Patchogue toddler found drunk -- Newsday.com
UNBELIEVABLE....
Patchogue toddler found drunk
Cops charge boy’s uncle with child endangerment after 2-year-old shows 0.09 blood-alcohol level
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Jose Gomez had enough to worry about yesterday morning as his wife gave birth to their third child at Brookhaven Memorial Hospital.
When he placed his two toddlers in his cousin's care before leaving for the hospital, he didn't expect to return to find his cousin arrested for child endangerment, his 4-year-old in protective custody and his 2-year-old hospitalized for being drunk.
Gomez's wife Orbilina, 30, was still in labor that afternoon when Suffolk sheriff's deputies looking for another person in an unrelated case at Gomez's Patchogue apartment said they walked into an apartment reeking of booze. Deputies said they found Gomez's cousin, Juan Reyes, 37, at about noon, sound asleep on a bed inside while the two children -- a boy, 2, and a girl, 4 -- wandered unsupervised nearby in the room.
Deputies said that after rousing Reyes -- with some difficulty -- they found empty hard liquor bottles inside the apartment. And they discovered that Reyes was not the only occupant of the apartment who was red-eyed and staggering.
The boy, deputies said, also smelled like liquor, stumbled and looked back at them with blood-shot eyes.
Police don't know how the boy got the alcohol.
"We did check the baby's bottle, but the place reeked of alcohol, so it was hard to tell whether it was the place or the bottle that smelled," said Lt. John McGann of the Suffolk County Sheriff's Domestic Violence Unit.
Deputies would not say what kind of liquor the boy drank.
An ambulance rushed the boy to Brookhaven Memorial Hospital's emergency room, where a blood test revealed a blood alcohol content of .094 percent. He was later released from the hospital.
"In adult terms, it's above driving while intoxicated standards in New York State," said Dr. Tom Caraccio of the Long Island Poison Control Center. "I would say it's a very serious case."
Caraccio said if the boy weighed 30 pounds and had consumed 80-proof liquor, he would have needed less than a 1-ounce shot to reach this level of intoxication. Even the judge who arraigned Reyes in First District Court in Central Islip yesterday seemed shocked by the number. "Let me get this straight: This is a 2-year-old child that blew an 0-9?" Judge Joseph Santorelli said just before setting the baby-sitter's bail at $5,000 cash or $10,000 bond.
Reyes pleaded not guilty to two counts of endangering the welfare of a child, a misdemeanor, and is being held at the county jail in Riverhead.
Reyes said nothing at the arraignment. His Legal Aid Society attorney was not available for comment yesterday.
Meanwhile, the father of the children, Gomez, 37, a factory worker, said he bears his cousin no ill will.
"I can't do any more about it and I'm not worried," said Gomez. "My son is all right."
Besides, Gomez has a more pressing family concern. He has a new baby, and it's a boy.
Patchogue toddler found drunk
Cops charge boy’s uncle with child endangerment after 2-year-old shows 0.09 blood-alcohol level
=============================
Jose Gomez had enough to worry about yesterday morning as his wife gave birth to their third child at Brookhaven Memorial Hospital.
When he placed his two toddlers in his cousin's care before leaving for the hospital, he didn't expect to return to find his cousin arrested for child endangerment, his 4-year-old in protective custody and his 2-year-old hospitalized for being drunk.
Gomez's wife Orbilina, 30, was still in labor that afternoon when Suffolk sheriff's deputies looking for another person in an unrelated case at Gomez's Patchogue apartment said they walked into an apartment reeking of booze. Deputies said they found Gomez's cousin, Juan Reyes, 37, at about noon, sound asleep on a bed inside while the two children -- a boy, 2, and a girl, 4 -- wandered unsupervised nearby in the room.
Deputies said that after rousing Reyes -- with some difficulty -- they found empty hard liquor bottles inside the apartment. And they discovered that Reyes was not the only occupant of the apartment who was red-eyed and staggering.
The boy, deputies said, also smelled like liquor, stumbled and looked back at them with blood-shot eyes.
Police don't know how the boy got the alcohol.
"We did check the baby's bottle, but the place reeked of alcohol, so it was hard to tell whether it was the place or the bottle that smelled," said Lt. John McGann of the Suffolk County Sheriff's Domestic Violence Unit.
Deputies would not say what kind of liquor the boy drank.
An ambulance rushed the boy to Brookhaven Memorial Hospital's emergency room, where a blood test revealed a blood alcohol content of .094 percent. He was later released from the hospital.
"In adult terms, it's above driving while intoxicated standards in New York State," said Dr. Tom Caraccio of the Long Island Poison Control Center. "I would say it's a very serious case."
Caraccio said if the boy weighed 30 pounds and had consumed 80-proof liquor, he would have needed less than a 1-ounce shot to reach this level of intoxication. Even the judge who arraigned Reyes in First District Court in Central Islip yesterday seemed shocked by the number. "Let me get this straight: This is a 2-year-old child that blew an 0-9?" Judge Joseph Santorelli said just before setting the baby-sitter's bail at $5,000 cash or $10,000 bond.
Reyes pleaded not guilty to two counts of endangering the welfare of a child, a misdemeanor, and is being held at the county jail in Riverhead.
Reyes said nothing at the arraignment. His Legal Aid Society attorney was not available for comment yesterday.
Meanwhile, the father of the children, Gomez, 37, a factory worker, said he bears his cousin no ill will.
"I can't do any more about it and I'm not worried," said Gomez. "My son is all right."
Besides, Gomez has a more pressing family concern. He has a new baby, and it's a boy.
posted by Mom of Two Cubs | 1:34 PM
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