A mother whose 2-year-old slipped out of the house and was locked outside in 100-degree heat while the mother slept on the couch will serve 10 days in jail.
The mother, Ashley D. Golden, 26, entered a guilty plea before General Sessions Judge Bill Locke to the charge of misdemeanor child neglect and was ordered to serve 10 days of an 11-month, 29-day sentence. She was also told to abide by a Department of Children’s Services parenting plan which has been set up for her in the wake of the incident.
She was charged when police responded to a call on Bybee Branch Road.
“I found on the front steps a 2-year-old child and no adults,” recalled McMinnville police officer Brad Cantrell. “The child was yelling and no one was responding.”
Officer Cantrell noted the child was extremely hot and sweating and the temperature at the time was around 100 degrees. The officer said he knocked on the door for about five minutes and could not get a response from the mother who was sleeping on the couch.
“When I talked to her she stated she had taken two Xanax and had gone to sleep with the child on the couch,” Cantrell stated in his warrant against Golden as the reason she did not hear her child calling from outside.