On Sunday, July 9, officers responded to two separate calls during the afternoon hours regarding a young boy wandering the neighborhood unattended, without shoes, in the heat. The reporting person knew the child to live in the 900 block of S. Thorp, which is where officers contacted the 5 year-old’s mother, Yesenia Flores (35). Officers advised Flores that she needed to be aware of her son’s whereabouts.
At approximately 5:41 pm, officers received a third call regarding the same young boy being at a residence on S. Main St. The reporting person advised the young boy is oftentimes playing throughout the neighborhood all day and well into the night without supervision. Officers escorted the boy home again, and made contact with Flores. Officers asked if Flores had any other children to which she responded she had an 8-year-old daughter who was playing at a friend’s house. Officers went to that residence to make contact with the child, to which the owner’s responded they had not seen her that day. Another child indicated the daughter often played at another home in the neighborhood and directed officers there, where she was located.
At no time that the officers had contacted Flores about her children had she reacted with distress or concern, according to the officers and detectives who communicated with her. Based on police responding to the child being unattended on 3 separate occasions in one day, the child being five years of age, located out of immediate line of sight of the mother without her knowledge and her lack responsibility or concern to care for the child, and the child being located without shoes in the harsh temperatures, Yesenia Flores was taken into custody and charged with Abandonment or Abuse of a Child, a Third Degree Felony.
Child Youth and Families was contacted and the children were released to a family member.
(News release from the Hobbs Police Department)