Inset: Kayla M. Christensen (Newton County Jail). Background: The Missouri truck stop where Christensen allegedly abandoned her 4-year-old daughter (Google Maps).
A Missouri woman is accused of abandoning her 4-year-old daughter at a truck stop in the middle of the night, then telling police she did not have a daughter.
Kayla Marie Christensen was taken into custody last week and charged with one count of first-degree child abandonment and two counts of first-degree child endangerment, court records show.
In a criminal complaint filed in Newton County, Missouri, prosecutors allege Christensen left the girl at a Love”s Travel Stop before dawn on Oct. 23.
The investigation began shortly before 3 a.m. Friday, when officers with the Neosho Police Department responded to a report of a young child alone in the travel stop’s parking lot.
Police said Christensen intentionally left the 4-year-old at the truck stop and did not plan to return for her.
As she allegedly drove away from her daughter, Christensen had her two other young children, both boys, in the car with her, police said. At the time, she allegedly did not have either child properly restrained in car seats, and both were in close proximity to “suspected drug paraphernalia,” according to police, which led to the endangerment charges.
The paraphernalia allegedly included syringes. Police said that driving under such circumstances “created a substantial risk of injury not only to the children but also to other motorists and members of the public,” according to the affidavit.
Police also said that when officers tracked her down and asked about the 4-year-old, Christensen claimed her only children were the two boys. The affidavit refers to the girl as “JV1.”
“As [the victim’s] mother and person legally responsible for her care, [Christensen] left four-year-old JV1 with the purpose of wholly abandoning her under circumstances likely to result in serious physical injury or death, as evidenced by knowingly driving away, failing to return, and later denying that she had a daughter,” the affidavit states.
After the alleged abandonment, Christensen allegedly left her two sons inside her car while she went into a casino in Wyandotte, Kansas, according to a report from Joplin, Missouri, news radio station KZRG. There did not appear to be any record of Christensen being arrested in Wyandotte County as of Oct. 26.
Records show Christensen was arrested on the night of Oct. 23, but she did not appear to be in custody as of Oct. 27. It was not immediately clear when she was scheduled to appear in court.
