A woman was arrested Thursday after police said several children at her in-home day care in Griffin were injured.
Connie Banks Pound, 61, is charged with multiple counts of aggravated battery, cruelty to children and battery, the Spalding County Sheriff’s Office confirmed. Authorities did not say how many children were injured, but Griffin police spokeswoman Officer Laurie Littlejohn confirmed that “reports, along with other collected evidence,” led to Pound’s arrest.
Pound’s day care, which is located in the 800 block of Hanover Drive and has been operating since 1995, was in good standing as recently as Aug. 8, Georgia Department of Early Care and Learning records show. At the time of the visit, DECAL records show eight children were present.
Agency spokesman Reg Griffin said they were alerted of the allegations against Pound on July 27, but it wasn’t until she was charged that the day care was closed.
“Due to her arrest, the owner will not be allowed to operate a family child care learning home while we continue our investigation of the allegations against her,” Griffin told The Atlanta Journal-Constitution.
The delay between DECAL learning of the allegations and the eventual closure of the day care was because no charges had been filed until recently, Griffin said.
“With the multitude of charges — I mean there were multiple charges filed by the Griffin Police Department. Based on their investigation and the arrest, we were able to tell her to stop operating,” he added.
Griffin said there had been a couple of reports in the past few years involving Pound’s day care, but “none of those were substantiated.” He did not specify anything about those reports. Records dating to September 2018 show that the day care was operating in good standing.
Macy Jones, the mother of a child who attended the day care, told Channel 2 Action News that her daughter came home multiple times with bruises since 2020. She said she opened a case against Pound recently after new evidence surfaced.
“Had a lot of black eye, a lot of bruised faces, and it was enough to finally charge her this time,” Jones said.
The mother told the news station she filed her first complaint two years ago after her child came home with a black eye. A month later, Jones said she got a call from the day care that her daughter had fallen and a doctor’s visit revealed her daughter’s tibia had snapped.
DECAL’s investigation will continue alongside Griffin police.
Pound received a bond of $125,000 and was released from the Spalding County Jail.
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