Delaware state troopers say a 4-year-old girl passed out packets of heroin she found in her mother's backpack to her day care classmates, thinking they contained candy.

The Delaware State Police said in a news release that the girl found the bags Monday in a backpack her mom gave her to use after hers was ruined by a family pet. The pack contained 249 bags of heroin weighing 3.7 grams.

Day care providers at the Hickory Tree Child Care Center in Selbyville called police when they noticed some children with the bags.

The girl's mother is 30-year-old Ashley Tull of Selbyville. She faces charges of maintaining a drug property and endangering the welfare of a child. A woman who answered a telephone number listed to Tull said she wasn't in and hung up.

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Ceudy Gutierrez reads a book to her 2-year-old son, Matias, at their home in Buford, GA, on Tuesday, Nov. 18, 2025. Ceudy Gutierrez is struggling to make ends meet for herself and her three young kids following her husband’s ICE arrest earlier this fall. (Miguel Martinez/ AJC)

Credit: Miguel Martinez-Jimenez