The Enid News and Eagle, Enid, OK

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July 18, 2008

Sitter accused of leaving boy, dogs in a car posts bond

By Cass Rains Staff Writer

A woman accused of leaving a nearly 2-year-old boy and two dogs locked a car outside a local bar posted a $20,000 bond Friday.

No charges have been filed yet against Ashley McLean, 23, who was arrested at Scooters Thursday night on complaints of child neglect/endangerment and obstructing an officer. McLean also may face possible charge of animal cruelty. According to jail records, she posted $20,000 bond about 4 p.m. Friday and was ordered to appear July 25 in Garfield County District Court for arraignment on charges in the incident.

According to a police report, Enid Police Department received a call about 12:53 a.m. to check the welfare of a child in a vehicle at Scooters, 3630 N. Van Buren. Officers found a child strapped into a car seat in “obvious distress,” along with two dogs.

The windows of the car were rolled up, and the vehicle was not running. Officers forced their way into the locked vehicle and removed the boy — then nine days short of his second birthday — from the vehicle.

The boy was crying, sweating profusely and extremely upset, police said, and an officer reported the inside of the vehicle was “extremely warm and stagnant.” The boy was taken by ambulance to an area hospital and released with no injuries and returned to his parents.

The parents had asked McLean to baby-sit the boy and told police they had no idea she had stopped at the bar.

McLean told officers several stories when they spoke with her at 1:15 a.m. but said she had “stopped by the bar to drop something off,” according to the report. McLean told police she had “tasted some friend’s drinks” while at the bar. Officers said they believed the boy and the dogs had been in the car for 20 to 50 minutes before they arrived.

While officers were speaking with McLean, Nathan McLean, 21, her estranged husband, came out of the bar and began creating a disturbance, according to report. Officers arrested him on a complaint of public intoxication.

Police said there was no evidence Nathan McLean knew of the child or dogs being left in the car.

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