JEANETTE EDMONDS (photo courtesy of Ponchatoula Police Department)
A Tickfaw woman is behind bars for allegedly abandoning her eight-year-old son inside a Ponchatoula laundromat this past Sunday. Ponchatoula Police Chief Bry Layrisson says people saw 43-year-old Jeanette Edmonds drive away without her son, and she was quickly located in Harvey and taken into custody by Jefferson Parish deputies. Layrisson says Edmonds showed no regard for the well-being of her son.
“She never acknowledged any reason for why she abandoned the child, and at no time did she ask the detectives if her son was okay,” Layrisson said.
Layrisson says that was not the first time Edmonds tried abandoning her son that day.
“She brought him to a local cemetery, where she tried to abandon him, and he was able to get back in the vehicle; and then she also brought him to a local farm, and the same thing occurred,” Layrisson explained.
The boy’s father drove down from Ruston to pick him up. Layrisson says in the more than four hours it takes to drive from Ruston to Ponchatoula, officers took care of the boy.
“We had him here for quite some time, so we went and got him some McDonald’s and put on some cartoons for him,” Layrisson said.
Layrisson says all things considered, the boy is doing well. Edmonds, meanwhile, is behind bars on three charges: One count of cruelty to juveniles, one count of child desertion and one count of criminal abandonment.
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