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A 43-year-old mother from Louisiana was taken into custody on Sunday after she left her 8-year-old son at a laundromat in Ponchatoula and traveled 60 miles away to another town across Lake Pontchartrain, on the opposite side of New Orleans.
Ponchatoula Police Department revealed that this was not Jeannette Edmonds’ first attempt that day to abandon her son. More details emerged following her arrest.
Local authorities were alerted shortly after 2 p.m. when a concerned citizen reported witnessing a woman leaving the child at the laundromat and driving away.
Edmonds was eventually found in Harvey, where Jefferson Parish deputies apprehended her.
Ponchatoula Police Chief Bry Layrisson informed the Louisiana Radio Network that the boy remained at the police station “for quite some time” until his father was located and came to pick him up. Layrisson noted that when Edmonds was found, she displayed a lack of concern for her son’s well-being.
“She never acknowledged any reason for why she abandoned the child, and at no time did she ask the detectives if her son was okay,” Layrisson said.
Earlier in the day, the sheriff said, Edmonds had twice tried to abandon the boy.
“She brought him to a local cemetery, where she tried to abandon him, and he was able to get back in the vehicle; and then she also brought him to a local farm, and the same thing occurred,” Layrisson said.
Edmonds has been charged with cruelty to juveniles, child desertion, and criminal abandonment.
Law&Crime said Edmonds was being held without bond, but she was no longer listed in jail records as of Wednesday evening.