza, 29, has been released on bond following her arrest for child neglect. The Leesburg Police Department responded to a late-night call from UF Health Hospital in Leesburg on June 19. According to the arrest affidavit accessed by Law&Crime, a neighbor had brought the child to the hospital around 1:30 a.m.
The neighbor explained to authorities that the child appeared at their doorstep around 1 a.m., desperately asking to be taken to the hospital after a fall from a bed. The neighbor noted there were no adults present in the home with the child.
The affidavit further states that the child was initially described by the neighbor as “weak, sick, and lethargic.” Medical tests at the hospital revealed that the child had ingested THC, the psychoactive compound in marijuana.
Police said the child slept most of the time, but officers were able to contact the child’s family. A family member confirmed to police over a video call that Plaza was the sole adult put in charge of the child while they went out of state to Georgia for several days. When the child was awake, they told police that Plaza had left them alone around 10 p.m. the night before. No other adults ever came to the house to watch the child.
The affidavit said police tracked Plaza down and contacted her by phone. Plaza told police that she left the child alone believing that the family was returning later that night. She eventually admitted that she left the child at their family’s home so she could spend the night at her boyfriend’s house.
When police asked about how the child could have THC in their system, Plaza said she had put a bottle of CBD oil in the bathroom medicine cabinet and THC gummies in the freezer. Both places were accessible to the child, and Plaza denied giving any substances to the child. She told police that the child “should not know what they are.” The child was unable to tell police what substances they had consumed.
Plaza was arrested on June 19 and posted $5,000 bond later that day. She is due in court on July 13.