Two charges against the two Escambia County Public Schools employees who were arrested fornot reporting alleged child abuse of a 14-year-old by her parents, instead hiding her from them, are dropped.
Prosecutors will not move forward with charges offailure to report suspected child abuse and resisting arrest without violence, according to a report.
The women are now only charged with interfering with the custody of a minor, the report says.
ORIGINAL STORY — 1:31 P.M.
ESCAMBIA COUNTY, Fla. — Two Escambia County Public Schools employees arrested for not reporting alleged child abuse of a 14-year-old by her parents to law enforcement — but instead hiding her from her parents in an apartment, according to an arrest report.
Arielle Rice, 33, and Ashley Anderson, 32, were both arrested on Sept. 1 on these charges:
- interfering with child custody
- failure to report child abuse
- obstructing law enforcement
The incident happened on Aug. 31 when police were called to Roger Scott Athletic Complex around 8 p.m. for a possible missing juvenile.
According to the report, the parents of a 14-year-old girl told police they all arrived at the park around 2 p.m. for a football game. The mother last saw the girl at the bleachers in the middle of the park around 3:30 p.m. Witnesses said they saw the girl with Rice at the football game.
The report states police executed a location ping on the girl’s phone. It pinged to the Northwoods Apartments on E Olive Road, where Rice lives.
According to the report, police arrived at the complex and made contact with Anderson, who said she is Rice’s roommate. Police asked to search their apartment for the girl, but Anderson did not allow it without a search warrant.
A short time later, Rice — who was in Warrington — called Anderson’s phone and spoke with police, according to the report. She said she hadn’t seen the girl since the football game and didn’t know where she was.
The report states Anderson eventually gave police consent to search the apartment. But before they could enter, Rice called back and said she had accidentally taken the girl’s phone from the park and that it was inside the apartment.
According to the report, Anderson withdrew her consent for police to search the apartment. Rice then arrived on scene.
“Because of Rice’s and Ashley’s nervousness, changing stories, current admission that [the girl’s] phone was in the apartment, and the unusual circumstances surrounding the disappearance of [the girl], [police] feared for her safety and entered the apartment to search for her,” officers wrote in the report.
The report states police found the girl hiding in a closet in the hallway. Rice, Anderson and the girl were all transported to the station for further investigation.
According to the report, Rice and Anderson both admitted to taking the girl without the parents’ approval and hiding her in their apartment.
“They did not want to give custody of [the girl] back to the parents or law enforcement because they had knowledge of child abuse committed on her in the past by her parents,” officers noted in the report.
According to the report, they both said the parents “allegedly had punched or choked [the girl] over approximately the last year and never reported it to law enforcement.”
“They said that on more than one occasion, they had seen bruising as well as injuries that caused [the girl] to limp,” officers noted in the report.
The report states Anderson and Rice admitted to failing to report the “injuries/incidents” to law enforcement.
“It should be noted that these abuse allegations are currently under investigation,” officers noted in the report.
Following their arrests, Rice and Anderson were both released from Escambia County Jail on Sept. 1 on $5,500 bond.
Escambia County Public Schools tells WEAR News that Rice and Anderson — who are employed as support personnel — are both currently suspended without pay pending the outcome of the investigation.
This is a developing story
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Source: weartv
