Gouverneur Village NY Police say 19 year old Mercedes Sanderson left her seven month old son alone in his crib inside her St. Lawrence County apartment for 8 to 9 hours daily while she travelled to and from her job in Jefferson County.
Sanderson is charged with 29 misdemeanor counts of endangering the welfare of a child and one felony count of first-degree reckless endangerment.
Since the beginning of November, Sanderson allegedly had been routinely leaving her infant son, Konner Sanderson, unattended inside their North Country Communities apartment while she worked a daytime shift at Dunkin' Donuts in the town of LeRay.
"The information that she told us was that she was leaving him basically in like a crib and leaving him with a bottle and just leaving him," said Officer Laurina Greenhill of the Gouverneur Police Department.
The alleged incidents occurred while Sanderson's husband and the infant's biological father, a Fort Drum soldier, was deployed to Afghanistan.
Officer Greenhill became involved in the investigation when a caseworker made an unannounced visit to Sanderson's apartment in the housing complex last December and made a disturbing discovery.
"The child had been left in an infant swing for approximately four hours in a soiled diaper and not properly clothed," said Greenhill.
The child was taken to E.J. Noble Hospital and admitted.
He was allegedly suffering from dehydration and malnutrition.
He has since been released and is in a foster home under the custody of the county Department of Social Services Child Protective Services unit.
Police say if allowed to continue, the mother's alleged lack of judgement could have resulted in deadly consequences.
"There was basically a potential of a risk of death to the child. Obviously the child is not able to care for himself," said Greenhill.
Police said it was an unrelated incident where Sanderson allegedly left the infant unattended in a car at a Watertown gas station that eventually led to her confession to leaving the infant alone while she worked.
Mercedes Sanderson remains free on electronic home monitoring under probation supervision pending grand jury action.
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