A Pittsburgh mother was charged Tuesday with child endangerment after police said they found four naked children \u201ccovered in dirt\u201d in her \u201cdeplorable\u201d Stanton Heights home \u2014 and two of them burst into celebration when they mistook an officer shining a flashlight on the ceiling for the sun.<\/p>\n
Officers were dispatched around 3:05 p.m. to 211 Schenley Manor Dr. for \u201can abuse call.\u201d<\/p>\n
Inside the two-story duplex of Koreya Washington, 26, police found walls covered in feces \u201cand other unknown dried liquids\u201d and a fridge storing only spoiled food, according to a criminal complaint. \u201cDirt, trash and food scraps\u201d covered both floors in the house.<\/p>\n
It appeared Washington and the children \u2014 who \u201chad a horrendous smell,\u201d police said \u2014 had not bathed in days, according to the complaint. Bedrooms were furnished with dirty mattresses \u2014 without sheets, covers or blankets, police said.<\/p>\n
The children, whose names and ages were not provided by police, were taken to UPMC Children\u2019s Hospital of Pittsburgh for evaluation. They arrested Washington on four counts of endangering the welfare of children.<\/p>\n
Washington was arraigned Wednesday and released on nonmonetary bail, court records show. Her attorney was not listed Thursday in court records.<\/p>\n
A city social worker told police he \u201cwas familiar with Washington\u201d and previously tried to get her services, the complaint said. But Washington, he said, had declined.<\/p>\n
A Schenley Manor Drive neighbor told police this week they \u201chave never seen the children outside of the house,\u201d the complaint said.<\/p>\n
Two of the oldest children told Sgt. Aaron Conner they were hungry, the complaint said. When he showed them his flashlight on the ceiling, \u201cthey started to scream for joy and dance, calling it the sun.\u201d<\/p>\n
Washington told police her boyfriend \u201cdoesn\u2019t allow her to leave the house\u201d or clean it, and that there are \u201congoing domestic violence issues,\u201d the complaint said.<\/p>\n
Police did not elaborate in the complaint.<\/p>\n
Washington also \u201cconflicted herself,\u201d according to police, by telling authorities that her boyfriend is not often home.<\/p>\n
The mother \u201ccontinued to blame her situation on everyone except herself\u201d and told police \u201cthat nothing should happen to mothers who don\u2019t care for their children if the mother is a victim of domestic violence.\u201d<\/p>\n
Workers for Allegheny County\u2019s Office of Children, Youth and Families planned to meet with the children at the hospital, police said.<\/p>\n
Washington\u2019s preliminary hearing is scheduled for Aug. 28. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A Pittsburgh mother was charged Tuesday with child endangerment after police said they found four naked children \u201ccovered…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":264810,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[73,75,74],"class_list":["post-264809","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-pittsburgh","tag-pittsburgh","tag-pittsburgh-headlines","tag-pittsburgh-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/264809","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=264809"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/264809\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/264810"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=264809"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=264809"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=264809"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}