Inset: Hashabah Yehudah (Hall County Jail). Background: Apartment complex in Oakwood, Georgia, where Yehudah”s son was allegedly found weighing 49 pounds (Google Maps).
A 44-year-old Georgia woman was arrested after cops found her 14-year-old son lying in a bed weighing just 49 pounds.
Hashabah Yehudah stands accused of second-degree child cruelty, according to the Oakwood Police Department. The investigation started on July 25 when Yehudah allegedly failed to take her son to Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta despite pleas from doctors to do so. A press release obtained by Law&Crime said officers conducted a welfare check on the boy at the apartment in the 3400 block of Peaks Circle.
According to an incident report obtained by local ABC affiliate WSB, the doctor’s office and hospital had repeatedly called the mother about getting her son medical care but she was “screening” the calls and not answering or responding to them. When officers went to the home, the boy’s brother answered the door and said he was in the bedroom. When cops saw the boy, he was “skinny and lying on a towel on the bed,” the complaint reportedly said.
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Per the press release, cops asked Yehudah why she did not take the boy to the hospital as requested. She reportedly said she wanted to get his iron up first, claiming that if she knew she he had to take him to the hospital immediately she would have.
Officers contacted Division of Family and Children Services and Children’s Healthcare and “confirmed that his health was critical and needed to be transported to the hospital immediately.”
The affidavit reportedly said that the situation was an “emergency and the child’s life is in danger.”
Cops arrested Yehudah and took her to the Hall County Jail where she remains without bond. It’s unclear if she has retained an attorney.
Neighbors said they tend to keep an eye out for the kids in the complex, but they had not seen the boy.
“I tell you, this community here is a community full of people that love and look out for each other’s kids,” neighbor D.M. Willis told WSB. “And unfortunately, it looked like one slipped through our hands and we weren’t able to see that or we weren’t aware of that.”
The boy remains in the hospital and is in the custody of child services.
