A Reeston mother of four who allegedly locked her minor children inside a house and left them unattended for hours, has been charged with the attempted murder of her four-month-old baby and neglecting and abandoning her children.
According to the charge sheet, the mother, 24, was arrested at Nompumelelo township in Beacon Bay on Saturday.
This after she had disappeared from Reeston on Wednesday, the day her four children were found allegedly neglected by concerned neighbours.
She was arrested after her partner, 35, reported a case of child abandonment and neglect at the Scenery Park police station on Wednesday last week.
He reported the matter to police after he was summoned from work to the scene by concerned neighbours on Wednesday afternoon.
The couple have four children – three boys aged seven, five and four months, and a two-year-old girl.
The state alleges that the young mother’s partner was called by neighbours who heard the children crying inside the locked house.
When the father finally arrived, hours later, he used a grinder to cut through the padlock on the door to free the children.
The woman was found by police three days later in Nompumelelo, where she was arrested.
On Monday, she made her first appearance at the East London magistrate’s court, facing charges of child neglect and abandonment.
Later, the state indicated to magistrate Rochelle Sam that they were now adding to her rap sheet a new charge of attempted murder.
The state argued that the infant could have died inside the locked house.
The woman made her second court appearance at the bail court on Wednesday to apply for bail but the matter was postponed to Thursday.
Speaking to the Daily Dispatch outside court on Wednesday, the partner confirmed he had opened a case against the woman and that they had had a minor argument.
“But I have since met up with her family and discussed the matter.
“I have now forgiven her and we also sorted out our differences out,” he said...