Cops: Drunk parents left 2 kids alone
A Cobb County couple left their 6-day-old baby and toddler home alone when they went to a friend's place to drink alcohol, according to police.
A Kennesaw police officer responding to another call in a mobile home park on the 2600 block of South Main Street spotted a 22-month-old boy in the street, crying and yelling for his mother, around 11:45 p.m. Thursday, according to the incident report obtained by the AJC. The officer picked up the child and, while looking for the boy's parents, saw the front door of a trailer on Lot 14 open.
Inside the trailer, officers found a crying newborn in a car seat, the report states. No other adults were home.
That's when officers said the children's parents, Courtney Rene Tench and Sean Wayne Grussing, "staggered" home, smelling like alcohol, the report states. Tench, 18, initially told officers she had only been gone from home for five minutes; Grussing, 23, said it had been two minutes.
"During the course of the discussion with Tench, she changed her answer to 10 minutes, 15 minutes, 20 minutes and between 1 to 2 hours," the report states. Tench also allegedly told officers she and her two children went to a friend's trailer, where Grussing later met her, around 7 p.m., the report states.
When the children started to fall asleep, Tench said she brought them home and put them to bed between 10 and 11 p.m., according to police.
The couple agreed to alcohol tests; Tench registered at .198, and Grussing, at .223, according to the police report.
Each was arrested and charged with two misdemeanor counts of contributing to the deprivation of a minor, jail records show. Tench also was charged with underage drinking.
Tench and Grussing were transported to the Kennesaw jail and then the Cobb County jail, where they remained Tuesday evening. Each was being held on $5,000 bond, booking records show.
The children were placed in protective custody, according to police.
