SPRINGFIELD — A 33-year-old Springfield woman was arrested after she was accused of leaving her two children home alone, while she shopped for alcoholic beverages and auto parts with a 16-year-old boy who was reported missing, court records show.
Kristen Foster, 33, was booked into the Clark County Jail on two counts of child endangering. She pleaded not guilty to the charges in court Monday.
Officers responded to Foster’s home in the 900 block of Barker Drive around 6:45 p.m. Friday after receiving a report that the missing juvenile was at the residence, according to court records.
Foster’s bond was set at $1,000.
Police responded and no one answered the door, however there appeared to be people inside, an affidavit read.
Neighbors told police Foster and the missing teen had left about 45 minutes before police arrived. Police parked down the street and spotted the vehicle returning to the home and approached the car.
Police said the teen was driving the vehicle and was trying to hide from police. The teen initially had refused to exit the car, but once the door opened police were “immediately overwhelmed by the fresh burnt odor of marijuana in the car,” according to a probable cause affidavit filed in Clark County Municipal Court.
The teen was detained for being a missing juvenile and for obstructing official business, according to documents.
Foster told police she knew the teen as being “friends through family.”
The teen told police he and Foster would “make out with each other and mess around” and also said “he was having sex with her,” according to the court documents.
Foster has not been charged with any of those allegations, court records show.
When police checked Foster’s home they found her two children inside the house and estimated they had been left alone for at least two hours.
The children were placed in the custody of their grandmother and another sibling who was living at the residence.
