One pleads guilty, one heading to trial in freezing children case
LETHBRIDGE – Two women accused of leaving their children in a locked and freezing car last December while they went to the bar, took their cases in very different directions in court Friday morning (Oct. 20).
The 31-year-old and 25-year-old mothers cannot be named to protect the identity of the two children involved.
The 25-year-old appeared in person in court to enter a guilty plea to a charge of failing to provide the necessaries of life.
In an agreed statement of facts read out by the Crown, a civilian called the Lethbridge Police Service at 11:25 p.m. on Dec. 15, 2016, after hearing a baby crying in a locked and shut-off vehicle parked along the 200 block of 5 Street South. Officers arrived on scene immediately, and smashed one of the front windows out of a white SUV, after it was identified by the witness. Inside they found a three-year-old girl who was crying and cold to the touch.